LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Alpha Group International announced the launch of a new fund finance intermediary service on Wednesday, aimed at providing a better way for borrowers to access and manage their fund financing.
The AIM-traded company said the service would be part of its growing range of solutions for the alternative investment market.

It explained that the global fund finance market was sizable and growing, with funds typically borrowing from bank and non-bank lenders via short-term revolving credit facilities to optimise liquidity and returns throughout key stages in the fund's lifecycles.

However, accessing fund finance was typically a time-consuming and resource-intensive process, Alpha claimed.

It said its solution was aiming to overcome those challenges by providing borrowers with an end-to-end 'modular' service, tailored to each borrower's specific requirements.

That, the board said, would include matching and introducing the right lenders, through helping structure the "ideal" funding product and overseeing the execution of a facility.

Lenders would also benefit from the service by having fast access to a large and growing pool of pre-qualified borrowers, and streamlined administration of loans.

Alpha said it already held relationships with more than 800 fund managers through its existing origination engine.

The fund finance team would operate from Alpha's new alternative banking headquarters in Paddington, west London, and was being led by its new managing director of debt structuring Adam Heaysman, who was bringing more than 25 years of experience in private equity and fund finance to the company.

"From our time working in the alternative investment industry, we've become increasingly aware that, whilst there is strong appetite from borrowers and lenders for fund finance, there is also considerable difficulty and complexity involved in bringing the two together," said Sam Marsh, Alpha's managing director of institutional.

"Given the diversity of borrowing needs, we also realised that it's not possible for one provider to cater for everyone adequately and independently."

Marsh said with that in mind, the idea of creating a solution for connecting "the right borrowers" with "the right lenders", and streamlining the process, was conceived.

"With Adam and the team's experience in the fund finance market, combined with Alpha's scale and expertise, we're now in an excellent position to make this happen."

At 1154 BST, shares in Alpha Group International were down 0.42% at 2,270.4p.

Reporting by Josh White for Sharecast.com.

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