China’s sovereign wealth fund has sold its stake in Blackstone Group more than a decade after investing in the world’s largest private equity firm.
China Investment Corp. no longer holds non-voting common units in the firm, according to a regulatory filing this month. Beijing Wonderful Investments, an entity set up by CIC, did not own any of the units on February 16, the filing shows.
CIC, which first purchased a $3 billion stake as part of Blackstone’s initial public offering in June 2007, had been winding down its interest over recent years. After making its exit, the sovereign wealth fund continues to do business with the alternative asset manager.
“We greatly value our partnership with CIC and are grateful for their successful, long-term investment in our firm,” a spokesperson for New York-based Blackstone said in an emailed statement. “We continue to expand this important relationship as one of CIC’s major asset managers and look forward to working closely together.”
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At the end of last year, Blackstone managed $434 billion of assets, including private equity, real estate, credit, and hedge funds.
CIC’s purchase of the firm’s non-voting units in 2007 gave the sovereign wealth fund a 9.3 percent stake in Blackstone’s equity, according to the alternative asset manager’s annual report for 2008.
The sovereign wealth fund held as many as 109,083,468 non-voting units in February 2009, before reducing its holding to 20,891,886 units as recently as November, filings show. CIC’s representative office in New York didn’t immediately return a phone call seeking comment about the exit from its investment.
Blackstone’s shares were trading around $34 each at 3 p.m. Wednesday, down slightly from Tuesday’s close. The asset management firm went public at $31 a share in 2007.
