Please follow our
Blog for
Topical News and Comment
Notable Transactions
Julius Baer
will set aside Sfr 99
Mio to take account of lower value of Kairos Partners that was
acquired in several stages between 2012 and 2016.
Update: Julius Baer just
announced that the Goodwill has been written down by another Sfr 190 Mio.
This means that 300 of the Sfr 500 Mio paid has been lost. (20-Oct-2020)
Comment: Acquisitions need to be carefully analysed. Not only
does the valuation have to be correct, in the financial industry extra care
has to be expended on assessing the human aspect. How committed are the
vendors, are they happy and willing to stay on for a significant amount of
time and how much skin in the game will they have?
Anath Capital
acquires Stratton Street and will integrate the credit fund
manager's $500 Mio AuM with its Garraway Capital subsidiary to bring
combined AuM to $ 1 Bio.
Comment: While consolidation in the Asset Management space
continues it will not end in a completely oligopolistic landscape. The
bigger the dominant firms become the less able they will be to differentiate
their products or achieve outperformance. This will always leave room for
up-and-coming managers - apart from the human desire to run their own
business rather than being stuck in huge bureaucracies.
21-Oct-2019
Wisdom Tree
acquires ETF Securities' European business (AuM $17.6 Bio). While ETF
Sec is partly paid in Wisdom Tree shares the total consideration is
approximately $600 Mio.
Comment: The process of consolidation in the ETF
market continues, soon all minor players will be gobbled up.
14-Nov-2017
Schroders
acquires Swiss Private Equity Fund of Fund Adveq
( $ 7 bio AuM)
Comment: Again one has to wonder why terms, i.e. basically the price
paid, is kept under wraps. After all, Schroder is a listed and therefore
public entity. As a fund manager it is a trustee for ordinary savers and
should be strident in its support for maximum transparency. Is the price too
high? or was it a good bargain? And from the seller's perspective the same
question applies, though to a lesser extent. The CEO as the likely main
beneficiary may want discretion, but from whom? the wife? kids? the tax
authority? jealous wider public?
21-Apr-2017
LGT Capital Partners buys Private Debt Manager European Capital
(AuM Euro 660 Mio)
3-Mar-2017
Chinese
Conglomerate HNA Group acquires 9.9pct of Austrian Fund
Manager C-Quadrat
20-Jan-2017
Old Mutual Wealth's
Quilter Cheviot has acquired financial planning and wealth management
company Attivo Investment Management for an undisclosed sum
25-Jan-2017
Canadian Pension Fund Brit.Columbia
Inv Mgt buys majority stake in alternative lending firm
Hayfin Capital Management (£7 Bio under management)
7-Jan-2017
New York Life
Investments To Acquire Majority Stake in $ 2 Bio AuM Credit Value
Partners
3-Jan-2017
Henderson Investors acquires Janus (AuM $197 Bio) for $2.6
Bio
15-Oct-2016
Swiss Life Asset Managers acquires Property Manager Mayfair
Capital
10-Oct-2016
Canada's Fiera Capital buys
Emerging Markets Specialist Charlemagne Capital
6-Sep-2016
Wells Fargo Asset Management buys $ 15 Bio AuM quant specialist
Analytic Investors
9-Aug-2016
Dyal Capital Partners has
bought a minority stake in middle-market private equity firm H.I.G.
Capital. The passive non-voting stake,
represents less than 15% of the economic interests of the $ 20 Bio AuM firm.
4-Aug-2016
Pacific Asset Advisors (PAAL),
an investment management firm wholly-owned by Pacific Life Insurance
Company, has completed its acquisition of Cadence Capital Management,
a boutique investment firm with approximately USD4 billion in assets under
management.
5-Jul-2016
Swiss Fund Manager GAM announces acquisition of $ 4 Bio AuM quant
fund manager Cantab Capital
4-Aug-2016
Goldman's Petershill sells
five Hedge Fund stakes to Affiliated Managers for $800 Mio (Winton,
Capula, CapeView, Partner Fund Management, Mount Lucas Management)
6-Jun-2016
Rothschild
acquires AuM Euro 10 Bio Private Client specialist Martin
Maurel (Marseille)
6-Jun-2016
Banque Havilland buys
Geneva-based Banque Pasche from Groupe Mutuel-CIC
26-May-2016
OCBC’s Bank of Singapore
acquires Barclays Wealth Singapore and Hong Kong for 1.75% of $8 Bio
AuM
27-Nov-2016
Handelsbanken acquires Euro 2
Bio AuM Optimix Netherlands
20-Apr-2016
KBL European Bankers acquires
Insinger from BNP Paribas, merges it
with T Gilissen
12-Apr-2016
LGT Liechtenstein acquires
majority in Vestra Wealth UK
14-Mar-2016
Old Mutal
to acquire Singapore’s AAM Advisory
UK-based wealth manager Old Mutual announced it had signed an agreement
to acquire Singapore-based independent financial adviser AAM Advisory, which
has about 100 staff and $450 million in assets under advice.
