Barings Supports Oaktree’s Majority-Owned Portfolio Company AZ Next Generation Advisory
Barings, one of the world’s leading investment managers, today announced it has acted as joint lead arranger of A$345m of senior secured credit facilities supporting AZ Next Generation Advisory (“AZ NGA”), a leading independent financial advice and accounting firm aggregator in Australia. This follows a recent material investment in AZ NGA by funds managed by Oaktree Capital Management (“Oaktree”), alongside Azimut, a global group with expertise in asset management, wealth management, investment banking and fintechs.
Established in 2014, AZ NGA is an aggregator of minority and majority equity stakes in high-quality financial advisory and accounting firms across Australia. The Group strategically invests in leading financial planning businesses to support growth and enhance operational efficiencies by offering strategic support and expertise to assist in the delivery of superior services to their clients. Since inception, AZ NGA has established a robust network of over 30 independently branded partner firms, collectively managing over A$15 billion of assets under advice as of August 2024.
“AZ NGA and the leadership team have a proven track record and have established themselves as the growth and succession partner of choice for high performing financial advice and accounting firms. This investment is a continuation of our global support for the sector, which includes a number of comparable investments across Europe and the U.S.” said Justin Hooley, Head of Asia Pacific Private Credit at Barings.
The AZ NGA investment also marks Barings’ first deal with Oaktree in Australia. “We are excited to partner with Oaktree who has extensive expertise in this sector, and we are uniquely positioned to further support the expansion of the platform. We look forward to collaborating with Oaktree on this and future transactions.” Justin added.
Contacts:
APACMarketing@barings.com
About Barings
Barings is a US$421+ billion* global asset management firm that partners with institutional, insurance, and intermediary clients, and supports leading businesses with flexible financing solutions. The firm, a subsidiary of MassMutual, seeks to deliver excess returns by leveraging its global scale and capabilities across public and private markets in fixed income, real assets and capital solutions.
*As of December 31, 2024
