IFC launches asset management division with $1bn fund(2)

The International Finance Corporation (IFC) has set up IFC Asset Management Company, which will function as a fund manager of third party capital.

IFC Asset Management Company will manage a $1 billion private equity fund, which will allow national pension funds, sovereign funds and other sovereign investors from IFC’s shareholder countries to co-invest in IFC transactions in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean.

The firm will also manage the $3 billion IFC Recapitalisation Fund, which protects “systemically important emerging markets banks” from the fallout of the global financial crisis, according to an IFC statement. 

This venture offers a new avenue to connect investment capital with developing county opportunities, to provide better jobs and livelihoods, along with good returns, Robert Zoellick, the World Bank’s group president said in the statement.

The venture follows Zoellick’s call for a “1 percent solution” in 2008, when he urged sovereign funds to invest 1 percent of their holdings in equity in sub-Saharan Africa.

Gavin Wilson has been appointed IFC Asset Management Company’s first chief executive officer, effective in July. He will represent the firm on the IFC Management Group, which is responsible for much of IFC’s key decision-making and strategic planning.

Presently, Wilson is a London-based managing director at Goldman Sachs’ investment banking division where he is responsible for relationships with industrial, diversified and sovereign fund clients in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). He has co-headed the bank’s EMEA industrials group and was previously head of its new markets investment banking execution team focused the same region.

Before Goldman Sachs, Wilson was a special advisor at the Bank of England. Prior to that, he has worked in the World Bank Group and management consultant firm McKinsey and Company.

IFC did not reply to requests for comment at press time.