European PE Investors Eye Obama Cautiously
European buyout chiefs will be looking to US policies on taxation and regulation adopted by President-elect Barack Obama when he begins his term of office at the beginning of next year, with a view to how it might impact on European domestic issues. “The danger is that kneejerk support for regulation and a tendency towards protectionism, which has been a feature of the US election, will gain traction internationally regardless of who is elected,” said Simon Walker, chief executive officer of the British Private Equity and Venture Capital Association, shortly before confirmation of Obama’s landslide win was announced. “It would not be right that the private equity industry in the UK, which has adopted a programme of self-regulation, gets swept up in this sentiment and becomes subject to a punitive tax
