CERES INFRASTRUCTURE PRIVATE DEBT FUND
Ceres Infrastructure Asset Management runs the leading independent private debt fund dedicated to financing the renovation of existing core infrastructure assets in the United States of America.
Ceres partners with the public and/or private sector to finance large core infrastructure projects in various sectors such as transportation (airports, toll roads, bridges, tunnels, rail, parkings, etc.), distribution (water, waste and energy pipelines/grids), utilities, construction, telecommunication (optic fiber networks), social infrastructure (student housing, etc.) and specialty infrastructure (government/military buildings, courthouses, storages).
Ceres deploys large amounts of senior debt (> US$ 500 million) over the long term (> 20 years) to single infrastructure projects. Ceres is an alternative source of financing (to banks or muni-bonds) for municipalities/public entities, corporates and/or private equity funds to realize their asset renovation in a timely and cost-efficient manner.
Ceres is a flexible solution (sculpts the debt amortization based on the cash flow profile of the asset to be renovated before and during operations) and matches the maturity of the loan with the duration of the concession. Ceres hereby reduces annuities hence the financial stress of the project thanks to the long term and affordable nature of its financing (reducing annuities) and avoids the refinancing cost/risk. Ceres also prevents the debt to end up on the public entity and/or the operator’s balance sheets and enhances returns to shareholders of the project (private equity infrastructure funds, operators, etc.).
Ceres does not finance the acquisition of infrastructure assets. It focuses on providing the capex need and lends directly to a project company which has the concession to renovate the asset.
Ceres enables municipalities/public entities or corporates to keep their assets and renovate their infrastructure. Ceres does not ask the grantor (availability based) or the operator to pay anything or take part to the financing Ceres. Ceres, will simply carve out some of the future cash flows coming from such specific asset to amortize its loan.
For U.S. institutional investors, Ceres offers the ability to gain direct exposure to high quality assets and visible run-off cash flows from tangible real infrastructures by investing in this fixed income defensive asset class. Ceres enables pension funds to match their assets and liabilities, get recurring attractive yields in a current low yield environment, uncorrelated to the market, to benefit from the best in class risk/reward ratio.
For operators, Ceres enables access to larger and more numerous projects without the burden/barrier to entry based on the operator’s balance sheet or financing ability. Ceres increases the chances of bidding success rate with pre-financed bids, accelerates the bidding process, and enables realization of backlog, while enhancing returns per project.
For private equity infrastructure funds, Ceres will finance the renovation/capex of newly acquired assets hence enabling private equity funds to acquire larger assets, avoid them to invest in capex the renovation of the infrastructure and increase their IRR.
By helping to renovate core infrastructure assets, Ceres finances the creation of numerous employments over the long term. A renovated infrastructure with today’s quality standards ensures the optimized use of the asset and adapt infrastructures to new and evolving consumption with embedded/digital technology (sensors for self-driving cars, traffic information, cameras, lighting, etc.) while maximizes safety of users as well as emergency first responders (firemen, policemen, etc.). Municipalities also ensure they provide their taxpayers with new and best infrastructure.
Ceres is a real quantifiable socially responsible impact investing (ESG) product with long-lasting effects, which contributes to the real economy’s renovation. Ceres assists U.S. public entities in solving the infrastructure financing problem and helps offer a better service to communities, pensioners and taxpayers.