Private Equity

There are three main objectives of the private equity course:

1. To develop an understanding of the roles played by the various participants involved in private equity. The course will consider the attractions of private equity as an investment class. The organisation and incentive structures of private equity funds, and the complex relationship with the companies in which they invest are also analysed.

2. To apply many of the ideas and theories developed in the core finance courses to a particular sector of the financial industry. The private equity sector – involving both venture capital and buy-outs – is a particularly interesting sector to analyse. Private equity is used to finance many companies where the generic problems encountered when financing companies – such as uncertainty or asymmetric information – are especially acute and complex.

3. To critically evaluate the valuation techniques employed in private equity transactions. By their very nature, private equity investments (which lack market valuations provided by public equity markets) are those where valuation is often difficult, being highly sensitive to assumptions and methodology. This course reviews a variety of valuation techniques in the context of real private equity transactions.

This is an elective course for MLF students taking the finance stream.