New data from the Association of Investment Companies (AIC) shows that 2024 has been a record year for share buybacks by investment trusts, with £6.95 billion of shares repurchased in the first 11 months of the year, according to the latest figures from Winterflood.

This compares to buybacks of £3.9 billion during 2023 – the previous record.

The total assets of investment trusts assets were £271 billion at the end of November, an increase of 4% from £260 billion at the beginning of the year.

Investment trusts paid out a total of £5.99 billion in dividends in the first 11 months of 2024.

Fundraising by existing investment trusts — called secondary fundraising — totalled £804 million, down from £1.1 billion last year.

There were no investment trust IPOs in 2024.

There were a total of 10 mergers between investment trusts in 2024, five liquidations, and 32 investment trusts changed their fees to benefit shareholders as boards continued to respond to deep discounts.

The number of mergers completed in the year was twice the number completed in 2021 (five), which was the previous record. Six investment trusts were acquired during 2024.

A total of 32 investment trusts changed their fees during the year to benefit shareholders, compared to 26 in 2023. Two manager changes took place in 2024.

The discount of the average investment trust excluding 3i was 13.7% at the beginning of the year, widening to 15.2% by December 12, 2024.

AIC CEO Richard Stone said: “Discounts have remained wide this year, prompting boards to take action. We’ve seen a record number of mergers, record share buybacks and 32 investment trusts have cut their fees.

“So far this century, investment trusts have weathered the financial crisis, the dotcom boom and bust and a global pandemic.

“As we look forward to 2025, we will continue to see the investment trust industry innovate and adapt to meet investors’ needs.”

The average investment trust generated a share price total return of 14.8% in 2024 (to 6 December).

The best performing sector was Growth Capital with a 48.4%return, followed by Private Equity (41.7%), Technology & Technology Innovation (33.3%), Leasing (30.5%), Debt – Structured Finance (21.6%), Global (19.5%),India / Indian Subcontinent (16.7%), North America (15.7%), Asia Pacific Equity Income (15.0%) and Debt – Loans & Bonds (13.8%).

Tritax Big Box REIT’s merger with UK Commercial Property REIT was the largest merger in 2024, creating a company with total assets of £6.1 billion.

This was followed by the merger of Dundee-based Alliance Trust and Witan Investment Trust, which completed in October bringing together total assets of £5.7 billion. The combined company, Alliance Witan, will join the FTSE 100 index on December 23.

An additional merger has been proposed between Asia Dragon and Invesco Asia to form Invesco Asia Dragon. If approved, it is expected to complete in the first quarter of 2025.