3i raised £700m for Europe’s largest publicly listed infrastructure fund, coming at the bottom of the pricing range and undershooting its maximum target by £600m as investors greeted the issue cautiously amid recent equity market volatility. 3i Infrastructure’s market debut came as Brevan Howard raised barely half its targeted maximum of €1.5bn. Smurfit Kappa, Europe’s largest cardboard box maker, meanwhile looks set to price its planned €1bn-plus offering near the lower end of its range. Five years ago, a correction the size of last week’s dip would have shut the market for IPOs until the summer, says Lex. That looks less likely this time round. Supply is not going to dry up, with a large backlog of new issues and there is only a limited risk of a buyers’ strike – liquidity is abundant. The casualties will fall into two camps. Smaller issues that offer limited liquidity in the after-market and the more opportunistic vendors among private equity and hedge funds seeking permanent capital. Investors are rightly questioning why they should buy into listed private equity vehicles carrying hefty fees and offering no visibility over the assets they will be acquiring.

This entry was posted by Helen Thomas on Friday, March 9th, 2007 at 4:50 and is filed under Capital markets, Hedge funds, Private equity. Tagged with 3i, brevan howard, smurfit kappa. Edit this entry.