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Crescent Capital
Here, Finance Monthly speaks to Aygen Yayikoglu from Crescent Capital, an Istanbul-based investment house, specialising in energy and infrastructure finance. He discusses the company’s recent and current projects as well as the future of fundraising within Turkey.
Q
You recently reached a first close with €100m commitments on your Clean Energy Transition Fund. What will the fund focus on and what is the fund target?
The fund will primarily focus on financing and construction of clean power generation assets such as wind, hydro, geothermal, biomass, and solar power plants through equity investments. We will also make investments in companies providing good and services to the clean and energy industry. This is the first energy fund launched in Turkey which has substantial energy needs to keep up with GDP growth, and will benefit from being a first mover in its field. The fund will act as a catalyst to help project owners meet their equity requirements and also help structure debt for green and brownfield assets. The geographic focus will be primarily Turkey, but we will also invest in South Eastern Europe, and selectively consider one or two investments in the Caucasus. The target size of the fund is EUR 200m, which together with additional equity from co-developers and lenders, would aim to have a stake in a portfolio of green assets exceeding EUR 1 billion in total size.
Q
Crescent Capital is a relatively new investment platform in Turkey, what is the strategy and focus of the firm?
We are an emerging, independent manager, fully owned by the founding individuals who have years of experience in traditional and green energy financing. We are building an international team based out of Istanbul to cover Turkey and surrounding regions. Our sole focus as a fund manager is energy and infrastructure. We plan to remain fully sector-focused and create a leading equity platform for Turkey and neighbouring countries which will continue to have large-scale infrastructure investment needs in the next 15 years.
Q
How do you view the future of fundraising within Turkey and Europe following the recent economic turmoil?
Fundraising is difficult and we expect it to remain difficult for some time. Nevertheless, there is growing interest in green assets with long-term
stable cashflows, especially as volatility in financial markets increase. We believe that allocations in alternative assets will increase and specialised managers with sector expertise will play an important role to deploy capital seeking alternative investments. We also expect that Turkish LPs will start becoming more active in the coming years and support the local private equity industry. FM
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We are building an
international team based out of Istanbul to cover Turkey and surrounding regions.
Contact Details:
Crescent Capital Tesvikiye Caddesi, 107-7 Nisantası, Istanbul, Turkey
Tel: +90 212 259 6704 Email:
aygen.yayikoglu@crescent.com.tr
www.finance-monthly.com
OCTOBER 2011
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