Emerging Markets

Exclusive: Management buyout of ADM Capital private equity arm

The Hong Kong-based fixed-income and agribusiness manager has offloaded its Central Eastern European and Kazakhstan PE business to a 16-strong team, which has rebranded it CCL Capital and will continue to manage ADM’s funds in the region.

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ADM Capital, a Hong Kong-based fixed-income and agribusiness manager, has spun out its Central Eastern European and Kazakhstan private equity business through a management buyout.

Sixteen professionals, including four partners, from ADM Capital’s Central Eastern European and Kazakhstan region team spun out to form CCL Capital on 1 August, a spokesman for ADM told Agri Investor sister publication Private Equity International. There was no third-party capital involved and ADM did not retain an economic interest in the new firm.

CCL Capital will continue to manage ADM’s Central Eastern European and Kazakhstan vehicles, which include the CEECAT Recovery Fund, a €265 million 2011-vintage targeting distressed assets in Central and Eastern Europe, Central Asia and Turkey, and the €100 million Kazakhstan Capital Restructuring Fund, a 2010-vintage. It is understood CCL will continue raising CEECAT Recovery Fund II, a 2015-vintage for which it is seeking as much as €300 million.

Its existing funds attracted commitments from LPs including Black Sea Trade and Development Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the International Finance Corporation, according to PEI data.

ADM reorganized the structure of its Central Eastern European and Kazakhstan team in 2014 to provide greater autonomy to those advising these funds from locations in Almaty, Istanbul, Kiev and Moscow, the spokesman said.

The disposal will enable ADM to focus on its Asian fixed-income business, the ADM Capital Foundation impact charity and its global Cibus platform, he added. The firm is understood to be seeking $500 million for the 2017-vintage Cibus Fund, which will target equity and equity-linked debt investments in food chain companies across Europe, Australia and New Zealand.

ADM Capital has deployed approximately $3 billion across 122 private credit transactions and completed 104 exits since 2004, according to its website. It operates fixed-income and agribusiness strategies, as well as an Asian impact loan and grant fund.