Now Chapelthorpe is in Swede’s sights

SECRETIVE Swedish investor Peter Gyllenhammar is building a stake in yet another Yorkshire quoted company.

The wealthy businessman has increased his shareholding in fibres and coatings firm Chapelthorpe to more than 15%.

Mr Gyllenhammar, a Swedish corporate financier, has acquired a reputation for building stakes in under-valued Yorkshire quoted companies including Leeds Group, Yorkshire Group and Jarvis Porter.

Now Wakefield-based Chapelthorpe has been added to his portfolio and he increased his stake to 15.7% in the company yesterday after buying almost 400,000 shares.

That takes his stake to 3.2m shares in Chapelthorpe, which has a current share price of 22.75p valuing the business at £4.64m.

He has a reputation of taking significant stakes in under-valued companies with the aim of influencing the management, rather than taking them over.

Mr Gyllenhammar is a non-executive director of Leeds Group, the textile business which recently bought a significant stake in cashmere business Dawson International.

The Yorkshire group, which was established as a textile business more than a century ago, paid almost £1m for a 28.76% stake in loss-making AIM-listed Dawson International which is based in Scotland.

Mr Gyllenhammar is a reclusive individual who prides himself on the fact that the last known public photograph of him was taken more than 20 years ago.