Investors

Alaska Permanent Fund taps Barings to invest in state infra

The MassMutual subsidiary will manage half of APF’s $200m Alaska Future Fund, a recently-launched in-state investment platform, targeting real assets and private equity.

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The Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation has tapped fund manager Barings to manage a separate account focused on in-state investments in infrastructure and private credit.

The Alaska Future Fund, to which APFC has allocated $200 million, is in response to board members “recognising the opportunity to earn attractive returns by backing emerging private market fund managers and private market investment opportunities in Alaska”, a spokeswoman for APFC, which manages and invests the assets of the $65.4 billion Alaska Permanent Fund, told Infrastructure Investor.

Mina Pacheco Nazemi, managing director of Charlotte, North Carolina-based Barings Alternative Investments, told sister publication PERE the Alaska Future Fund’s main priority is to invest in-state. “We want to make sure that the businesses and projects that we’re ultimately investing in are based in Alaska, have operations in Alaska, or have future plans to be in Alaska,” Nazemi said.

She added that, for Barings’ mandate, “the real focus of the vehicle” will be on transportation and infrastructure assets. Nazemi said the fund is structured to be invested over four years, though assets requiring longer hold periods will be considered. APFC may provide additional capital to the vehicle as well.

APFC set up the Alaska Future Fund as a separately managed account to have “more control of their capital”, Nazemi explained. The sovereign wealth fund manages around $2.1 billion of capital invested in infrastructure, $507 million of which is through co-investments. In a previous interview, APFC chief investment officer Marcus Frampton told Infrastructure Investor that co-investments are likely to move to between 30 and 35 percent of the infrastructure portfolio over the next three to four years.

McKinley Capital Management, which is the largest private financial services company in Alaska, according to APFC, will manage the other $100 million allocated to the Alaska Future Fund and will focus on private equity.