GNC Apollo IPO

GNC Holdings and Apollo Global Management Consider IPOs

Two private equity firms are eying now as the opportunity to go public.  Apollo Global Management and GNC Holdings have long looked to become public companies through an IPO and the current spark of life in the IPO market seems to be the opportunity the private equity firms have been looking for. 

Investment firm Apollo Global Management LLC late Tuesday priced an expanded initial public offering at the top of its expected range, making the deal potentially worth more than $650 million. Its debut, delayed since April 2008, comes as the private equity industry recovers from the recession. The successful offering could open the door for other well-known investment firms, like Carlyle Group, to go public, said Matthew Rhodes-Kropf, a Harvard Business School professor who studies private equity, mergers and venture capital.

Meanwhile, the latest private equity-backed offering is vitamin chain GNC Holdings Inc., which is looking to raise up to $382.5 million this week. Apollo bought GNC in 2003 for $750 million, then tried and failed to take it public in 2004 and 2006. Apollo finally sold GNC in 2007 in a deal valued at $1.65 billion to investment firm Ares Management LLC and the private equity arm of the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan, a large Canadian institutional investor that administers retirement funds for Ontario's teachers and former teachers.

Like it did with GNC, Apollo buys companies in trouble and tries to sell them for more, usually years later. It uses borrowed money to acquire such companies, a transaction known as a leveraged buyout.  Source

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Private Equity Firms Spain 

Private Equity Firms Look to Invest in Spanish Savings Banks

Private equity firms are looking for new opportunities in the struggling Spanish savings banks.  Reportedly, Spain is teeming with hedge funds and private equity firms considering taking over savings banks that are saddled with defaulted loans.

"Spain is crawling with hedge fund and private equity people" considering investments in the country's regional savings banks, which are saddled with busted loans due to the bursting of Spain's property bubble, one savings bank executive told the Financial Times. Among the alternatives looking at the troubled Spanish banks are Apax Partners, Cerberus Capital Management, Paulson & Co. and Soros Fund Management.

Those talks hit a roadblock when the banks, including Bankia and Banca Civica, turned their noses up at the low valuations on offer. But everything changed when Moody's Investors Service slashed the credit ratings of 30 Spanish lenders, noting that it is "increasingly likely that the sovereign will not be prepared to write all banks a blank cheque."

Now, facing a government-imposed deadline to recapitalize, the banks are back at the bargaining table. And at that table, they're hearing more bad news.  Source

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China Private Equity Managers

China Private Equity Firms Grab Larger Share of Market

Chinese private equity firms are grabbing a larger part of the market from foreign competitors, according to a recent study.  Local managers are benefiting from high inflows of capital from domestic investors.  Now, local private equity firms make up about 20% of the total private equity deal value in China.

Local managers more than doubled their share of the total private equity deal value in China to 20 percent last year from 2007, the consulting firm said in a report released today. McKinsey forecast domestic investors will boost commitments to buyout firms as much as fivefold by 2015.

Fundraising in China is benefiting from swelling assets of government agencies such as China Investment Corp., the state pension fund and the nation’s foreign exchange regulator, said Bruno Roy, managing partner of McKinsey’s Beijing office. Chinese insurers, recently approved by the government to make private equity investments, may allocate 3 percent of their assets to such funds in five years, he said.

“Over time, we expect Chinese limited partners to become increasingly present both in China and abroad,” Roy said in an interview. “For the last two years, their commitments to local Chinese private equity funds have already exceeded those made by foreign limited partners. We expect that trend to continue.” Source

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Apollo Initial Public Offering

Apollo Global Management Prepares Initial Public Offering

Once again, Apollo Global Management LLC has taken steps toward an initial public offering.  The private equity firm has previously considered going public and now has announced that it is planning an initial public offering that would fetch $500 million.

Private equity firm Apollo Global Management LLC says it is planning an initial public offering that would raise up to $500 million.

Apollo's debut has been on hold for a long time. The buyout shop had initially planned to go public in April 2008.

Apollo says it and its stockholders plan to sell 26.3 million shares for $17 to $19 each. In a separate transaction, shareholders may also resell up to 35.6 million shares they currently own at the IPO price. Apollo will not receive proceeds from stockholders' sales.

