Golding gets €300m infra mandate from German insurer

Germany’s HUK-COBURG Insurance Group has chosen Munich-based Golding Capital Partners (Golding) to manage what is being called “one of the largest infrastructure mandates in the German-speaking area,” Golding said in a statement. 

HUK-COBURG Asset Management, which invests on behalf of Germany’s largest car insurer, has chosen Golding to manage a €300 million infrastructure allocation following an “extensive international selection process”. 

The Munich-headquartered infrastructure, private equity and private debt investment manager will target investments in transport, energy, utilities and renewables, among others. Matthias Reicherter, head of infrastructure for Golding, says the team will “identify attractive investment targets that go beyond straightforward fund investments”. 

Golding said its mandate also includes co-investments and direct investment opportunities. 

German limited partners (LPs) are emerging as a force to be reckoned with in infrastructure. Mathias Burghardt, head of infrastructure at AXA Private Equity (AXA PE), which recently raised €1.75 billion for infrastructure investing, called Germany “the new giant in infrastructure investing – both on the pensions and insurance side”. 

German LPs are the most numerous investment group in AXA PE’s third infrastructure fund, making up over 25 percent of the fund, which is especially noteworthy when you consider that AXA PE had no German LPs – outside of AXA Germany – investing in Fund II. 

The Research Center for Financial Services at the Steinbeis University Berlin, with the support of DekaBank, released a study earlier this year stating that German institutional investors are looking to increase the amount allocated to infrastructure to around 2 percent by 2016, up from the current average of 0.5 percent.

HUK-COBURG has over 10 million customers and manages some €26 billion. The group calls itself “the foremost insurer for private households”. Its business is traditionally focused on car insurance, with over nine million vehicles insured in Germany. 

Golding is an investment manager covering private debt, private equity and infrastructure in Germany. It serves over 100 institutional investors with a team of 50 and has in excess of €2.5 billion under management.