SGAM Alternative Investments has launched an investment fund dedicated to the art market that it says is the first investment structure backed by a leading global asset manager to offer in
SGAM Alternative Investments has launched an investment fund dedicated to the art market that it says is the first investment structure backed by a leading global asset manager to offer investors a financial placement based on the art market that benefits from strict regulation with regard to reporting and transparency.
The fund will use private equity techniques and rely on partnerships with an international and exclusive network of art consultants, dealers and auction houses to guarantee the convergence of financial interests. The fund will aim for a rate of return of between 15 and 20 per cent net per year over a period of eight years.
SGAM AI says the fund will have access to 20th and 21st century works of art of great aesthetic and historical value, whose selection criteria will be approved by an art committee composed of international curators, historians and private collectors internationally recognised for their expertise and integrity.
Members of the committee include Jean Manuel Bonet, former director of the Valencia Institute of Modern Art and the National Museum Centre of Art Reina Sofia in Madrid, and Hélène Kelmachter, curator of the Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art.
With the art market becoming more and more professional, direct investments in the sector are becoming increasingly difficult, SGAM AI says. By combining complementary areas of expertise from the fields of art and finance, the asset manager has sought to create the conditions for access to artists with great potential, as well as to previously unknown works of art, under optimised economic conditions.
SGAM Alternative Investments is a wholly owned subsidiary of Société Générale Asset Management with EUR53.3bn in assets under management at the end of March and 360 employees worldwide. The SGAM Group as a whole, including TCW and BAREP, manages a total of EUR66.6bn in alternative investments assets, of which EUR13.4bn is in hedge funds. SGAM had a total of EUR371bn in assets under management at the end of March.
