PE veteran Jon Moulton, founder of the UK’s Alchemy Partners and Better Capital, lambasts the country’s financial services industry for not lobbying the UK government more vociferously for the sector to be included in EU trade negotiations

Just happened

Election perspectives
With hours to go until the US election, here’s a round-up of some private equity-related content from across the PEI Media stable that we’ve made available to our subscribers this week to help inform your thinking:

• The private equity industry is focusing on protecting the Republican party’s majority in the US senate, as it seeks as many allies on Capitol Hill as possible;
• The effort to include private equity as part of defined contribution pension plans could be vulnerable under a “blue wave” scenario;
• On Blackstone’s third quarter earnings call last week, president and COO Jonathan Gray said potential infrastructure spending and funding for cities could offset any headwinds caused by a “blue wave”;
• Republican incumbent Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden have starkly conflicting views on taxation and housing creation, so the election outcome could have significant implications for US real estate investment;
• Carlyle is not concerned about any potential tax changes should there be a new administration. “Whatever changes to current taxes, the simplicity of C-corp structure makes it much easier to understand and manage through future tax changes,” chief executive Kewsong Lee said on the firm’s third quarter earnings call last week.

Swiss banker
UBS and Partners Group have teamed up to provide private markets access to the bank’s wealthy clients, per a statement. The partnership allows UBS clients to access Partners Group’s direct investments via a joint initiative structure which will also offer a sub-portfolio of co-investments. The initiative has an annual investment capacity of between $1 billion and $3 billion. UBS clients will also be able to invest a minimum of €20,000 in Partners Group’s European Long-Term Investment Fund, which will invest in PE, real estate and infrastructure deals. More details here.

Grass greener over there?
Investment bank Greenhill has lost four managing directors from its secondary advisory business, making it seven top-level departures in the space of a month, sister title Secondaries Investor reports (subscription required). Todd Miller, Andy Nick and Chris Bonfield are to join Jefferies, where former Greenhill colleagues Brenlen Jinkens and Scott Beckelman moved in September to launch a secondaries advisory business. Another MD, Brian Mooney, is moving to the buy-side, as did the team’s former head Stephen Sloan, who joined Portfolio Advisors in September. London-based Bernhard Engelien and Briac Houtteville are now leading the rebuild of the team.

Essentials

Big in Asia
Executives managing some of the world’s largest Asia funds are sleeping easier than at the start of the year. KKR and Carlyle Group – two of Asia’s heavyweights – both credited the region with strong performance in their respective Q3 earnings calls last week. The former said its relative weighting to Asia helped it benefit from the region’s comparatively early recovery and that its Asian Fund III was running at a 24 percent net IRR, outperforming its Americas and Europe funds. Carlyle posted a 14 percent YTD rise in accrued performance revenue, driven in no small part by its fourth Asia buyout fund, which is up 28 percent for the year.

Nordic assets: Reassuringly expensive
The perception that the Nordics is a market with high valuations is partially explained by the types of businesses and deals done there. These are heavily skewed towards “hotter and faster growing segments of the economy” – such as tech, healthcare, fintech, industrial automation – and in many respects, fully deserve those higher valuations relative to other assets, said Joana Rocha Scaff, managing director and head of Europe private equity at Neuberger Berman at the Nordic Private Equity Forum last week. Buyout funds in the Nordics have been among the top performers in Europe last year, delivering an IRR of 16.35 percent, according to data from eFront.

Dig deeper

LP meetings. It’s Monday, so here are some LP meetings to watch out for this week.

4 November

• Tulare County Employees Retirement Association
• University of Nevada, Reno Foundation
• The Foundation Daytona State College
• Fresno County Employees’ Retirement Association

5 November

• Los Angeles County Employees’ Retirement Association
• City of San Jose Police & Fire Department Retirement Plan
• Los Angeles Fire & Police Pension System
• Oklahoma State Regents For Higher Education
• San Bernardino County Employees’ Retirement Association (SBCERA)

6 November

• Teachers’ Retirement System of Louisiana
• San Joaquin County Employees’ Retirement Association