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Metropolis veteran Martin Gilbert has vowed he’ll “by no means” promote his shares in fintech Revolut as he invests in a brand new fund geared toward shopping for inventory from staff of fast-growing expertise companies globally.
Gilbert, who’s chair of London-based Revolut, is backing the LTC Make investments fund V with two different entrepreneurs, contributing a mixed $20mn, in accordance with folks conversant in the state of affairs.
The fund will snap up inventory in established tech corporations from present shareholders — resembling fintech employees who took shares of their firm — who’re eager to promote, in accordance with an investor presentation seen by the Monetary Occasions.
However this might rule out extremely valued corporations resembling Revolut, which secured a $45bn valuation on the finish of final yr, making it probably the most beneficial fintech corporations in Europe.
Gilbert instructed the FT in response: “I’ve no intention of ever promoting my Revolut shares.”
Early Revolut traders and staff offloaded nearly $1bn worth of stock in a collection of secondary share gross sales all through the second half of final yr. New consumers who sought publicity to the fintech included rich Goldman Sachs shoppers and Abu Dhabi’s sovereign fund Mubadala.
The presentation mentioned that a whole lot of billions of {dollars} “are locked in late stage expertise corporations” that had “fractured, multi-layered possession”, with restricted choices for traders in search of to money of their stake and exit.
The fund is being launched by the London Expertise Membership, a community of rich traders, entrepreneurs and establishments, with Gilbert’s backing, with a view to elevating $250mn to take a position. One in every of LTC Make investments’s present funds is a backer of Revolut.
LTC Make investments, an offshoot of the expertise membership, is within the technique of in search of regulatory approval as an funding supervisor for additional fund launches, in accordance with folks conversant in the state of affairs. Martin Gilbert will be a part of the board of LTC Make investments as chair of the funding committee, the folks added.
The agency is led by Konstantin Sidorov, founding father of the LTC community, and Denis Clean as chief funding officer. Clean reportedly left his job at Greek billionaire Maria Angelicoussis’s personal funding agency in 2023 over a pay dispute, and previously labored at Hermitage Capital, the funding fund co-founded by Invoice Browder. Clean declined to remark.
In keeping with LTC Make investments’s presentation, start-ups backed by enterprise capital, somewhat than personal fairness, lack “any significant secondary market specialist consumers,” making it troublesome for present traders to exit.
It mentioned that whereas companies backed by personal fairness corporations had been typically majority owned by one investor, corporations backed by enterprise capital had been normally owned by dozens, if not a whole lot, of particular person traders, who had their very own have to promote inventory at sure factors.
The presentation famous that this “mismatch of provide of secondary shares and lack of devoted capital” has created a possibility to purchase shares in late-stage expertise corporations at “distressed valuations”.
