New Mexico State Investment Council (SIC) is among investors taking part in the first close of Blackstone’s debut infrastructure fund.
The $23.7bn (€19.4bn) endowment has approved a $100m investment in the fund, Blackstone Infrastructure Partners, according to a board meeting report.
New Mexico SIC is the latest investor in the fund to be revealed after IPE Real Assets reported that Pennsylvania Public School Employees’ Retirement System had approved a commitment.
The board meeting report shows that Blackstone expects to raise up to $5bn for the open-ended fund in the current quarter.
Blackstone declined a request for comment.
The company, which manages $120bn of real estate assets, announced plans to move into infrastructure last year. At the time, it said it hoped to raise $40bn of equity for the fund, with the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia agreeing to match third-party commitments up to $20bn.
One third of the $100m being committed to the fund by New Mexico SIC will be used for co-investments. It is the first time that New Mexico SIC has structured a commitment in this way for its $2.19bn real return portfolio.
New Mexico SIC could benefit from reduced management fees as a first-close investor. The Townsend Group, which is advising New Mexico SIC, stands to secure fee breaks for its pension fund clients if more than $300m is committed in aggregate, according to the board meeting report.
Blackstone Infrastructure Partners is targeting a net internal rate of return of 10% by investing in core and core-plus assets in primarily in North America – 30% of the portfolio can include assets in Western Europe.
The fund will focus on large-scale and complex opportunities that typically require equity investments of more than $1bn.
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