Macquarie in talks to sell private markets fund of funds to management

The fund-of-funds group, known as Macquarie Investment Management Private Markets, is a stripped-down version of its former self. Macquarie offloaded management of the US and European operations to RCP Advisors and SL Capital Partners, though the bank still owns the businesses, a person close to the situation told peHUB in a prior interview.

“We believe that incorporating the regional specialist skills of these advisors creates a more compelling value proposition for our clients,” Macquarie said in response to a series of questions.

Any management buyout is unlikely to include the infrastructure and clean tech investing fund-of-funds operation, the person said. In fact, the head of the group’s real assets focus, Brenden Woods, left Macquarie and earlier this year joined StepStone Group.

The management-owned fund of funds would have a specific focus on Asia-Pacific, one of the people said.

Macquarie declined to comment.

Macquarie decided to transfer management of its Europe and US private markets fund of funds operations after a strategic review of the business, according to information seen by peHUB.

That change included shutting down related in-house operations in London and Munich, according to the information, which was expected to lead to some layoffs. The private markets group’s offices in Australia and Asia were not to be affected by the changes, according to the information seen by peHUB.

Along with Woods, Dennis Kaiser, a vice president within the private markets group, left the bank in January. Merrick McKay, head of European investments on the private markets team, transitioned over to SL Capital as part of the shift in management.

Macquarie Investment Management’s private markets group has managed private equity and infrastructure fund of funds since 1996. The group is led by Michael Lukin.

Chris Witkowsky is editor of peHUB