Sovereign funds new anchors for IPOs

These are among the top 10 anchor investors in big IPOs this year

What’s common between the IPOs of Eris Lifesciences, ICICI Lombard, SBI Life Insurance and Security & Intelligence Services (India) is The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) was the common anchor investor in all these IPOs, which were also some of the biggest issues this year.

ADIA is not alone. Sovereign wealth funds and pension funds have emerged as the top anchor investors in Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) this year. 

Take top 10 IPOs by size this year (see table), three to four out of top 10 anchor investors in these issues were sovereign wealth funds such as ADIA, GIC or pension funds