ICG buys structuring talent for infrastructure debt

ICG has launched a European infrastructure debt strategy, first reported by Alternative Credit Investor, and hired the two investors who will establish and lead it—Augustin Segard in London from Schroders Capital and Grégoire Castres Saint Martin in Paris from Antin Infrastructure Partners—to provide financing solutions to infrastructure deals, projects and businesses across Europe, focused on core and core+ sectors.

The résumés say more about the mandate than the announcement does. Segard spent his most recent years as head of junior infrastructure debt at Schroders Capital, leading the JULIE fund series, which the coverage describes as investing in European infrastructure assets, after earlier roles at AXA Investment Managers and InfraRed Capital Partners; Castres Saint Martin was managing director in Antin's financing team, structuring financings across the capital structure, after infrastructure financing and advisory work at BNP Paribas. Junior debt sits below the senior loans most European infrastructure borrowers place with their lenders, and it gets priced in negotiation rather than on a screen—two hires with that profile suggest ICG is setting up a desk to originate and structure subordinate and structured risk, not to buy the senior tranches that every insurer already competes for.

Benoît Durteste, ICG's chief investment officer and chief executive, framed the launch as "a natural extension of our platform" and pointed to "a market-leading infrastructure business" alongside ICG's credit heritage, while Alternative Credit Investor's related coverage puts ICG's assets at $126bn, up 11%, and its European corporate fund at €12bn. That scale lets a manager hold loans while it works out how to fund them—and the launch announcement names no vehicle, no target size and no funding route.

The managers who can reuse the structure will own the liability chain. KKR reopened its Lending Partners shelf in August with a $624 million static CLO, a non-reinvesting vehicle built out of a portfolio it already held, and Onex and Aristotle Pacific brought $756 million of CLO paper to market as the reset wave rolled on. Whether European infrastructure loans can be warehoused and term-funded the same way is unconfirmed; the coverage does not say. ICG's balance sheet gives it the room to find out.

Buying structuring talent is the smarter half of this trade. Junior infrastructure risk is a negotiated market where a new entrant can win on terms and documentation, while senior infrastructure debt is a spread contest settled by whoever has the cheapest liabilities. If the first mandates come back senior, ICG has hired two well-regarded investors into a business that does not reward hiring. If they come back subordinated, it has bought the one capability the platform lacked—and the tranche it takes on deal one will say which strategy this is long before the first close does.