Patria Investments, a portfolio company that I’ve written about in the past, announced that it added on a real estate platform via acquisition. Previously the CEO had hinted at such an action:
We already have 3 funds as I mentioned, down there in Brazil, in the Brazil Stock Exchange. And we also look for buying these — kind of these permanent capital structure funds through acquisitions through M&A. And if we do pursue M&A opportunities in the real estate arena, within real estate, there is several permanent capital structure funds in the region that were listed in the main stock exchanges in the region, Mexico, Colombia, Chile and Brazil, so we can also add these kinds of funds, not only organically, as I mentioned, but also through M&A.
PAX Q4-2021 Earnings Transcript
Today they described the acquisition:
Patria Investments (“Patria”) (NASDAQ: PAX), a global alternative asset manager, announced today an agreement to acquire VBI Real Estate (“VBI”), one of the top independent alternative real estate asset managers in Brazil, with approximately R$ 5 billion in assets under management across both development and core real estate vehicles. The transaction is structured in two stages, the first of which entails the acquisition of 50% of VBI by Patria. The second stage, when closed, will lead to full ownership and integration of VBI to Patria’s platform.
PAX Press Release
VBI has roughly 60% of its AUM via permanent capital structures (publicly traded REITs on the B3) and the rest via drawdown vehicles.
Overall, Patria has bolted on a real estate platform, credit platform, and growth equity platform to its existing PE and infrastructure flagships in a very short amount of time post IPO. Only time will tell if they are able to successfully increase distribution, cross-sell, and as well as maintain investment performance across these platforms. Time will tell.
Disclosure: We own shares of PAX, this is not investment advice. Do your own work.