Rev. Date March 18, 2024
Due to its less transparent and illiquid nature, private assets are often analyzed differently than the public sleeves of a portfolio. As investors continue to increase exposure to private assets, there is a greater need to understand the role of private assets in diversified portfolios and how to plan for the liquidity needs. Venn’s Private Assets Lab is a specialized solution to help analyze such less transparent, private asset classes.
Venn’s Private Asset Lab includes private asset datasets and various analytic tools to facilitate multi-asset portfolio analysis:
Private Asset Data Library - Venn provides metadata, fund performance characteristics and/or cash flows for more than 18,000 funds, as well as the returns data for private asset indices. Users may also upload their own fund data to analyze on Venn.[1]
Desmoothing, Interpolation, and Extrapolation - using Venn’s desmoothing, interpolation, and extrapolation features, clients can view private asset returns through a more public lens and analyze a multi-asset portfolio more holistically.
Private Asset Performance Metrics - Venn provides visualization of private asset performance metrics, including IRR and public market equivalents (“PMEs”), both at the investment and aggregated portfolio levels.
Cash Flow Modeling - cash flow modeling tools can help investors manage a variety of risks associated with private asset portfolios including funding risk or the risk of defaulting on capital calls. Functionality includes the ability to visualize historical and projected cash flows.
Where can I find the private asset data?
Private asset data can be found by navigating to the Data Library and clicking the “Private Asset Data” tab at the top. Clicking on the three dots icon in the “Actions” column and selecting “Manage Data” for any investments or portfolios in the private asset data library will direct you to the Manage Data page, where you will be able to find the fund’s information (metadata), performance data, cash flow data, and any portfolios that fund has been added to. For portfolios, the Manage Data page will show the funds underlying the portfolio along with information on each of the funds.
What private asset data are available in Venn?
The following data fields are available for private asset investments and can be viewed in the Manage Data page:
Metadata
Fund Manager
Asset Class
Strategy
Sub-Strategy
Vintage
Fund Size
Capital Commitment*
Currency**
Fund Status (e.g. Closed, Liquidated, Raising, etc.)
Fund Type
Geographical Focus
Core Industries & Industries
Final Close Date
Final Close Size
Performance Data
Net IRR %
Net Multiple
RVPI %
DPI %
Called %
Cash Flow Transactions
Transactional data for Capital Call, Distribution and Value, or Cumulative Contribution
*Capital commitment shown in the metadata tab is the initial commitment size that the provided cash flow and performance data are based on. If users enter a different commitment size when constructing a portfolio, all relevant metrics will be scaled accordingly. (For example, if a fund’s cash flows are based on an initial capital commitment of $10M and a user enters $20M as the commitment for the fund in their portfolio, cash flows will be scaled by x2.)
**Private asset analytics currently only support USD and non-USD funds are not currency converted.
What type of funds does Venn provide data for in the Private Asset Data Library?
Venn’s Private Asset Data Library shows the metadata, fund performance and/or cash flows for private asset funds provided by Preqin. Below is an asset class breakdown of the investments of the top 100 private asset fund managers by total fund size currently covered in the Data Library.***
***Note: data as of 11/29/2023 and subject to change.
Certain data provided by Preqin Ltd. Copyright 2023 Preqin Ltd. All rights reserved.
For more information on Preqin’s private asset data coverage, please refer to their website here.
Can I upload my own private asset investment fund data?
If there are private asset investments you’d like to analyze that aren’t currently provided by Venn in the Data Library, you can upload your own data by clicking the “upload” button in the left-side panel, then clicking the “Private Asset Data” button. For more information on private asset investment data uploads, please refer to the FAQ here.
To update any data for user-uploaded funds, data must be re-uploaded using the uploader. When updating data for existing investments you can choose to: overwrite the full dataset, overwrite just the overlapping data (if there’s a data revision), or append new data.
What Private Asset analytics are available and where can I find them?
Venn’s private asset analytics can be found in Studio and Report Lab. Below are the list of functionalities available:
Private Asset - Cash Flow Pacing - these blocks can be used to visualize historical, projected and typical Contributions, Distributions, NAV, and Net Cash Flows of a private asset portfolio or investment. Only private asset investment or portfolios can be analyzed using this feature. For more details on how the cash flow models are calculated, please refer to this article.
Private Assets - Performance - these blocks can be used to visualize private asset performance metrics in a time series chart or in a table format as of a specific date. Performance data can be analyzed both at individual investment and portfolio levels. For more information on private asset performance metrics available in Venn, please refer to this article.
Private Asset - Metadata- table showing summary metadata for private asset portfolios.
Currently, only the analysis blocks labeled as “Private Assets” may be used with private asset investments and portfolios. These blocks will not run if returns-based investments or portfolios are added as subjects. Other blocks will not run if private asset investments or portfolios are added as subjects.
Can Venn calculate private asset performance metrics?
For individual investments, Venn currently does not calculate performance metrics such as IRR, net multiple, etc. using the cash flows data, and relies on the reported performance metrics supplied by Preqin or data uploaded by users.
For portfolios, Venn computes the portfolio level performance metrics by aggregating the reported data of the underlying funds.
PMEs are calculated by Venn for both investments and portfolios.
Please refer to this article for more information on private asset performance metrics.
What happens if I include both private and return-based investments and/or portfolios in one subject group?
As noted above, currently only private asset investments/portfolios may be used for blocks labeled as “Private Assets” while only return-based investments/portfolios may be used for the rest of the analysis blocks. As such, if both private and return-based investments/portfolios are added to a single subject group, each block will exclude any subjects that do not meet its input requirements.
What is a Private Asset Portfolio and how do I create one?
A Private Asset Portfolio is a portfolio made up of only private asset investments and can be used for the private asset analytics listed above. Please note that a private asset portfolio does not consist of any returns information, and as such cannot be used for Venn’s return-based analyses. To use Venn’s return-based analytics including factor analyses, please create a returns-based portfolio instead.
Private Asset portfolios can be created by clicking “New Portfolio” in the left-side panel and selecting the “CREATE NEW PRIVATE ASSET PORTFOLIO” option. Once saved, you will be able to access the portfolio from your Private Asset Data Library.
Please note Private Asset portfolios may only be created, configured, and modified in Studio.
[1] The total private asset data library covers metadata for 75K+ funds, of which around 18K funds have performance and/or cash flow data available. Data is as of 11/29/2023 and subject to change.
Private asset portfolios are less liquid than public asset portfolios and have additional risks, including the risk of loss. Cash flow pacing models rely on historical data and the typical cash flow profiles of an asset class or strategy to make projections based on assumptions. A fund’s or portfolio’s actual cash contributions and distributions will be different from those shown by the model.
This document highlights certain aspects of this feature. As an overview, it does not discuss all material facts or assumptions. Please see Important Disclosure and Disclaimer Information.