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What's New In Investments, Funds? – GAM, Liberty Street Advisors, DriveWealth

Editorial Staff

9 February 2022

GAM Investments
Zurich-listed GAM Investments has partnered with US-based registered investment advisor firm Liberty Street Advisors.

The partnership will give clients access to late-stage privately-owned technology and innovation-driven companies, GAM said in a statement. GAM intends to launch a capability which will use the expertise of Liberty Street’s private markets investment team. 

Growth equity is a segment of the private equity asset class which sits between venture capital and traditional private equity. GAM said that there are more than 900 venture capital backed companies valued at more than $1 billion.

“An increasing number of our clients are seeking to diversify their portfolios by including longer-term private asset investment strategies. In our view, privately-owned companies in their later-stage non-public funding rounds could offer investors strong long-term performance potential, while their historical downside resilience and lower volatility compared to public equities also make this asset class attractive for portfolio diversification,” Peter Sanderson, group chief executive at GAM Investments, said.

Kevin Moss, a managing director at Liberty Street, said: “We are seeing companies stay private for longer, driven primarily by regulatory changes, ease of business model development in the private sphere and a larger pool of available private capital. A significant portion of these companies’ value appreciation occurs prior to entry into the public markets, at mid or large-cap size. We believe that late-stage, private growth companies can present an attractive balance of risk and return for investors, compared to early-stage venture investments and public equities.”

DriveWealth
DriveWealth, a “fractional investing” firm, has acquired and launched two wholly-owned subsidiaries, DriveLiquidity and DriveDigital.

With “fractional investing,” investors buy a portion of a stock or some other entity such as a stake in a private equity fund, widening access to mass-affluent and retail clients otherwise unable to enter certain areas.

DriveWealth's new subsidiary DriveLiquidity will provide the capability to trade cryptocurrencies on a proprietary basis. The new subsidiary acts as a liquidity provider, both to DriveWealth and other cryptocurrency venues. DriveDigital is a cryptocurrency exchange platform.

The launch of such groups is an example of how digital assets, or cryptocurrencies and related entities, are becoming increasingly mainstream in the wealth management industry. 

"This next stage of growth for DriveWealth represents an additional milestone in support of our core mission – expanding access to notional investing," Bob Cortright, founder and CEO at DriveWealth said.