US private equity firm WCAS buys majority stake in EquiLend
Welsh, Carson, Anderson and Stowe (WCAS), a private equity firm based in New York, USA, has acquired a majority stake in the securities lending platform EquiLend.
WCAS acquires majority stake in EquiLend
EquiLend says it expects the deal to complete in Q2 this year, subject to regulatory approvals. Financial terms of the acquisition have not been disclosed.
At the same time, WCAS is expected to commit a further $200 million to fund the organic growth and acquisition activities of EquiLend.
Brian Lamb, CEO of EquiLend, says the acquisition will “propel our business to new heights and enable us to do more than ever within securities finance and beyond”.
Founded in 2001 by a consortium of financial institutions including JP Morgan, Lehman Brothers and Goldman Sachs, EquiLend provides trading, post-trade, analytics, regtech and platform solutions for the securities finance industry.
Perhaps best recognised as the operator of the multi-asset class trading platform Next Generation Trading (NGT), the fintech claims to execute $2.4 trillion transactions for its nearly 200-strong client base every month.
Speaking on the deal, Ryan Harper, general partner at WCAS, says the firm sees EquiLend as “uniquely positioned to help drive further electronification, efficiency and innovation” in the securities finance industry.
