China's Primavera raising up to $5 bln in new dollar fund -sources

CTBC Financial Holding Co

08/03/2021 03:16

By Kane Wu
    HONG KONG, March 8 (Reuters) - Chinese private equity firm
Primavera Capital Group, an early investor in billionaire Jack
Ma's Ant Group, is raising a new U.S. dollar-denominated fund of
up to $5 billion, two people with direct knowledge of the matter
told Reuters.
    The firm, an avid investor in China's tech startups, is
targeting $4 billion for its fourth dollar fund, with a hard cap
at $5 billion, said the people, who declined to be identified as
information related to the fundraising is confidential.
    It is aiming to reach a first close within the next two
months, one of the people said.
    Primavera, which has offices in Beijing and Hong Kong, did
not immediately respond to a request for comment.
    The fundraising comes amid heightened regulatory scrutiny of
China's technology giants which has clouded their near-term
outlook.
    Tighter grip on the sector came after authorities' November
suspension of Ant's Shanghai and Hong Kong dual listing, which
delayed the hefty returns early investors could have expected
from the world's biggest initial public offering.
    The financial technology giant was set to raise $37 billion
at a valuation of $315 billion. It has since agreed a
restructuring plan with regulators, Reuters reported in
February.
    Primavera invested in Ant's 2016 and 2018 fundraising,
during which the company's valuation leapt from $60 billion to
$150 billion. The private equity firm's founder and chairman,
Fred Hu, serves as an independent non-executive director on
Ant's board.
    Another Ant investor, Boyu Capital, is also targeting $6
billion for its new dollar fund, Reuters reported last month.
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N2KT29P
    In February, Taiwan's CTBC Financial Holding Co Ltd
 2891.TW  said it would invest no more than $20 million in
Primavera's fourth dollar fund via unit Taiwan Life, without
mentioning the total amount the fund was seeking.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nNDL4DDQDl
    Primavera has led investments in over 50 companies across
tech, consumer, financial services, healthcare and education
sectors, its website showed. It teamed up with Ant in the $460
million spin-off of Yum China Holdings Inc  YUMC.N   9987.HK  in
2016 and also invested in short video streaming giant Bytedance
and online wealth platform Lufax Holding Ltd  LU.N .
    The firm more recently invested in community grocery
shopping app Xingsheng Youxuan and job search site Zhaopin.com,
and raised $414 million for a special-purpose acquisition
company.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL1N2KP0HH
    It closed its third dollar fund in November 2019 at $3.4
billion. Investors included CTBC and the Pennsylvania State
Employees' Retirement System, public disclosure showed.

 (Reporting by Kane Wu in Hong Kong; Additional reporting by Yan
Zhang in Beijing; Editing by Sumeet Chatterjee and Christopher
Cushing)
 ((kane.wu@thomsonreuters.com; +85228436590; Reuters Messaging:
kane.wu.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))