Selection expertise and high non-financial standards catering to responsible, diversified and innovative investment strategies
Multi-strategy investments
Over the past 20 years, SWEN CP has developed close relations with asset management teams across Europe and has thus been able to create investment opportunities in the whole range of market segments (Private Equity, Private Debt, Infrastructure), whether in the primary markets, secondary markets or through direct investments.
SWEN CP offers privileged access to Europe’s finest asset management teams, with which it engages in constructive and transparent dialogue; these alliances enable it to take advantage of proprietary investment opportunities and deliver exceptional financial and non-financial performances.
Complementary backgrounds, experiences and fields of expertise are crucial to our team’s cohesion and to the climate of trust we are able to maintain with our counterparties, clients, fund managers and investment managers.
We combine our individual and collective experience with meticulous tried-and-tested management processes to ensure that the investment decisions we take are sound and of a high standard and that our interests are aligned with those of our partners.
Private Equity
Our database covers some 250 funds, over €3bn* of assets under management and 2 multi-strategy fund ranges open to third-party investors, enabling our team to promote itself as a key and choice investment partner.
Our clients with a management, advisory or monitoring mandate are benefiting from our long-standing expertise in building investment programmes: we take a bespoke approach to each client, mandate and managed fund depending on specific market features (differences between regions, strategies, types of companies, etc.), risk diversification and the combination of fund-based and direct investment approaches applied.
The geographic mix of our operations includes investments in local funds (in a single country), pan-European funds or global funds, and factors in the macroeconomic climate, currency considerations, the degree of concentration in target markets and investment objectives.
We get involved at various stages of a company’s development, but the underlying purpose in each case is to provide support for sustainable growth projects.
Our team covers the whole range of market segments, so programmes can be tailored to suit our clients’ needs.
Private Infrastructure
SWEN CP is a long-standing operator in the Infrastructure segment, having intervened in the market regularly over the past 10 years, with €2.3bn* of assets under management.
The programmes it develops are very much open to the international market via pan-European funds deploying complementary strategies and funds with more global approaches to investment.
Portfolio construction factors in the particular features of this asset class:
- A focus on brownfield assets (capacity to generate current yield)
- A heavy emphasis on Core+ / Value-Add underlying assets, i.e. with embedded scope for transformation or growth
- Relatively concentrated portfolios compared with Private Equity to take into account a lower default risk
- A very high degree of international diversification
- Large unit investments as assets are more uniform (in terms of size, market structure, embedded risks, etc.)
- Currency exposure kept under control
Currency risk management is adjusted to the pace at which programmes are deployed and to expected asset holding periods.
Private Debt
The team boasts 15 years of investment experience in the mezzanine debt segment. It has roughly €500m* of assets under management in 40 specialised funds and also in around 20 transactions that it has carried out in its capacity as a direct investor in the mezzanine debt of European companies.
Positions in the 8%+ yield tranche (subordinated debt) offer attractive risk/reward trade-offs, with an equity cushion provided by the sponsor of the operation and access to capital gains generated over time corresponding to significant rerating potential on top of the contractual yield offering a significant spread above the risk-free rate.
SWEN CP enjoys close relations with French partners covering the full spectrum of sub-segments that might potentially make use of high-yield financing; i.e. mezzanine, sponsorless, corporate financing, special situations.
The investment solutions we offer focus on maintaining an attractive contractual current yield but without forgoing the equity capital gain, so they adhere to our investment objective which is to offer products that are diversified and well-suited to an institutional allocation strategy.
Our programmes go back through 6 generations of Private Equity funds and 4 generations of Infrastructure funds; they focus largely on secondary markets and direct investments alongside partners that can ideally strengthen our long-standing ties with asset managers operating in primary markets.
We set a number of objectives when structuring an investment programme:
- optimise flows,
- reduce the J-curve,
- manage risk,
- ensure asset management fees are consistent with the client’s needs and the type of asset.
An ESG policy is applied throughout the investment process. Our policy is an ambitious and thorough one and has been built over nearly 10 years of experience in collecting and applying relevant data that can be used to assess fund managers and investments.
Private Equity
The Territoires Innovants range offers access to France’s finest small-cap buyout and venture/growth fund managers (including impact funds and pro-active allocation to the “green share”).
The Europa range offers international diversification, access to experienced European fund managers - the best in their respective fields - and a dynamic combination in which secondary markets and direct investments account for a large majority of portfolio assets. Since 2017, a “green share” has also been systematically set aside for investments that address Ecological and Energy Transition issues.
Private Infrastructure
These programmes offer highly dynamic and “global” geographic diversification (European, North American and, to a small degree, emerging market assets), and the new generation aims to allocate 75% of funds to direct investments and secondary market transactions.
Private Debt
The Direct range is mainly allocated to quasi-equity securities in France and Europe. The team enjoys a certain degree of flexibility when it comes to taking advantage of opportunities to invest in mature assets in secondary markets. The aim is to deliver an attractive yield with a diversified risk profile (in terms of equity sponsors, sectors, business models and portfolio dispersion).
Alongside its risk-profiled funds, SWEN CP has also developed expertise in structuring dedicated funds and investment / advisory mandates for third parties in the private equity, debt and infrastructure segments that are tailored to the client’s objectives and needs.