Neil Woodford’s former team of stock pickers disbanded when demand for British shares plummets

The dissolution of the investment team led by Neil Woodford, whose London-listed stocks have been losing interest.

Invesco will merge its European division with its UK-based stock-picking unit from January.

As investor interest in British stocks declines, the teams are merging.

The Invesco UK High Income and Equity Income funds have shrunk from £33bn to £6,86bn since Mr Woodfood took over their management.

Mr Woodford became a stock-picking star at Perpetual in the early 2000s, before it was acquired by Invesvo. He chose tobacco stocks that were not in fashion but paid a consistent dividend.

In 2013, Mr Woodford launched his own fund after raising £1.6bn.

Woodford Investment Management however, who adopted a more risky strategy, failed to sell its assets fast enough to meet the surge of withdrawal requests by investors.

Mr Woodford’s role in the scandal has been heavily criticized since.

Invesco UK’s current team includes seven fund managers led by Martin Walker. Walker will also co-run the new department located in Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire.

John Surplice is the co-head of European Equities at Invesco. He said: “The teams have worked together for many years and they share many resources in order to maximize their intellectual property, both at fund management level and at analyst level.

We are just formalising our collaborative approach.

Invesco’s closure of its UK-focused unit is a reflection of the wider distaste among investors for UK shares following Brexit. Invesco’s active funds have also been affected by the popularity of low-cost trackers.

The FTSE 100 is awash with big-name technology companies. Last year, Arm, the chip maker, chose to list in New York instead of London. This reflects the lack of large tech firms on the FTSE 100. has moved other London-listed companies such as CRH, Paddy Power’s owner Flutter Entertainment and others to the New York Stock Exchange.