The firm says it expects its own proceeds from the IPO to be about $296.6 million after expenses if shares price at $18 each.  Source

For more information on Apollo Global Management including contact details, visit our Private Equity Directory

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HCA Holdings IPO

HCA Holdings Has $3.79 Billion Initial Public Offering

HCA Holdings raised an impressive $3.79 billion in what was the largest U.S. initial public offering by a private equity-backed company.  The hospital chain sold 126.2 million shares at $30, the top of the range initially proposed.  This marks a big vote of confidence from the market and could lead to more IPO exits. 

HCA, based in Nashville, Tennessee, sold 126.2 million shares at $30 each, the top of the proposed range, the company said yesterday in a statement. The underwriters may exercise an overallotment option to buy as many as 18.9 million additional shares within 30 days, the company said. HCA sold 87.7 million shares, while existing investors sold 38.5 million.

The IPO surpassed that of Houston-based energy-pipeline company Kinder Morgan Inc., which raised $3.3 billion in its Feb. 10 initial stock sale. Private equity-backed IPOs in the U.S. have gotten a boost this year as the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rallied to the highest level since June 2008, increasing investors’ interest in companies acquired through debt-fueled acquisitions as credit markets started to freeze four years ago.

“We have a market that’s more willing to take on risk,” said Alan Gayle, senior investment strategist at RidgeWorth Capital Management in Richmond, Virginia, which oversees $52.5 billion. “This is a much better, much warmer climate for this type of offering.”

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Russian Private Equity Firms

Russia Launches Fund to Partner with Private Equity Firms

Russia is launching a multi-billion dollar fund aimed at attracting foreign buyout firms to the country.  The Russian government is reportedly putting together a $10 billion fund to invest in partnership with overseas private equity funds.

This is a big welcoming gesture to private equity firms from a government that has yet to establish a great business environment.  Many private equity firms are still wary of working in Russia because the great potential risks often outweigh the potential gains.  The fund's creation reportedly involves the Russian VEB development bank and Goldman Sachs.

Russia’s VEB development bank is working with Goldman Sachs Group Inc. on the fund, which will invest in partnership with overseas private-equity firms, said the people, who declined to be identified because the plan hasn’t been disclosed yet. The government is seeking to lure buyout firms such as Blackstone Group LP (BX) and Carlyle Group LP to invest in one of the nations where they are least active, one of the people said.

Leveraged buyout firms have led $1.5 billion of takeovers this year in Russia, about half the $2.9 billion of investments announced in China, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Carlyle, one of the world’s biggest private equity firms, shut its Moscow office in 2005, a year after opening it, saying the country was too risky. Carlyle co-founder David Rubenstein last week reiterated that Russia doesn’t provide a good environment for investments.

“Russia has not proven to be a place where Western private equity investors can have the returns and realize the profits commensurate with the risks they’ve had to take,” Rubenstein said at the Super Return conference in Berlin last week.  Source

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Private Equity Career Training

Would You Like to Advance Your Career?

Advancing your career in private equity can be difficult without a strong background.  If you have little experience in private equity or you just want to strengthen your résumé, then you should consider our training program. 

The Certified Private Equity Professional program is a way to boost your credentials and demonstrate your knowledge of the private equity industry.  You can watch the following video overview to learn more about this private equity training program (click here if you are reading this via e-mail):



Our program is limited to just 25 professionals per quarter, and after joining you can choose from one of four examination dates per year including: January 15th, April 15th, July 15th or October 15th.  If you would like to join our next class of Private Equity Professionals, visit the Certified Private Equity Professional program website.

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TVM Capital MENA

Interview with Youssef Haidar from TVM Capital MENA

Today I'm including an interview on CNBC with Youssef Haidar a partner at TVM Capital.  TVM Capital is a global private equity firm specializing in healthcare.  The private equity firm has expanded into the Middle East and North Africa with TVM Capital MENA.  In the following video, Mr. Haidar talks about private equity investing in the healthcare and consultation sectors.  Unfortunately, the video is not in English but there are subtitles.  If you are reading this via RSS or e-mail, watch this video here.

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