Monitor
Private Capital Monitor 17/11
17th November 2023
WORTH A READ
Europe
In the Financial Times, Ivan Levingston and George Hammond highlight Resurge Growth Partners, a company focused on acquiring startups to facilitate a turnaround. The company expects to make average investments ranging from €10 million to €30 million.
At the Financial Times Future of Asset Management Europe conference, Nick Moakes, chief investment officer of the £38bn Wellcome Trust (one of the world’s largest charitable foundations, focused on health research) argued years of low interest rates have attracted a wave of “tourist capital” into private equity, warning this “shakeout” could result in painful losses for ill-informed investors.
New Private Markets features The Private Markets Decarbonisation Roadmap, a collaborative tool by Initiative Climat International, PESMIT, and Bain & Co. Designed for private fund managers, it offers a unified language, classification, and measurement system, streamlining the decarbonization of portfolios with a standardised approach. The roadmap can be read here.
United States
The presence of outside consultants causes pension funds to change the benchmarks used to identify successful investments, and beating or missing these expectations can affect how funds determine their asset allocations, writes Institutional Investor. Benchmarks have become easier to beat over time, which pads consultants’ pockets and allows them to help manage more assets.
While base pay for private equity professionals has generally grown this year, bonuses are expected to be lower than in past years due in large part to the current fundraising slump. Additionally, experts anticipate overall growth in compensation to flatten next year as hiring demand wanes.
BlackRock and other large US investment firms are creating funds to aide the Ukrainian reconstruction effort, according to MarketWatch. The funds will be established across sectors of the economy, including logistics, real estate, and agriculture.
WALL OF MONEY
PAI Partners closes new $7.6 billion fund, surpassing target
The French buyout group has raised 7.1 billion euros ($7.59 billion) for its latest fund, surpassing its target despite difficulties in drawing new money by private equity groups.
BlackRock holds first close of Evergreen Infrastructure Fund at $1bn
BlackRock has held the first close of its Evergreen Infrastructure Fund with client commitments of over $1bn from European founding partners. The fund has already begun to commit capital.
L Squared Capital Partners closes fourth PE fund at $840m
The firm has held the final closing for its fourth private equity fund (Fund IV) with $840m of capital commitments, taking the total raised by the firm from investors since its launch in July 2014 to over $2bn.
DEAL CHART
| Acquisition Target | Buyer | Seller | Value | Date | Region | Sector |
| Cyxtera | Brookfield Infrastructure Partners | – | $775 million | 2-Nov | US | Data Centre Services |
| Strutural Building Components LLC | HB Capital | – | – | 1-Nov | US | Structural Construction |
| Ascential Digital Commerce | Omnicom Group | Ascential | $900 million | 30-Oct | UK | Information and Analytics |
| Ascential Consumer Research (WGSN) | Apax Partners | Ascential | £700 million | 30-Oct | UK | Information and Analytics |
| Entergy Gas Distribution | Bernhard Capital Partners | Entergy | $484 million | 30-Oct | US | Energy |
| Alerce | Oakley Capital | – | – | 30-Oct | Spain | Transport Management Software |
| Profi Rom Food SRL | Koninklijke Ahold Delhaize | Mid Europa Partners | €1.3 billion | 30-Oct | Romania | Grocery Retail |
| Dollar Shave Club | Nexus Capital Management | Unilever | – | 26-Oct | US | Grooming |
| Christine McVie’s Fleetwood Mac royalties | Harbourview Equity Partners | The Estate of Christine McVie | – | 26-Oct | US | Music |
MEDIA OF THE WEEK
Lina Khan Is Sending a Message to the Private Equity Industry
Listen to the podcast here
MOVERS AND SHAKERS
- Brookfield Asset Management has opened a new office in Frankfurt, Germany. Brookfield manages over €25 billion of assets across sectors in Germany and employs over 4,000 people in the region.
- ArcLight Capital Partners, has appointed Andrew L Ott, former President and CEO of PJM Interconnection, as a Senior Advisor to focus on new investment opportunities in the power, infrastructure, and energy transition sectors.
- CoVenture Management, an alternative asset management firm focused on direct credit opportunities and credit-oriented investments in early and late-stage companies, has appointed Graham Kohan as a Managing Director in the firm’ hybrid capital team.
HORSE’S MOUTH
[Tristan Nagler, a partner at Aurelius comment on the beauty market in response to Aurelius’s acquisition of The Body Shop from Natura] “It’s still quite bricks and mortar…The whole industry is lagging a little bit and there is no great reason for that.”
“No one is willing to send the hard message of saying this needs a reset, and that will be the role that we play.” – Oren Peleg, Founder of Resurge Growth Partners on the reason for founding a business purely to help companies transition from venture ownership to private equity ownership.
“My own definition of leadership is this: The capacity and the will to rally men and women to a common purpose and the character which inspires confidence.” – Bernard Law Montgomery1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, a British army officer who fought in both world wars, born on this day in 1887.
