Episode summary
A Hong Kong Family Office on Private Markets, Data Centers and the Next Generation
Summary
Sergio Belza says client demand at Aneto Capital is moving away from a 60/40 public-market model and toward private markets, especially private equity, venture capital and private debt, with a stronger push for institutional access. He also says the next generation is changing portfolio design by demanding value-led investing, impact and sustainability, along with simpler structures and less financial complexity.
On the opportunity set, Belza highlights direct lending, real assets and private equity secondaries. He argues direct lending is attractive because banks are pulling back, the loans are usually collateralized, and clients can align capital with their values. He also says real assets are shifting toward technology infrastructure such as data centers, and that roughly a third of his clients have direct or indirect exposure there.
Belza links data centers to both AI demand and geopolitics, saying data sovereignty matters as much as compute power. On portfolio construction, he favors feeder funds for efficiency, discretionary mandates for core holdings, and direct co-investments for sophisticated clients. He also says many portfolios are split between high liquidity and very illiquid assets, while reporting and presentation should be simplified so clients can see risk, income and liquidity clearly.
Key takeaways
- Belza says clients are moving from public markets toward private markets and now want institutional access rather than retail-style exposure.
- He says the next generation is pushing value-driven, impact and sustainability goals, along with simpler portfolios and reporting.
- Belza sees direct lending as compelling because banks are retreating and collateralized lending offers an attractive risk-return profile.
- He says about one-third of his clients have exposure to data centers, which he links to AI growth and data sovereignty concerns.
- He says feeder funds, discretionary mandates and direct co-investments each fit different client needs, fees and sophistication levels.
Notable quotes
“we are seeing a clear shift from public markets um towards private markets”
“they are asking for institutional access whereas before uh they were happier with a different kind of access”
“onethird of our clients is directly or indirectly in the data center business”
“I call it customization because it is not the same for all the clients”
How the episode opens
Sergio, client demand across high netw worth and ultra high netw worth segments is shifting fast. What are your clients asking for now that they were not a few years ago?
Thank you very much Courtney for um this interview. This is a very interesting question indeed. Um things evolve um so do our clients.
So maybe just to summarize a little bit um we are seeing a clear shift from public markets um towards private markets. Maybe a few years ago the clients were satisfied with a standard let's say 60 40 uh% public market private market split. This is now changing.
uh we see more demand for private markets like private equity uh venture capital even private debt notwithstanding all the problems except maybe the main difference is that they are asking for institutional access whereas before uh they were happier with a different kind of access. Um maybe the second uh change that we see here is the gen the influence of the next generation. Um wealth is being transferred to the next generation.
Uh which also has a strong demand for valuedriven investing which was not the case in the previous generation. So things like impact investing and sustainability and very personalized. So what is our impact of the family?
So not only returns, financial returns but also um sustainability returns and impact. So both um I think this is very new. This is coming from the new generation.
And finally I would say and this is really a summary um less financial complexities. So before we were used to doing complex products you know from structured products
Uh to um convertible bonds with complicated formulas I mean they are not that complicated but uh uh it was more complex portfolios whereas now um we really see a demand in the global asset allocation um for among other things this Three main ideas.
From the episode’s captions: roughly the first two minutes, lightly cleaned. Keep watching on YouTube →
Topics
- private markets shift
- institutional access
- data center exposure
- next generation investing
- risk-adjusted opportunities
Companies and tickers mentioned
- Aneto Capital
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Summary, takeaways and quote selection by Octagon. Quotes are short excerpts; the full conversation is in the episode.
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