Deutsche and KKR take top fee slot for 2007

KKR took top spot in the 2007 end of year fee tables produced by Thomson Financial in conjunction with Freeman & Co covering the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region, with Deutsche Bank coming top as the recipient of private equity-related fees.

The fees relate to debt, equity, M&A and syndicated loan products. Fees paid by the top 10 private equity houses increased from US$2.16bn in 2006 to US$2.35bn in 2007. KKR moved up from fifth spot in 2006 to take the top place in 2007, knocking Permira from the top slot in 2006 to third place last year.

The market share of fees paid by the top 10 fell marginally from 44.9% in 2006 to 42.7% in 2007.

The top 10 private equity fee payers remained reasonably similar for the 2006 and 2007. However, Charterhouse, Goldman Sachs and PAI Partners make an appearance last year in the top 10, pushing out Carlyle Group, BC Partners and PAI from the 2006 top ten.

The main area of increase in fees paid to investment banks by private equity related to M&A and loan fees, followed by a marginal increase in equity fees. However, fees generated from debt by the top 10 firms fell dramatically from US$84m to US$25.9m in 2007.

Deutsche Bank jumped from third place at the end of 2006 to become to the top private equity fee recipient in 2007, generating US$431.4m of fees in the past 12 months.

Morgan Stanley fell from top slot in 2006 to 10th place last year, with fees falling from US$354.1m in 2006 to US$203.2m. The top 10 banks, however, remained the same apart from UBS, which came eighth in 2007, pushing out Barclays Capital, which came in sixth in 2006 but did not appear in 2007.

Total fees received by the banks from the top 10 houses increased from US$2.6bn in 2006 to US$2.9bn last year, with the average fees earned by the top 10 investment banks increasing from US$259.9m to US$293.53m.

However, the market share of fees earned by the top 10 banks fell from 53.9% in 2006 to 53.4% last year.