2-Feb-2016
Legg Mason
acquires $12 Bio AuM EnTrust Hedge Multimanager for $400 Mio (3.3% of
AuM)
22-Jan-2016
Aberdeen
buys Arden Asset Management - expanding the Hedge Fund business will
be a counterweight to exposure to Emerging Markets (8/15)
1-Jan-2016
Investcorp
acquires SSARIS $800 Mio Hedge Fund of Fund
15-Nov-2015
AMG Affiliated Managers
takes
minority stake in $3.6 Bio AuM Ivory Hedge Fund
8-Nov-2015
AMG Affiliated Managers
buys Systematica Hedge Fd stake held by Bluecrest, valuation
approx 10% of AuM
8-Nov-2015
Goldman Sachs Asset Mgt
acquires $550 Mio AuM Imprint Capital
- to extend offering in impact investment. Is it soon de riguer for every
asset manager to offer 'impact' investing products or is this a passing fad?
15-Aug-2015
Corsair Capital (Mervyn Davies) and Palamon
(L Elson) acquire Currencies Direct for £200 Mio
11-Aug-2015
Mediobanca
acq 51% of Cairn Capital for
£40 Mio from Royal Bank of Scotland, has option for rest, AuM $5.6
Bio
4-Aug-2015
China's Fosun enters Germany with acquisition of Hauck Aufhaeuser
- it will be interesting how this jump into the water will pan out for this
Chinese Firm. Dipping the toes may be an intelligent strategy but will it
ever produce a meaningful contribution to this large firm's business
results?
12-Jul-2015
TIAA-CREF
acquires Nuveen, combined AuM reaches $800 Bio, broadens
product line-up. But is bond focus a drag on future outlook?
14-Oct-2014
Man buys Numeric - at first sight the (initial) payment looks
reasonable, but the devil may be in the earn-out terms.
14-Jun-2014
Standard Life
buys Ignis - boosts AuM to £240 Bio - gathers critical mass.
12-Mar-2014
FX provider HiFX
bought by Euronet - not cheap at 15 times EBITDA
10-Mar-2014
Legg
Mason to buy former Deutsche Bank Unit QS Investors
1-Mar-2014
BNP Paribas acquires
Poland's BGZ Bank from Rabobank - 1.2 times book
13-Dec-2013
SunTrust
sells $ 50 Bio AuM RidgeWorth Investments (12/13)
15-Nov-2013
Standard Life Wealth acquires Newton Private Client Business
Firm pays
£83.5 Mio and gains £ 5.5 Bio in private client assets
15-Nov-2013
New York Life
acquires
Dexia Asset Management
If you thought
that the market for investment management in Europe was already over-crowded
this deal shows that any fund management house that wants to be seen as a
global player needs a presence here - despite the best efforts of regulators
to frustrate market practitioners.
20-Oct-2013
UBP Union Bancaire
Privee acquires Lloyds TSB's
International Private Banking Assets
29-May-2013
Cantor
Fitzgerald
acquires $ 3 Bio AuM hedge fund Fintan Partners (3/14)
3-Mar-2013
Orix acquires Robeco
And a new player enters the fund management arena, we wish them good
luck!
25-Feb-2013 Morgan Stanley sells
Quilter - again
This
time the firm is sold to Private Equity for a respectable £175 million which
is quite reasonable as a ratio of assets under management in the
current climate (£7.6 billion).
25-Jan-2012
Sumitomo pays $93
mio for 5 pct stake in Moelis
This
transaction confirms that - contrary to some cindications - the animal
spirits in the financial markets are not yet completely extinct. Together
with the sale of Royal Bank of Scotlands aircraft leasing business the other
day the deal illustrates that Asian firms try to get a larger footprint in
the financial services sector while their competitors - especially the
European ones - are under pressure. One can only hope that they have the
managerial capability to make the most of the good weather while it lasts,
although the historic precedents from the previous forays during the 1980s
and 1990s are not favourable.
19-Jan-2012
TPG buys 30% stake
in Saxo Bank from General Atlantic and Espirito Santo for US$ 560 Mio
valuing it at $ 1.87 Bio.
Saxo Bank
proves that the financial service sector does not have to be dominated by
the incumbent market leaders as long as market niches and trends are used in
an intelligent and cost-effective way to build market share.
26-Aug-2011
UBP Geneva buys ABN
Amro's Swiss Private Banking Unit
The trend
towards a concentration of private banking activities in stronger hands is
continuing with UBP's purchase of the unit that managed Euro 11 billion in
client assets.
