Global Opportunistic Fund I Declares a Pay Out of 5%
Global Investment House “Global” announced today that Global Opportunistic Fund I (“GOFI” or the “Fund”) is declaring a pay out of approximately 5% and along with earlier distributions, the total distributions for the Fund aggregate to approximately 30% of the capital invested to the unit holders on record as on June 30th, 2008.
Mr. Shailesh Dash, Head of Alternative Investments Group at Global, declared that “the payout represents the principal and net investment income from fully exiting Dana Gas and partially exiting from Depa and Ithmaar Bank as well as dividend payouts from various portfolio companies.”
Mr. Shailesh Dash added that, “The Fund exited its position partially from Depa and Ithmaar and made a return of approximately 212% and 62% (excluding dividend) respectively. The Fund completely exited from Dana gas and the return on the final portion of the stake was 108%.”
Mr. Dash further stated that Depa plans to expand operations into Jordan in the coming months as part of its regional expansion plans and has identified Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain.
Mr. Dash also mentioned that Depa recently acquired a further 22.2% stake, worth AED 27.9 million, in Jordan Wood Industries Company (JWICO), bringing Depa’s total holding in this company to 36.4%. This step will help strengthen Depa’s foothold in the Jordanian market and marks the first step to establish Depa Jordan.
He further stated that shares of Depa were sold as part of the IPO (London as well as Dubai listing) and Ithmaar on the Bahrain Stock Exchange as post listing on the Kuwait Stock Market in which the price performance has been impressive along with increased liquidity. Both of these exits also met the exit criteria.
He added that efforts during the coming quarter will be to assist our portfolio companies in their respective expansion plans as well as the selection of investment bankers and underwriters for their respective IPOs.
Mr. Dash further stated that the above returns are calculated on the sale prices and do not include dividends received on these companies.
About Global’s Private Equity Team
Global’s private equity investments began shortly after establishing Global in 1998 and has managed to develop further as its first private equity fund was launched in 2003. Starting with a team of 3 in 2005, the private equity team today employs a team of 38 professionals, the largest dedicated private equity team & investment professionals in the MENA region with cumulative work experience of more than 200 years.
The team comprises of 11 nationalities spanning the MENA region and South Asia enabling it to prove a local perspective for deals in all target regions. The teams employs diverse work experience and backgrounds ranging from private equity, investment banking, transaction advisory, venture capital, financial research, strategy consulting, credit rating and auditing. The team employs its in-house due diligence team for quick and thorough financial due diligence on time critical deals. The Private Equity Team currently manages nearly USD 3 billion from 5 funds of which it committed more than USD 1.2 billion into over 50 portfolio companies spread across the MENA region, Turkey, India and China spanning across 15 different sectors.
