本内容来自:投资组合
亚博赞助欧冠机构投资者青睐基础设施贷款
项目融资债务一度被养老基金和主权财富基金所摒弃,但它可以提供多样性和稳定性。欧洲的银行有大量的资产可以出售,但是组合一个投资组合是有风险的。
项目融资债务变得性感起来。亚博赞助欧冠标准普尔(Standard & Poor 's)美洲项目融资主管阿瑟•西蒙森(Arthur Simonson)预计,机构投资者很快将开始要求对欧洲银行持有的数十笔基础设施贷款进行大规模信贷审查。常驻纽约的西蒙森表示:“我们可能会看到一个由70个资产组成的捆绑包,有多个买家和标普的一个评估。”养老基金、主权财富基金和其他机构过去不太关心基础设施贷款,这些贷款支持从交通项目到公用事业的所有项目。这也就不足为奇了:尽管这些贷款承诺长期定期支付,但传统上它们的息差很小,同时又存在机构投资者不熟悉的风险。亚博赞助欧冠但一些变化——债务抵押债券(cdo)市场萎缩、利润率扩大和发行规模激增——促使人们重新审视它。摩根大通资产管理公司(J.P. Morgan Asset Management)驻纽约的基础设施债券投资组合经理杜文(Bob Dewing)说,全球基础设施贷款市场至少价值5,000亿美元。资产管理公司对此表示关注。例如,去年秋天,摩根大通聘请杜文领导一个新的基础设施债务团队,为养老基金、保险公司和主权财富基金提供咨询。一些投资者聘请顾问或资产管理公司,将多家银行的贷款组合成价值数十亿美元的投资组合。 There’s plenty to like about infrastructure loans. Their distant maturities, often seven to 18 years away, appeal to long-term investors, and they typically yield 2 to 4 percent. Infrastructure portfolios also offer diversity across sectors, geographies and currencies. “Once investors have learned the attractiveness, they’ll stay,” Dewing contends. European lenders, who are among the biggest backers of private infrastructure projects, have no shortage of product to flog. Several, including French banks BNP Paribas and Société Générale, are peddling infrastructure loans singly or in batches as they seek to boost capital reserves and meet liquidity and funding ratios set by Basel III regulations. Another incentive: Some European banks hold billions in Greek and Italian sovereign debt. Asset managers expect an uptick in sales of infrastructure loans this year, but the speed of deal flow is uncertain. That’s partly because sourcing, scrutinizing and executing a portfolio can be laborious. The assets call for individual review, probably by a rating agency. “A lot of people think that buying a portfolio is good for size and scale, but you still need to carefully underwrite the individual assets,” says Kirk Edelman, U.S. CEO of Germany’s Siemens Financial Services, a potential buyer of infrastructure debt. Also, sellers used to price infrastructure loans more aggressively — say, LIBOR plus 100 to 150 basis points. So when it comes to existing debt, investors are wary of yields beneath today’s floor of 200 to 300 basis points. “These are great loans, great credits, but they’re mispriced, and they always were,” says Marc Bajer, chairman of London-based Hadrian’s Wall Capital, adviser to Aviva Investors Hadrian Capital Fund I. The fund, which should complete its first close this quarter with £150 million ($230 million) in assets, will provide long-term subordinated senior debt for European infrastructure financings. Infrastructure loans often feature derivatives, swaps and pricing step-ups; all of this adds to the complexity of a sale. Investors are wary of refinancing risks: When margins compress, borrowers tend to pursue refinancings en masse. Then there’s the risk of each loan. “You don’t just buy the loan,” Bajer says. “You buy the counterparty exposure to a European bank.” Perhaps the biggest deterrent? Lenders are gunning for sales close to par. For instance, Société Générale wants at least 98 cents on the dollar for its power-generation loans.
这些障碍可能会让机构投资者望而却步——这对其他人有利。亚博赞助欧冠迄今为止,买家包括加拿大和日本的银行,以及通用电气能源金融服务(GE Energy Financial Services)等非传统贷款机构。在2011年的一次拍卖中,通用电气从爱尔兰银行(Bank of Ireland)获得了价值近10亿美元的项目融资贷款。••