Ex 3i plc Media Sector Partner Joins The Guitar Fund Management Team With Anchorage Capital Partners Ltd.

Ex 3i plc Media Sector Partner Joins The Guitar Fund Management Team With Anchorage Capital Partners Ltd.

LONDON, July 21/PRNewswire/ -- Anchorage Capital Partners ("ACP") (a Mercantile Investment
Group company) announced today that David Noble has joined the management
team of The Guitar Fund, which plans on investing $100 million into the rare
and vintage guitar market. Mr. Noble, previously a Sector Partner in 3i's
media division, one of the largest private equity firms in the world, is a
semi-professional luthier and a very established vintage guitar collector
with a wide knowledge base and experience in appraising and procuring
valuable instruments. Tommy Byrne, ACP's Co-Founder and Chief Investment
Officer of the Fund said, "We are extremely pleased to have David join our
team. He brings both an in-depth knowledge of vintage guitars and a sound
strategic investment mindset to the management team."

"I am very excited to be involved with such an innovative
investment strategy", Mr. Noble said, "This is absolutely the best time to
establish such a non-correlated fund. Even in this credit crunched
environment, vintage guitars and collectibles in general are benefiting from
the rapid expansion of wealth worldwide". Mr. Byrne added, "Christies
International has just reported a 10% increase in auctions and private sales
of art and collectibles for the first half of this year, an increase driven
by new buyers from the Middle East, Russia and Asia. In other words we see
the supply of the rare and vintage guitar market declining as the number of
buyers grows internationally."

According to ACP, the vintage guitar market has comfortably
outperformed traditional markets by a large margin. The 42 Guitar Index, an
index created by Vintage Guitar magazine in 1991 to track the price action of
mid-range vintage guitars, has shown an average annual return of over 31%
without experiencing a single down year.

The Fund also benefits from an advisory board of guitar
experts, investment managers and professional musicians, one of whom is
Elliott Randall, best known for his lead guitar work with the band Steely Dan
on mega-hits including Reelin' In the Years. Another professional musician on
the Board, Robbin Thompson, once the lead singer for the Bruce Springsteen
band Steel Mill, commented, "Bringing David on board, adds more depth and
strength to an already impressive management team, who are thinking outside
the box."

Source: Anchorage Capital Partners Ltd

Tommy Byrne, email: tbyrne@anchorage-capital.com, Dir. +44(0)20-7409-0711, Mob. +44(0)788-777-3300

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