BlackFin Capital Partners, a leading European financial services sector investment specialist, has held the final close of BlackFin Financial Services Fund IV with €1.8bn, taking the firm’s total assets under management to $4bn.
The fund, which attracted strong support from institutional investors in Europe (45%), the Americas (45%), and Asia (10%), significantly exceeds an initial €1.5bn target, and provides the firm with 80% more capital to deploy than its predecessor €985m Fund III.
The fundraising attracted support from both existing investors, with a re-up rate of 100% and from 25 new relationships. BlackFin’s global base of LPs is well diversified and includes Public Pension Funds, Sovereigns, Fund of Funds, Insurance & Asset Managers, Endowments and Family Offices.
Fund IV will continue BlackFin’s highly successful strategy of investing across asset-light financial services subsegments. Insurance brokerage and processing platforms, wealth-management and financial advisory, asset management, payments, and financial software or processing providers benefit from significant tailwinds, such as increasing demand from financial consumers for advice, new technologies, and changing regulation. The strategy focuses on primary transactions, where BlackFin acts as the first financial sponsor and can add substantial operational value. Deals are typically off-market and proprietary, including highly complex carve-out of business units from large financial institutions.
The new fund has already made its first investments into OpGroen, a carve-out of Aon Netherlands’ personal lines insurance business, and soon into IBS Capital Allies, a leading independent wealth manager with €5bn assets under management.
Since raising Fund III, BlackFin has invested substantially into its platform. New offices in London and Amsterdam have been opened to expand BlackFin’s multi-local European footprint. The BlackFin team has grown to 50 professionals, including nine partners, across five offices. In 2022, the firm also closed its second FinTech VC fund, BlackFin Tech II, at €390m, representing the largest dedicated B2B FinTech fund in Europe.
Rede Partners acted as global fundraising advisor, Jasmin Capital as local fundraising agent in France, and Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP as legal counsel.
