Mercury Capital Opens Office In San Francisco

Paul Tam, formerly of Brookfield Asset Management and Bear Stearns & Co., will head up the new office for Mercury Capital.  He will focus on raising investor dollars for vehicles in the real estate sector.

Led by management committee members Michael Ricciardi, Alan Pardee, Enrique Cuan and Michael Manfredonia, Mercury Capital now employs 30 professionals at its headquarters and in London, Boston, Dubai, Los Angeles, Singapore, Tokyo and now San Francisco. The firm has added about five people in the past year.

Pardee said the investing and fundraising climate has picked up steam since last September and that 2013 has been “remarkably different” from recent years, with greater interest from limited partners around the globe. “We’re seeing healthy demand from nearly everywhere,” Pardee told Buyouts. “It’s active. People are embracing risk again. There’s conviction returning to the marketplace.”

Some favorable trends on his radar screen include: real estate and infrastructure funds, secondaries, and a partnership between Mercury Capital and placement agent HMC Capital-Itajuba for deals in South America.

Among its more recent deals, Mercury Capital helped raise $751 million for ACON Investments and its fund, ACON Equity Partners III LP. The effort exceeded the original fundraising target of $600 million.