private equity / far-flung barbarians / economist

the march goes on and on... no wonder when you see deals like this one from blackstone . http://immobilienblasen.blogspot.com/2006/11/reits-going-gaga-blackstone-to-buy.html
time to move out of the us......but even in asia things are really already heating up http://immobilienblasen.blogspot.com/2006/11/singapore-singapur-private-equity.html
it gets even clearer when you read this piece from business week http://immobilienblasen.blogspot.com/2006/10/private-equity-excess-business-week.html and other stories under the labels (at the bottom) that the full topic "private equity" feel like a bubble
thanks to http://www.itulip.com/ for the chart.



die karavane zieht weiter. kein wunder wenn man sich die deals in den usa wie den von blackstone ansieht. aber selbst in asien sind erste überhitzungen zu spüren. je mehr man über das thema "private equity" liest desto mehr kommt man zum schluß das es sich auch hier um ne blase handelt. (bitte links und label beachten)

Private equity explores more distant frontiers

THE art of private equity, it might be said, is finding and polishing diamonds in the rough. No wonder, then, that more firms are venturing off the beaten path in search of uncut gems.....more investors and fund managers are turning to the developing world. Just this week Citigroup unveiled plans for a new $200m fund dedicated to Africa.

Although America and Europe still attract the lion's share of private-equity investing, emerging markets—from Asia and Africa to Latin America—are rapidly growing. More than $22 billion was raised for these markets in 2006, according to the Emerging Markets Private Equity Association, up from $3.4 billion in 2003. The fastest growth last year was in Africa and the Middle East. A survey of big investors by the association found that 65% plan to increase their commitments to emerging markets in the next five years.

Several things explain their new appeal. Keener competition for deals in America and Europe is prompting funds to look further afield. Economic growth and greater stability have made some countries more attractive than they once were, as has the new maturity of their capital markets. A growing band of companies in the developing world have global ambitions of their own and want to tap into the expertise and networks that foreign investors can offer.

Finally, the rewards in these locales are often much richer than elsewhere. A private-equity index compiled by Cambridge Associates showed an annual return in emerging markets of about 23% over the three years to June 30th. That is more than double the return offered by the Standard & Poor's 500 stock index. Last year, the gap was even bigger: 25% versus 8.6%........( i think this benchmark is not quite fair, they should compare the return vs the private equity return in europe and the us. i think that the return are much higher than the s&p500 / denke das dieser vergleich hinkt. man sollte fairerweise die pe indizes von europa und den usa als maßstab nehmen und nicht den s&p500.)

Of course one investor's frontier may be another's backyard. Countries like Israel and South Africa may seem fresh and far-flung to some, but in a private-equity sense they have already emerged. The stock of private-equity investment as a fraction of GDP amounted to 3.2% in Israel and 1.9% in South Africa at the end of 2005, putting them ahead of every region of the world except North America (see chart).

These days the true pioneers in the field—investors and fund managers such as CDC, Actis and Acap Partners—are putting money into countries from Afghanistan to Tanzania. ....

as long as they call private equity not bavarians......... :-)