google一下, 网上大概有10几万条相关新闻. 我随便找了一篇抱歉有点长. 重要的地方已经标注,SPAC没有听说过, 不过有点要注意的是PE和VC的投资对象不一样, 其风险也不一样(PE可以IPO但是VC不一定,因为VC的风险更大些), 这里只是一个PE的market leader把大概10%左右的asset上市.
Big Buyout Firm
Prepares to Sell
Stake to Public
Blackstone Would Add
To Its Financial Clout;
A Sign of Market Peak?
By DENNIS K. BERMAN and HENNY SENDER
March 17, 2007; Page A1
NEW YORK -- The king of private equity is expected to go public.
Blackstone Group, the lucrative partnership that has grown rich taking public companies private, is in advanced stages of planning an initial public offering of roughly 10% of its management company, according to people familiar with the matter. An offering of that size would conservatively value the entire enterprise at $40 billion.
Such a move would give Blackstone even greater financial clout, including more money of its own to invest in deals. But it also may signal that Blackstone partners think the financial market has hit a peak.
An IPO would offer everyday investors the benefits -- and risks -- of sharing in a business that historically has been the sole preserve of sophisticated institutions and wealthy individuals. The largest private-equity firms have had massive, 100%-plus annual returns in recent years, bringing one household name after another -- from Hertz to Burger King -- under private ownership.
Private-equity firms either buy companies or divisions of companies on behalf of their own investors, take them private, and then sell them off within a few years. A Blackstone IPO might well be followed by other well-heeled private partnerships -- whether hedge funds or buyout firms. Should that occur, it would signal a significant shift in the capital markets, which have become dominated by these firms that have prospered because they have access to cheap credit, aren't subject to the regulations governing public companies and pay the executives at companies they acquire handsomely.
Blackstone and several rivals have been exploring IPOs in the wake of the successful stock-market listing of hedge fund Fortress Group in January. The speed of Blackstone's decision is surprising and may reflect the belief of Stephen Schwarzman, Blackstone's co-founder and chief executive officer, that market conditions are worsening. Both Mr. Schwarzman and Blackstone President Tony James have in recent weeks been privately and publicly warning about a turn in financial conditions, especially in terms of their own firm's ability to finance acquisitions via cheap and ever-plentiful financing offered by Wall Street banks.
By going public, Blackstone would gain a source of permanent capital, since money raised from on the open market never has to be returned. Blackstone then wouldn't need to depend on endless rounds of time-consuming fundraising from its usual investors: public and corporate pension funds, endowments and wealthy families (这里提到了传统的融资方式). It also would get a powerful advantage over rival bidders since once it has listed, it could offer its stock as well as cash to finance acquisitions. That could enable it to outbid competitors, whether other private equity firms armed with cash or industrial firms that often use stock to partly pay for acquisitions. Blackstone already boasts the largest private-equity fund at $20.6 billion. It has $55 billion of capital under management.
Blackstone's management company, a partnership of about 60 investors, has been on a buying spree and owns everything from Madame Tussauds wax museums and Mrs. Paul's fish sticks to the country's largest office landlord, Equity Office Properties Trust. Blackstone has separate arms that invest in hedge funds and advise corporate clients on mergers and restructurings.
The personal wealth created for Blackstone partners by a public offering could be staggering. Much of the proceeds of any initial offer will likely go to the Blackstone's two founders, Pete Peterson, a former commerce secretary under President Nixon, and Mr. Schwarzman, with the bulk going to Mr. Schwarzman. Mr. Schwarzman, who is said to be worth upward of $10 billion now, could double that.
Around Blackstone, the joke for years has been that the firm is like a pool table with one leg shorter than the others -- so all the balls gravitated to that corner. That leg was said to be Mr. Schwarzman, who often keeps half of a given fund's returns since he holds the biggest stake and is its biggest rainmaker.
Mr. Schwarzman, along with Henry Kravis of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., has become a poster child of the private equity world. But while Mr. Kravis is associated with the early, raw days of private equity in the 1980s, Mr. Schwarzman is considered the new "King of Wall Street," as he was dubbed on a recent Fortune magazine cover. His recent 60th birthday celebration, which featured singer Rod Stewart and was emceed by actor Martin Short, was the talk of New York society.
Such a high profile, though, could cause a public backlash in an environment when anger is rising over what is seen as excessive compensation for top executives and a widening income gap in the U.S. In addition, should small shareholders buy into Blackstone's IPO, it would expose them to some of the risks of private-equity funds. That could attract more attention in a Congress controlled by Democrats. Lawmakers are already discussing ways to potentially limit how much money pension funds can invest in hedge funds, thereby limiting the risk a fund blow-up could indirectly have on its retirees.
More important, some Senate staffers are examining whether to change tax rules in such a way that would force hedge funds and private-equity firms to pay higher taxes on their massive profits. Every time a private-equity firm sells one of its companies, whether to a single buyer or through the public markets, 20% of the profits go to the management company. Investors in private-equity firms also pay management fees of about 1.5% of the money under control. So when Blackstone recently raised $20 billion, it pocketed about $300 million in fees.
In addition, private-equity firms pocket an array of fees from the companies they buy. Just for sealing the deal to buy Equity Office Properties last month, for example, Blackstone got to share a success fee of $400 million with its investors. It gets additional fees for arranging financing for its portfolio companies and for monitoring them.
There would be plenty of irony in a Blackstone public offering. Mr. Schwarzman has for years evangelized against the failings of public-market ownership to companies he hoped to acquire. In a series of recent public appearances, Mr. Schwarzman has been unsparing, calling public stockholding "a broken system" and criticizing the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley corporate-accountability law as having "taken a lot of the entrepreneurial zeal out of a lot of corporate managers." Quarterly earnings reports for public companies, he has said, create a "tyranny."
Blackstone's plans may point to a much deeper shift in the financial markets. The lines between public firms and private concerns are continuing to blur. The next few years, a number of Wall Street denizens say, might see the creation of hybrid companies that exist simultaneously in the public and private spheres.
Indeed, Blackstone's decision is likely to lead to a race by others to follow suit. Carlyle, KKR and TPG -- the former Texas Pacific Group -- have all been considering a similar step and may be forced to imitate a Blackstone IPO if only to have equal firepower in competing for attractive targets.
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