Yellow Point Equity Partners has secured $150 million in the final close of its fourth private equity fund, earmarked for investments in mid-market companies in Canada and Northwestern United States. It is the largest fund raised in the Vancouver-based firm's 12-year history, bringing total assets under management to about $250 million.
Bank of Nova Scotia, Canada's third biggest lender, is in discussions to sell a $1 billion vendor and equipment financing portfolio, sources told Reuters. Two of the sources said the assets that Scotia is looking to sell are housed within its Roynat unit, a small business financing provider acquired by the bank about 20 years ago.
Canada Pension Plan Investment Board said it has agreed to buy a student housing portfolio in the United States for around US$1.4 billion, in partnership with Singapore wealth fund GIC and The Scion Group, Reuters reported. The three parties said they had formed a student housing joint venture, Scion Student Communities, which will acquire University House Communities Group.
Torys' Partners Jared Fontaine, Ian Arellano and Neville Jugnauth expect to see Canadian deal-makers make significant, large-scale acquisitions in foreign markets in 2016, building on the intense activity of the past year. With recent weakness in the domestic economy, they also believe there will be increased opportunities for investors to deploy more capital to M&A deals in Canada.
Deal-makers celebrating a record year for mergers and acquisitions that was bolstered by mega deals are pinning their hopes on a larger number of smaller deals to fuel consolidation in 2016, Reuters reported. While the number of announced deals globally declined from 2014, values rose 40.8 percent to a record US$4.6 trillion this year, according to preliminary Thomson Reuters data.
Creditors of Grupo OAS, the Brazilian engineering business under creditor protection, agreed to sell a 24.4 percent stake in infrastructure company Invepar to Brookfield Asset Management for 1.35 billion reais (US$346 million), Reuters reported. The creditors agreed to sell the stake if Brookfield drops a plan to extend OAS a debtor-in-possession loan, a source said.
How to spend it? That's the leading question for buyout firms and their investors, as the amount of capital coming into the market forces both sides to rethink their strategies, Reuters reported. For private equity managers, the money mountain has created a US$163 billion headache.
Shaw Communications Inc said it has agreed to buy Wind Mobile Corp, Canada's fourth-largest wireless provider, in a deal that gives it a much-needed presence in the cellular market, Reuters reported. Shaw said the deal valued Wind and its parent company at $1.6 billion, much higher than the roughly $300 million a group of private equity firms, hedge funds, and other investors paid in 2014.
Special purpose acquisition companies, or SPACs, have recently broken ground in Canadian IPO markets, raising close to $1 billion. Torys' Partners John Emanoilidis, Rima Ramchandani and Mile Kurta discuss the opportunities presented by Canadian SPACs, and the challenge they face in sourcing and closing a quality acquisition in a tight timeline.
The Public Sector Pension Investment Board (PSP Investments), one of Canada's 10 largest pension fund managers, is considering entering the oil and gas sector, as weak crude prices create opportunities for long-term investors, Chief Executive André Bourbonnais told media this week.