Lone Star targets $7bn for Fund IX

The Dallas-based distressed investor closed its prior fund on $5bn last May.

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Dallas-based Lone Star is led by chairman John Grayken. Since it was founded in 1995, the firm has raised 12 private equity funds, including three real estate vehicles, with aggregate commitments totaling $45 billion. Lone Star’s most recent real estate fund closed on $7 billion in October 2013, according to the firm’s website.

Lone Star has launched its Fund IX with a $7 billion target, according to documents filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

The launch of Fund IX comes less than a year after Lone Star closed its eighth fund on its $5 billion hard-cap. Fund VIII was raised after less than a year of marketing, sources previously told Private Equity International. Lone Star targets distressed investments in loans and securities, including single family residential, corporate and consumer debt products and financially oriented and asset-rich operating companies in the US, Western Europe and Japan.

The firm was unavailable for comment at press time.

It is unclear whether Lone Star will engage a placement agent to help raise Fund IX. Lone Star did not use a placement agent for Fund VIII, despite having engaged UBS for its two prior funds. Fund VIII received a $400 million commitment from the Oregon Investment Council. Other limited partners in the fund include the Houston Firefighters’ Relief and Retirement Fund, New Mexico Educational Retirement Board and the State of Wisconsin Investment Board, according to PEI’s Research and Analytics division.

Lone Star Fund VII raised $4.6 billion in 2011. None of Lone Star’s funds have topped the amount of capital raised for Fund VI, which closed on $7.5 billion in July 2008, according to the firm’s website.

Dallas-based Lone Star is led by chairman John Grayken. Since it was founded in 1995, the firm has raised 12 private equity funds, including three real estate vehicles, with commitments totaling $45 billion. Lone Star’s most recent real estate fund closed on $7 billion in October 2013, according to the firm’s website.