More than 60% of the capital for the private equity deals achieved in the UK in 2019 came from the US, according to research by drxDATA.
A total of 46 private equity funds were closed in the UK during 2019, attracting the financial backing of 80 separate Limited Partners (LPs). Of these 50 were situated in the US, while 14 of them, equal to 18%, were located in the UK.
The findings show that there was still significant transatlantic capital flow into London throughout the year despite Brexit concerns.
The research by drxDATA also found that European LPs continued to prioritise the UK as a destination for investment, with 6 LPs from the DACH region, 4 from the Benelux region and one from Finland directing capital to London.
There were also significant flows of capital into the UK from LPs located further afield in Australia, Bermuda and Canada.
Public pension funds accounted for more than half of the 80 LPs investing in UK private equity funds, while insurance was in second place, accounting for 13% of the total.
There were a further 12 different types of LPs and other sources of capital investing in UK private equity funds, including a wide variety of both institutional and developmental investors. These included six sovereign wealth funds.
Samuel Robberts, Head of drxDATA, said: “Limited Partnerships play a pivotal role in the private equity market place as they provide capital to all of the funds that Drax works with. As such they have a lot of power within the marketplace. Understanding where capital is coming from and the types of investors that are providing capital, in particular their appetite for risk and their search for returns, is important as we seek to work with funds across the private equity life cycle."
drxDATA® is Drax’s proprietary data analytics platform which is used to develop unique data sets providing insights and analysis for our clients.
Drax contact: Samuel Robberts
Director, Head of drxDATA
Email: sr@draxexecutive.com
Tel: 0203 949 9565
