Darby CCD Targets Mid-Sized Mexico Buys

Darby Overseas Investments plans to raise its first Mexico-specific fund through the certificados de capital de desarrollo (CCD) market. “We will look to continue doing what we’ve been doing in Mexico for the last 15 years,” MD Jaime Salinas tells LatinFinance. Darby has made 10 investments in Mexico since 1996, he explains, and exited 7. The shop has played in Mexico through LatAm-wide funds, the most recent of which raised $175m and is now fully invested. Salinas says the CCD aims to raise around MXP2bn and target – as it has in the past – medium size companies in a variety of industries in Mexico with equity and quasi-equity investments. Ideally, the transaction would close by the end of the year, Salinas says. A parallel fund, common among PE CCDs, is likely. The 10-year CCD will have a 5-year investment period. Bank of America Merrill Lynch is managing the transaction.