Grant Bartucci, associate director of corporate access and broker relations at Point72 Asset Management, talks to IR Magazine about meeting efficiency, issuer communication and the return to in-person engagement.
How big is the corporate access team at Point72 and when was it created?
It’s a team of four in total but that includes my part of the group, which is two people and is heavily focused on direct interactions with companies. The other side of the team focuses more on the sell-side corporate access we consume. We talk to each other every day as a full team and we’re continually working together – corporate access isn’t in a vacuum, whether we consume it through the sell side or directly. We ultimately want to make sure every interaction is meaningful from our side and the company side.
How does corporate access work at Point72? Does it all go through your team, or can issuers expect inquiries to come through both your team and portfolio managers/analysts?
It’s a bit of both. Not everything comes through our team. A big part of what we do is to make sure we have relationships with companies either through our team or directly through the investment professionals. We have a lot of analysts and portfolio managers who have seasoned relationships with management teams and the last thing I would want to do is step into that relationship. Companies can hear from me directly or from a portfolio manager or analyst they’ve known for a number of years.
Has there been an increase in inbound meeting requests from IR teams and issuers in general?
Our situation is somewhat unique in that we’re so active in our outreach. We will get inbounds from companies we speak to a lot because they know we will want to reach out to them, but I wouldn’t say there’s been an increase in inbound. The most inbounds are from small caps that are trying to get their story out – perhaps a newer public company or a company at a new market cap level that’s doing targeting on its own. For the most part we’re the initiator of the outreach but we do welcome inbounds.
When did you join Point72 and how has corporate access changed since?
I started my role in corporate access in 2015. That was really our first foray into having a dedicated resource on behalf of outreach to companies. Part of that was preparing for the onset of Mifid II, which was a big part of the discussion at the time, but it wasn’t only that. It was a decision to invest the time and resources to make sure we have great relationships. We’ve always had those relationships through our portfolio managers and analysts, but we wanted to institutionalize that.
What’s changed in corporate access since the Covid-19 outbreak?
The big one is that everything is forced into the virtual setting. In terms of the interactions themselves, I think it’s probably opened up the lines of communication more. You’d think you might lose a lot of that communication with everyone working remotely and in their own silo. But public companies have been very active in making sure the lines of communication were open from the beginning. In the early days of Covid, companies didn’t know what was going on, but they made sure they were still speaking to investors. That was something we’re very thankful for and value highly.
The virtual setting has its pros and cons. It’s largely been more efficient in terms of the number of meetings you can host and the number of people who can and do attend. Overall, however, the value of corporate access hasn’t changed. It’s still a hugely important part of our process.
To what extent have you been able to get more representatives from Point72 involved in meetings during Covid-19?
It’s been easier to do that. We can set up the meetings and make sure we’re co-ordinated internally. We know companies are even more inundated now with requests and the best we can do is make sure they’re as efficient as they can be.
In addition, we’ve had situations where we get more of our teams in the meeting – which means we get an hour, rather than 30 minutes.
This is an extract of an article that was published in the Spring 2021 issue of IR Magazine. Click here to read the full article.
