After sealing first deal in Israel, Jared Kushner sets sights on Phoenix Agencies
After sealing first deal in Israel, Jared Kushner sets sights on Phoenix Agencies
Phoenix Holdings is trying to bring in a partner to Phoenix Agencies, valued at more than a billion dollars. Jared Kushner's Affinity Partners is in advanced negotiations to purchase a quarter of the company
The investment fund led by Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of former U.S. President Donald Trump, is currently engaged in advanced negotiations to acquire a 25% stake in Phoenix Insurance Agencies at a valuation of $1 billion.
The investment in the Shlomo Group immediately raised questions about the possibility that another Affinity transaction will come to fruition. This involves a move by Phoenix Holdings to bring in a partner to the Phoenix Agencies, which controls eight insurance agencies valued at more than a billion dollars.
As revealed in Calcalist, Affinity Partners is the leading contender in the race. The emerging outline indicates Phoenix will directly sell 25% of the shares of the Phoenix Agencies to Affinity for about $250 million.
Affinity has competition for the deal, including from Blackstone, which is the largest alternative asset manager in the world, the British fund Pollen Street Capital, and the American funds Reverence Capital Partners and Searchlight Capital, which is the controlling owner of Bezeq.
Assuming Affinity wins the tender, it has every intention of carrying out the transaction, which is being managed for Phoenix by the Jefferies Group. A source privy to the details of the transaction between Affinity and the Shmeltzer family told Calcalist that the fund "hopes that the deal with Shlomo Holdings will not be its last in Israel," and emphasized that the fund is currently examining more than three additional transactions in Israel. In fact, since the fund was established in 2021, it has examined more than 1,000 companies, and made investments of more than $700 million out of the $3 billion it raised, mainly from Saudi Arabia's wealth fund, in 2021.
For the owners of Phoenix Holdings, the American investment funds Centerbridge and Gallatin Point, this upcoming deal is a kind of substitute for the sale of control of Phoenix itself. The two funds, which own 33% of Phoenix's shares, signed a memorandum of understanding in December with the ADQ Fund, one of Abu Dhabi's sovereign wealth funds, to sell the majority of the controlling shares (25%) in Phoenix for NIS 2.3 billion ($600 million) and according to a company value of NIS 9.2 billion ($2.39 billion). The memorandum of understanding was canceled in July, after the buyers withdrew due to regulatory difficulties.
The transaction to sell a share of the Phoenix Agencies is the second time that Kushner's name has been associated with the largest insurance and finance group in Israel in terms of market value. In 2014, the Kushner family signed a deal to acquire control of Phoenix itself from Delek Group, the controlling owner at the time, for NIS 1.6 billion and at a value of more than NIS 3 billion. Later, the Kushner family asked for a discount, but the deal - which also encountered regulatory difficulties - did not materialize. In 2019, Delek Group sold control to Centerbridge and Gallatin Point, the current controlling owners of Phoenix, at a value of NIS 6 billion.
