LatAm overtakes Asia-Pacific fundraising

Infrastructure Investor’s Research & Analytics team has been looking at changes in limited partner (LP) investment into infrastructure funds targeting Asia-Pacific and Latin America. 

A steadily increasing amount of capital has been raised from LPs for Latin America focused funds since 2008. The high point was 2012, when more than twice as much was raised than during the previous year, with FIP Sondas closing the largest Latin American fund of 2012. 

However, the upward trend of Latin American fundraising has not been sustained so far in 2013; only $50 million has been raised in the first half of the year.  More positively, as of August 2013, there are 15 funds in market targeting Latin America with an aggregate target size of $6.26 billion. Therefore the picture looks more optimistic for the second half of 2013, with several funds looking likely to achieve final closes.  

By contrast, managers are closing funds targeting Asia-Pacific less frequently since the peak in 2010, when China-ASEAN Investment Cooperation Fund I was the largest Asia-Pacific fund closed in that year. However, and again in contrast, it has been a more promising start to the year for Asian fundraising with almost $2 billion having been raised. 

In addition, the “more capital, fewer funds” trend that is featured in the current “Chart of the Week” is apparent in Latin America and Asia-Pacific too.  Only two funds targeting Asia-Pacific closed in the first half of 2013. These two funds, including China Life Suzhou Urban Development Industrial Investment,  raised 56 percent more capital than the four funds that closed during the same period last year.     

Aggregate capital raised in Latin America and Asia-Pacific from 2008-H1 2013