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Fitch Ratings says it expects direct lending through funds to gain momentum as European bank deleveraging continues to drive corporate disintermediation.
Fitch expects assets such as properties or corporate loans to be increasingly financed via funds, which will often have recourse to debt to increase returns for junior/equity investors, typically pension funds or insurers.
In this context, the agency has recently come across several transactions aimed at providing financing to funds. Funds with financing (or senior share classes) are typically limited partnerships, closed end funds or lightly regulated vehicles invested in private equity (corporate and projects), loans, bonds and properties.
The European Commission has enhanced its State Aid approval for the Venture Capital Trust (VCT) scheme.
This will allow the Government to introduce various changes to the VCT rules, including:
• Increasing the size of companies which can receive VCT funds (from those with assets of GBP7 million to GBP15 million); and
• Allowing companies with a greater number of employees to receive funding (up from a headcount of 50 to 250); and
• Enabling companies to receive more money from VCTs and other similar schemes (up from GBP2 million to GBP5 million).
Ian Sayers (pictured), Director General,
UK based private equity investment trust, Candover Investments (Candover) has outsourced its back office operations to Ipes, a fund services provider specialising in private equity.
The decision to outsource the back office was a strategic one, based on Candover’s need to match its operating model to a revised investment policy which now focuses on returning cash to shareholders.
Malcolm Fallen, Chief Executive for Candover, says: “Our number one priority is delivering value for our shareholders and we therefore needed to find an efficient and cost effective solution for managing our back office requirements. After analysing various options, we decided to
GCP, a provider of blended equity and debt to the UK’s small to medium sized businesses, has invested in Iglu.com, an online ski and cruise agent, in a deal valued at GBP19 million, to help the business expand into Europe.
GCP is taking a significant minority stake in the business and will join the existing board. GCP underwrote the entire transaction, providing the debt and equity on the deal that was a buyout from Matrix Private Equity Partners.
Simon Jobson, partner at GCP, says: “Iglu has capitalised brilliantly on the huge increase in the popularity of online travel, especially in
Dunedin the UK mid-market buyout house has sold Capula to Dutch quoted company, Imtech. This is the second exit for Dunedin within ten days following the sale of WFEL to KMW, a German land defence systems provider. Under Dunedin’s ownership both businesses have seen significant growth, attracting a number of bids from overseas buyers.
Capula, the UK’s market leading independent provider of IT systems that control operations and real time information at power stations, nuclear facilities and water networks has reported record order intakes under Dunedin’s ownership, of over GBP75 million in the last two years. Since Dunedin’s initial investment
The Cambridge Associates LLC Australia Private Equity and Venture Capital Index (CA Australia Index) rose by 7.85% in 2011, significantly outperforming the S&P/ASX 300 Accumulation Index which fell by 10.98% over the same period. This translated to an outperformance of 18.83% — net of fees — for the 2011 calendar year.
The CA Australia Index outperformed the S&P/ASX 300 Accumulation Index over nearly all time horizons for up to 10 years, according to the latest quarterly report released by the Australian Private Equity and Venture Capital Association Ltd (AVCAL) today.
As of 31 December 2011, the CA Australia Index had
HarbourVest Global Private Equity (HVPE) net asset value (NAV) was up 12 per cent for the year ended 31 January 2012.
At 31 January 2012, HVPE’s NAV was USD944.0 million, or USD11.42 per share, a USD1.18 increase per share over the financial year from 31 January 2011 (USD10.24), continuing its growth trajectory since early 2010.
The increase was driven by realised profits via M&A and IPO exits (USD1.02 per share), value growth in the buyout and venture portfolios (USD0.46), and the repurchase of 300,000 shares (USD0.01). These changes were partially offset by net foreign currency losses (USD0.05 per
Arma Partners acted as exclusive financial adviser to IXcellerate Ltd on its placement of Series A equity.
The International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, is among the institutional investors subscribing to the issue alongside IXcellerate’s co-founders.
Upon completion of all phases, the project cost will total c. USD55 million, most of which will be invested towards the construction and operation of a 6,200 square metre facility in Moscow set on a 15,000 square metre campus. The datacentre will be built over three phases, with the first 1,000 square metres planned to be operational in 2012.
Clairvue Capital Partners has completed investing Clairvue Capital Partners Fund I, a USD200 million fund launched in April, 2010.
According to Jeff Giller, Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer: “The preponderance of Clairvue I’s capital was invested in real estate vehicle recapitalisations where the proceeds advanced by Clairvue were used to help resolve debt maturity issues and other capital needs. The seven investments in Clairvue I’s portfolio create broad diversification with exposure to assets located throughout the United States and Europe, to office, retail, industrial, hotel and multi-family property types, to vehicles with vintage years from 2004 through 2008, and
The Hong Kong Venture Capital and Private Equity Association (HKVCA) is partnering with Cambridge Associates to provide extensive, independent Asian private equity (PE) and venture capital (VC) performance data to industry participants.
As part of the strategic partnership, HKVCA will give its members access to aggregate Asian PE and VC benchmark data and statistics based on the performance of managers in Greater China. Cambridge Associates, a global provider of independent research and investment advice, derives PE and VC benchmarks from the financial information in its proprietary database of institutional-quality PE and VC funds, one of the largest such data repositories
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