16-Aug-2011
IPO may value
Russian Nomos Bank at 27 pct of assets
If Nomos can
get away the sale of 20 pct of the share capital it would highlight the
disparities in the valuation of banks. Memories of pre-crash euphoria cannot
be dispelled.
31-Mar-11
CB Richard Ellis
buys ING Real Estate Investment for $940 million
Contrary to talk
of a property glut and property being overvalued there is strong underlying
demand for the asset class as investors are seeking a refuge from volatile
equities, bonds and hedge funds.
16-Feb-11
Bank Leumi
pays Sfr 177 mio for Geneva's Banque Safdie
At
just under 3 pct of assets under management the price seems to be a fair
one.
10-Feb-11
Raiffeisen buys
70 pct of Polbank - valuation more realistic than pre-crunch
News that the
Austrian Raiffeisen International buys a 70 pct stake in the aptly named
Polbank in Poland confirms that the market for banking assets in the
emerging markets is still decoupled from the market valuations in many
developed markets. The price paid to the former holder of the stake, the
Greek Eurobank EFG, represents around 12.7 pct of Polbanks balance sheet of
Euro 5.5 billion (per Sept 2010). This is a much less aggressive valuation
than those seen applied to banks in Eastern Europe a few years ago but still
puts a lot of hope into the possibilities of reaping economies of scale from
merging the business with Raiffeisen's existing network in Poland.
4-Feb-11
BBVA acquires
24.9 % stake in Turkey's Garanti Bank
While the price
may appear to be high compared to still depressed share prices in most banks
it is not a dramatic premium compared to prices paid for banks in emerging
markets during the pre-crunch euphoria when they were way above intrinsic
value.
3-Nov-10
Ampega-Gerling
buys 32.6% of Austria's C-Quadrat
Consolidation
in the asset management industry continues as this opportunistic acquisition
demonstrates.
14-Oct-10
Siemens AG sells
its Austrian investment management unit Innovest to Macquarie
The Australian
firm continues its expansion into the gaps left in the market by the demise
or merger of several large financial houses during the past few years
7-Oct-10
Credit Suisse
pays $425 million for a 30% stake in hedge fund firm York Capital Management
The animal
spirits are alive and well - at least at Credit Suisse! But is a minority
stake really necessary to get access?
16-Sep-10
Santander to pay Euro
555 Mio for SEB's German Assets
Not a cheap
price for Euro 8.5 Bio in loans and 4.6 Bio in deposits
13-Jul-10
RHJ completes £225 Mio
purchase of Kleinwort Benson
From day one we
thought that Dresdner overpaid for KB so this should be a happy departure
for a name that still offers cachet.
5-Jul-10
Santander buys remaining
25% in Santander Mexicano
$2.5 Bio may be small change for the bank but it implies a hefty 20
percent plus of assets
1--Jun-10
Man Group plc will buy GLG Partners for
$1.6 billion
in cash and stock
This could turn out to be a turbulent marriage
28-May-10
Sciens Capital
Management acquires Partners Group Hedge Fund platform
11-Apr-10
F&C buys
Thames River Capital
Let's hope this helps F&C's share price
29-Apr-10
Nomura to acquire Nexen Energy Marketing UK
The commodity
space remains hot - let's hope it is not a just another bubble
15-Feb-10
Affiliated
Management Group (AMG) buys Artemis Fund Management
How large can you grow a multi-boutique asset manager?
12-Feb-10
Macquarie
acquires Canadian Wealth Manager Blackmont Capital
Asset gathering
remains the name of the game
31-Dec-2009
Nomura to acquire London Investment Banking boutique Tricorn Partners
Not all
boutiques enjoy to stay single
16-Dec2009
Consortium buys troubled Constantia Private Bank
The worship of the 'Great Leader' as management style led another ship
onto the rocks
26-Nov-09
Macquarie buys
Fox-Pitt Kelton
Space vacated by the demise of some large investment banks gets
populated by new players
01-Oct-09
Ameriprise to Buy
Bank of America’s Columbia Funds
Another admission that banking and asset management often make
unhappy bedfellows
30-Sep-09
Bank of New York
Mellon buys largest part of Insight Investment
The transaction
demonstrates that prices for institutional asset managers remain depressed
13-Aug-09
Standard Bank South
Africa takes 33% stake in Troika Dialog
A gutsy transaction
in extremely difficult times
9-Mar-09
TD Ameritrade to
buy options specialist thinkorswim
Future of the brokerage industry is not as dark as many commentators predict
9-Jan-09
Mitsubishi UJF takes
stake in Capula Invesment Management
Minority stakes in hedge fund
management companies tend to be problematic - for the buyers!
21-Oct-08
Citibank buys 20% stake in AK Bank
A hefty price for a minority
stake
20-Oct-06
Dexia buys 75% of Denizbank
A very full price
01-Jun-06 |
