Fund Management

The UK Chancellor has increased the tax burden on the country's beleaguered buyout executives. But his move is carefully calculated to keep the industry in London, writes Nicholas Lockley.

US bank Citi is considering backing a leveraged loan debt vehicle set up by US buyout firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts to take advantage of the $300 billion leveraged loan backlog.

Kabir Misra is in charge of a new Softbank affiliate that is making its mark across Asia.

Asian private equity will not escape unscathed from the global credit crunch.

Blackstone bets on Indian construction * CLSA leads $60m Chinese water financing * Longreach, Phoenix in IT bail-out * Another Oz buyout fails * Chinese VCs busier than ever * US hedge funds bail out Taiwanese bank

China to relax rules on foreign equity ownership * Australia clears private equity purchase of Symbion Health * Thailand: civil servant recommends alternative assets move * China restricts insurance deals

Eric Mason heads up The Carlyle Group's leveraged finance division for Asia, a new initiative for the Washington-based private equity group which also runs debt investment teams in Europe and the US. Mason joined Carlyle in June, just before the beginning of the US subprime crisis. Before Carlyle, Mason was managing director and co-head of JP Morgan Syndicated & Leveraged Finance Asia Pacific.

The subprime meltdown is threatening to prevent the LBO model from gaining further ground in Asia. But not everyone involved in Asian private equity has succumbed to pessimism yet, finds Sharon Lim.

Leading Japanese private equity group Advantage Partners is making a $2 billion foray into hedge fund management.

When the banks underwriting Cerberus' $7.4 billion ( e5.4 billion) acquisition of Chrysler and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts' £11.1 billion ( e16.3 billion; $22.3 billion) acquisition of Alliance Boots found themselves unable to syndicate several billion dollars of debt, it was a sure sign that sub-prime mortgage turmoil had begun to impact the leveraged buyout market substantially. At the end of August, analysts reported that banks were still waiting to offload $330 billion of debt from agreed deals, and some predicted there would be no more mega-buyouts struck this year, and possibly well into 2008. PEI talked with William Allen, founder of London-based leveraged debt advisor Blenheim Advisors, to get his views on the implications of the credit crunch.