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Secondaries specialist Greenpark Capital closes debut fund on E200m

London-based secondaries specialist Greenpark Capital has successfully navigated an unforgiving fundraising climate to close its debut fund on target with E200m.

The firm secured commitments from a wide range of institutions in Europe, the US, and elsewhere.

Greenpark will focus on traditional secondary private equity fund transactions but will also invest in portfolios of direct and tail-end investments. It has already made a handful of investments and expects to accelerate its activity now that it has closed its fund. 

The firm was spun out of one of the oldest European secondary specialists Coller Capital by Marleen Groen, Joanna Jordan and Andrew French in 2000 and began fundraising shortly afterwards. In addition to its fund, it will also be leading a co-investment syndicate.

There are still only a handful of specialist players in the European market. There were widespread expressions of interest by a lot of funds of funds a couple of years ago but they have yet to make much of an impact and most of the interesting deal flow is still concentrated in just a few hands.

The precipitous downturn in public and private markets has had the effect of dramatically raising interest in secondaries over the past 18 months. Financial pressures have flushed a lot of sellers into the market, providing a wealth of deal flow and opportunity for practiced investors.

Activity last year, however, fell someway short of expectations. Part of the problem was that much of the available material, immature venture fund investments, was of little interest to buyers. But more significantly, sellers were slow to adjust to financial realities by lowering their prices to within range of buyers.

Business has been livelier so far this year, suggesting resistance is being gently eroded. Deutsche Bank, for example, announced last week the completion of its E1.5bn portfolio sale to a consortium of investors, specialists and non-specialists alike. A handful of other major bank sellers are also thought to be close to completing their divestments.

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