Author: Lily Harper

Asset managers have it easy. The parties, the access, the spreadsheets. And the money isn’t bad. However, to keep the show on the road, there is the minor detail of winning and retaining clients. But what if you just bought them?While this isn’t exactly what private equity firms have done, neither is it completely not what they’ve done. As the Bank of England wrote in its latest Financial Stability Report:Historically, PE business models have relied on PE firms or financial sponsors (general partners) raising funding at arm’s length from investors (limited partners) such as insurers, pension schemes, and family offices.…

One thing to start: The US Treasury department has called on Congress to scrap a provision in Donald Trump’s flagship budget bill that would allow Washington to raise taxes on foreign investments, reversing a plan that had spooked Wall Street.And a scoop: The private equity owner of the former KPMG restructuring and advisory business Interpath is poised to appoint bankers to manage a sale of the company at a target valuation of about £800mn.Welcome to Due Diligence, your briefing on dealmaking, private equity and corporate finance. This article is an on-site version of the newsletter. Premium subscribers can sign up…

Stay informed with free updatesSimply sign up to the Private equity myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox.The private equity owner of the former KPMG restructuring and advisory business Interpath is poised to appoint bankers to manage a sale of the company at a target valuation of about £800mn. Banks have this week begun pitching to HIG Capital to advise on the sale of Interpath Advisory, according to people familiar with the matter, kicking off a formal sale process for the former KPMG restructuring business.HIG will appoint banks to help it sell Interpath for about £800mn, four years after…

Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for freeYour guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the worldDonald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” has become an opportunity for special interest groups of all types to make a bid for whatever goodies they think they deserve. Running to more than 1,000 pages, it has become the perfect opportunity to request beneficial changes that, fair or not, will be pretty much drowned out in all the noise. An example is the debate over pass-through companies, and one type in particular. The American tax code has created a whole class of…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.American consumers are tapped out. From fast food to designer handbags, inflation-weary shoppers are balking at paying more. Companies therefore struggle to raise prices without losing customers. But one industry has escaped this penny-pinching: premium credit cards.At a time when companies are touting price cuts, two of the country’s top credit card issuers are doing the opposite. JPMorgan this month raised the annual fee on its luxury card — the Chase Sapphire Reserve — to $795. That is a 45 per cent…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Jes Staley has failed to overturn a decision by the Financial Conduct Authority that he “recklessly” misled the regulator about his ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, in a major setback to the former chief executive of Barclays.In a judgment handed down on Thursday by the Upper Tribunal, judge Timothy Herrington said Staley did not fully disclose to Barclays the nature of his relationship with the dead financier.“We have noted Mr Staley’s achievements as chief executive of Barclays, but in our…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.EU lawmakers have reached a long-awaited political agreement to revamp how the bloc manages failing banks, in a move aimed at bolstering financial stability and minimising the impact on taxpayers.The deal, struck late on Tuesday between EU countries and the European parliament, updates the EU’s crisis management and deposit insurance framework, a cornerstone of the bloc’s post-financial crisis banking reforms. The compromise was “a significant step forward in our efforts to strengthen financial stability, protect depositors, and avoid burdening taxpayers’ money when banks…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.As the Genius Act moves inexorably towards legislation, US banks are likely to come under more pressure to do business with stablecoin issuers and cryptoasset firms. But this might cause them new regulatory troubles. The Federal Reserve, like most global supervisors, has always included in its risk ratings a measure of “reputational risk” — the risk that doing some kinds of business might attract unfavourable publicity and lead to either business franchise damage or in the worst case, a bank run.How are…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.One of Hong Kong’s biggest property developers is in talks to refinance billions of dollars in bank loans following years of ambitious debt-fuelled expansion, adding to pressures in the Chinese territory’s struggling real estate market.New World Development borrowed money for projects that people inside and outside the company have characterised as “aggressive”. They include a HK$20bn (US$2.6bn) retail and office space near Hong Kong’s airport and several mainland Chinese developments, including a $1.3bn mixed-use complex in Shenzhen.This week the company said it…

When RSM Tenon, the UK’s first publicly listed accounting firm, collapsed in 2013, it marked the failure of the profession’s decade-long experiment with the public markets.A number of acquisitions left the UK’s then top-10 auditor saddled with debt it couldn’t service and accounting errors that regulators put down to “extensive misconduct”. RSM Tenon was put into administration and investors moved on.But the experiment is suddenly back on. In a profession that historically operated as private partnerships, advisers and executives are predicting a wave of initial public offerings in the next few years.Advocates say firms’ interest in the public markets is…