FORTUNE — The Carlyle Group (CG) today confirmed the poorly-kept secret that it is buying Los Angeles-based asset management firm TCW Group from Société Générale.
No financial terms were disclosed for the deal, although an earlier press report put the enterprise value for TCW at approximately $700 million. Carlyle will hold around a 60% position, with TCW management and employees holding the remainder. Former TCW fixed income boss David Lippman will take over as company president and CEO, with current CEO Marc Stern transitioning into a chairmanship role.
Société Générale had acquired a majority stake in TCW eleven years ago for approximately $800 million, later boosting the position to 85%. But the French bank wrote down the value of its TCW stake by around €200 million earlier this month, in a move that helped contribute to a 42% drop in quarterly profit.
Nothing too shocking about a private equity firm acquiring an asset manager. The only interesting twist here, however, is that Carlyle opted to make TCW a regular portfolio company, rather than integrate the firm into Carlyle’s own asset management platform.
Carlyle has significantly expanded its asset base via acquisition over recent years, most notably with last year’s purchase of private equity fund-of-funds and secondaries manager AlpInvest. In fact, having “public currency” to make such deals was one of the reasons Carlyle went public earlier this year.
TCW would have nearly doubled the firm’s AUM by contributing around $130 billion, and really blown out its hedge fund business. Instead, it will be held inside of two Carlyle private equity funds. Don’t be surprised to see TCW on the IPO calendar within the next couple of years.
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