Stone Point eyes at least $9bn for next flagship

Stone Point Capital is back in market with its next flagship offering, just about a year after closing its last pool that brought in $9 billion, three sources told Buyouts.

The firm is testing the fundraising markets that are historically tough, with limited partners being selective with their capital as they face overexposure and liquidity issues from slow distribution activity.

North American buyout, growth, secondaries, venture capital and other funds collected a total of $559 billion last year, down 9 percent from 2022, according to Buyouts data. The number of fund closings dropped even more intensively, hitting a five-year low with some 1,208 pools reaching the finish line last year, down 17 percent from the prior year.

Still, managers have to raise capital, and the best performers are finding success, despite the headwinds.

Stone Point hopes to match that success. It is bringing Fund X back slightly earlier than some LPs expected, an indication, according to one source, that the firm is preparing for a possibly longer marketing period than in the past.

The firm is targeting $9 billion, the same amount it raised for Fund IX, but has not yet set a hard cap, one of the sources said. This could mean the firm raises more than the target, though it remains to be seen how the market reacts to any new fundraise this year.

Stone Point closed its eighth fund on $7 billion in 2019. Fund VIII was generating a 13 percent net internal rate of return and a 1.3x multiple as of June 30, 2023, according to performance information from California Public Employees’ Retirement System.

Stone Point, formed in 2005 with the management buyout of Marsh & McLennan’s MMC Capital, targets investments in North American financial services businesses. The firm, led by Charles Davis, focuses on subsectors including banks, insurance, asset and wealth management, real estate finance and specialty finance and technology.

The firm last month agreed to acquire HireRight Holding Corp alongside General Atlantic, according to a statement. The firm already owned about 75 percent of the company and agreed to buy the remainder of shares they didn’t already own in a deal valued at about $1.65 billion, the statement said.