Investment manager AGL Credit Management and Barclays have launched a new private credit investment platform, with backing from the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority.
AGL Private Credit (AGL PC) will have exclusive access to Barclays’ deal flow as well as originating deals directly. It will focus on senior secured loans to large corporate borrowers and will seek to capitalise on what it calls “an attractive and growing opportunity at the convergence of the private credit, broadly syndicated loan and high yield bond markets.”
The new firm will operate as an independent manager, with complete control over origination, asset selection, portfolio construction and portfolio management.
The platform has received an anchor commitment from a wholly owned subsidiary of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, a sovereign wealth fund.
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“We have the remarkable opportunity to combine our firm’s deep capabilities in corporate credit investing with access to Barclays’ strong origination, sector and advisory expertise to form a leading private credit platform,” said AGL founder and chief executive Peter Gleysteen.
“As the traditional leveraged finance and private credit markets continue to evolve, this is a synergistic extension of our market-leading specialised investment business. We are pleased to collaborate with Barclays to offer its clients the private credit benefits of certainty, speed and long-term investment alignment and separately for AGL to provide a private credit opportunity to our investor universe.”
The new platform will incorporate key elements of AGL’s investment model with decisions made by AGL’s investment committee and will be supported by the firm’s investing resources and operational infrastructure.
Gleysteen will lead AGL PC and its team of 11 investment professionals, including Taylor Boswell, AGL’s head of private credit. AGL also recently hired Phil Capparis as chief risk officer to oversee risk management across AGL’s investments, including AGL PC.
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“This is the next step in building out Barclays’ private credit capabilities to complement the top-tier capability of our existing Leveraged Finance platform, which continues to evolve and respond to market dynamics,” said Taylor Wright, co-head of investment banking at Barclays.
“Across our client base, there is a strong desire to work with a single partner who can deliver the full range of financing solutions to meet their strategic objectives and AGL’s strong investment capabilities and track record make them an ideal collaborator for us in this venture.”
Hamad Shahwan Al Dhaheri, executive director of the private equities department at ADIA, said: “ADIA has been an investor in AGL since it launched in 2019, and this anchor commitment to AGL PC will support the next phase of the company’s growth. We see strong investing synergies from the combination of AGL and Barclays’ expertise, creating a differentiated private credit platform that aims to address a clear market opportunity.”
AGL Credit Management launched in March 2019 and has more than $14bn (£11.1bn) in assets under management.
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The $1.7tn private debt market is booming, with investment managers, banks and sovereign wealth funds all eager to tap into the sector’s attractive risk/return profile.
Another Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund, Mubadala Investment Company, has invested in private credit funds managed by Apollo Global Management and Ares in recent months.
