The Credit Suisse Investment Foundation CSA has gathered another half a billion francs from pension funds, according to information obtained by finews.asia. The infrastructure fund received some of the money from rival banks.
The investment foundation of Switzerland’s second-largest bank (CSA) made headlines in 2019 when it joined other major shareholders to pursue the delisting of energy provider Alpiq against the wishes of hedge funds. It hasn’t been to the detriment of the CSA – the energy infrastructure investor has since received a further 487 million Swiss francs ($496 million) from domestic pension funds.
With a total of 1.7 billion francs in money pledged, CSA today is the largest Swiss fund that invests its assets exclusively into Swiss energy infrastructure. It has now closed the books for the time being.
Fund for Critical Infrastructure
«After the latest capital increase, CSA Energy Infrastructure Switzerland has now signed up more than 170 Swiss pension funds,» said Roland Doerig in an interview with finews.asia.
The former energy adviser and Dominik Bollier are co-heads of Credit Suisse Infrastructure Partners, which is managing the CSA foundation for the bank. The infrastructure partners are an investment boutique of Credit Suisse dedicated to the energy sector.
The investment fund, launched in 2014, was only open for Swiss pension funds. The basic idea behind the vehicle was to put Swiss national assets into vital energy infrastructure for an open-end period of time – in hydropower, Swissgrid (the high-voltage-network) and the Transitgas pipeline that connects the North and the South of Europe.
Money From Rivals
The focus on critical infrastructure and distribution networks helped create a conservative risk profile despite the highly volatile electricity market, said Doerig. The performance of the CSA wasn’t revealed to the public, but pension funds are said to be highly satisfied, according to the fund manager.
Half of the money the fund recently generated came from 40 new investors, increasing the number of pension funds invested in CSA to 173. A fifth of the funds are managing pension rights from banks and insurers – so Credit Suisse rivals are indirectly investing in the CS fund.
Major Players in Energy
UBS launched a clean energy infrastructure fund for Switzerland at around the same time as its smaller rival and collected some 472 million francs by September of 2019. Its focus is on the production of sustainable energy as well as the supply of energy and waste disposal.
The two funds run by Switzerland’s big two banks have made UBS and Credit Suisse major players in the Swiss energy business.
Global Interests
To be sure, Doerig and his 35-strong team of experts at Energy Infrastructure Partners has already reached across borders – the CS Energy Infrastructure Europe 1 fund, for instance, is placing assets of institutional investors in critical infrastructure across Europe.
The energy experts participated in the construction of Europe’s largest wind farm in 2016, an investment in cooperation with Norway’s Statkraft. Statkraft is the state-owned energy provider in the Nordic country, which in turn has a major investment in Credit Suisse through its Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM).
Credit Suisse’s fund is working to build a pipeline of stakes outside Europe – with projects in Asia, Latin America, and the U.S. The volume is said to involve the potential for another billion francs. That would be more than plenty to make it an energy giant in emerging markets.
