LPC-AnaCap buys 177 million euro Barclays' loan portfolio

By Claire Ruckin

LONDON (Reuters) - Specialist European financial services private equity firm AnaCap Financial Partners has agreed to acquire a 177 million euro (£152.7 million) loan portfolio from Barclays, it announced on Tuesday.

The portfolio, which has a gross book value of €177m, is made up of Italian performing and non-performing corporate secured loans.

The loans are primarily to small and medium-sized corporates, secured against real estate located mostly in the north of Italy.

Last month, AnaCap Private Equity Funds also agreed to acquire Barclays’ French retail banking operations, becoming AnaCap’s sixth banking platform in Europe.

Last year AnaCap’s Credit Funds’ acquired three portfolios of unsecured and secured non-performing loans from GE, RBS and UniCredit, totalling around €2.5bn.

The portfolios from GE Capital Real Estate and RBS comprised Italian non-performing, secured and unsecured loans to small and medium-sized enterprises, totalling more than €2bn. The secured positions were held against residential and commercial property. At the time, AnaCap had purchased about €8bn worth of Italian bad loans over a four year period.

(Editing by Christopher Mangham)