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NEWS

This Week in Private Credit: Blue Owl Acquires Atalaya, Oak Hill and One Investment Management Launch Joint Venture, and Cinven Sits on the Sidelines

Blue Owl Capital is continuing its private credit push, reaching an agreement this week to acquire Atalaya Capital Management for up to $800 million. It’s also Blue Owl's third acquisition in recent months, following deals for real estate finance platform Prima Capital Advisers and insurance solutions firm Kuvare Asset Management.

Blackstone is growing its AUM with a new focus on wealth management products

Blue Owl will pay an initial $450 million for Atalaya, split between $350 million in equity and $100 million in cash. The deal also includes a potential revenue-based earnout of up to $350 million.

Atalaya manages more than $10 billion and has had a relationship with Blue Owl’s Dyal Capital Partners business since 2017, when it sold a minority stake to the firm.

The deal hands Blue Owl a foothold in the fast-growing (high single digits) asset-based finance market—a $5.2 trillion corner of non-bank lending (which is about as large as the entire syndicated loan market) that’s been a key focus area for insurance funds, pension funds, and private credit.

This week’s other private credit news comes from Oak Hill Advisors and One Investment Management (OneIM), who’ve teamed up to launch a $5 billion European private credit joint venture.

The duo plans to focus on upper middle market and large-cap companies, which could mean more direct competition with syndicated loans and high-yield bond offerings that traditionally cover the larger end of the market. Bloomberg reports that the two will primarily offer first-lien and unitranche facilities.

The launch also suggests that there’s still plenty of optimism to go around, even as this summer has brought some concern over European economic headwinds and potential credit deterioration.

Led by Rajeev Misra, formerly of SoftBank's Vision Fund, OneIM has raised approximately $7 billion since its 2022 launch, including backing from Abu Dhabi’s Royal Group and Mubadala.

To wrap things up, this week’s most interesting private credit news comes not from another splashy fund launch, but instead from an aversion to the asset class altogether.

Speaking with Bloomberg, Cinven’s Jorge Quemada, co-managing partner and head of Iberia, and Maxim Crewe, a partner leading the firm’s consumer and financial services teams, shut the door on any foray into direct lending for Cinven.

“We are very focused on buyouts, we don’t see ourselves becoming a multi-asset manager, investing in different types of asset class,” said Quemada.

Whether the firm feels its expertise is uniquely suited to buyout investing or thinks private credit is nearing the end of the cycle, its position is at odds with the AUM-first approach taken by many of Cinven’s peers.

Sam Hillier

Sam Hillier is a reporter at Transacted covering private equity and investment banking. He previously spent time as an investment professional focused on middle market buyouts.