Vanguard Group will expand its partnership with alternative money manager HarbourVest Partners this summer to give retail investors access to private equity.
The money management giant said in a news release Wednesday the strategy will be available initially to eligible non-advised Vanguard clients and in the near future will be made available to eligible advised clients of Vanguard Personal Advisor Services.
"We look forward to providing our qualified individual investors access to our partnership with HarbourVest, one of the industry's premier private equity providers," said Matt Benchener, managing director of Vanguard Retail Investor Group, in the news release. "Our extensive private equity research suggests that investors who can access high-quality, broadly diversified strategies with top private equity managers can potentially realize significant financial benefits over long time horizons."
Vanguard's partnership with HarbourVest began in February 2020 and featured Vanguard's first entry into the private equity market. HarbourVest, which was designated a subadviser, designed the Vanguard HarbourVest 2020 Private Equity Fund for Vanguard's outsourced CIO clients.
On Feb. 16, Vanguard announced that it closed the fund at nearly double its target size, and that the 2021 vintage private equity fund was open for investment. Vanguard spokesman Charles Kurtz declined to provide the amount at which the fund closed.
Francis M. Kinniry, principal and head of private investments at Vanguard, said in written comments in February "over time, we aim to expand access to qualified (retail) investors in additional channels."
As of March 31, Vanguard Group had $7.5 trillion in assets under management.
