Private Equity/Venture Capital

A Framework for Benchmarking Private Investments

Executive Summary Private investments often play an important role in an investor’s portfolio, yet the inconsistent methodologies typically used to evaluate private investment performance and public market performance result in a lack of understanding about true relative performance. The two most common measures of investment performance—time-weighted returns (TWRs) and money-weighted returns, typically an internal rate…

Global ex US PE/VC Benchmark Commentary: Fourth Quarter 2013

The Cambridge Associates LLC Global ex US Developed Markets Private Equity and Venture Capital (PE/VC) Index rose 6.5% in US$ terms in fourth quarter 2013, its sixth consecutive positive quarter, bringing its return for 2013 to 16.3%. The Cambridge Associates LLC Emerging Markets PE/VC Index rose 7.3% in fourth quarter and 13.6% for the year….

Investment Opportunities in Sub-Saharan Africa

Africa’s changing political and economic landscape over recent decades offers investment prospects worthy of consideration. In this report, we address the key opportunities and risks associated with public (long-only and hedge funds) and private market investing in sub-Saharan Africa, with an emphasis on Frontier Africa. We find that public markets exhibit attractively low correlations to…

Growth Equity Is All Grown Up

Growth equity has matured and evolved into a distinct asset class with different characteristics from both venture capital and private equity, and may represent an attractive alternative for certain investors. For those old enough to remember the commercials, U.S. growth equity could perhaps be called the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup of the private investment world….

Restoring Balance to GP-LP Relationships

The current environment provides institutional investors a unique opportunity to bring their alternative asset fund manager relationships into better alignment and this paper presents our perspective on what terms we consider to be reasonable for non-marketable alternative asset strategies and hedge fund strategies.

U.S. Venture Capital Investing

While the recent uncertainty and volatility in economic and financial markets have made it difficult to ascertain the outlook for the venture capital market, these conditions may also serve to create a better supply/demand balance down the road. We continue to regard select high-quality venture capital managers as an effective means to capture returns from…