Private Equity is a broad description of a sub sector of the investment world. Private Equity can best be described as investments in the securities of private businesses. Private Equity is often broken down into the following categories:
- Business “angel” capital
- Venture capital
- Development or growth capital
- Funding for management buy-outs and management buy-ins
- Mezzanine capital
- Pre IPO funding
- Distressed debt funding
- Turnaround funding
- Opportunistic investing
Generally speaking, private equity involves a private placement and as such is not available for direct public participation. Private equity typically also refers to capital that is injected into unlisted concerns. However, in the case of some of the categories above (such as management buy-outs) this is not necessarily the case and the funding can be injected into listed concerns. Typically though, even if the underlying security being purchased is of a listed nature, private equity capital would tend to flow through a “special purpose vehicle” of some sort, thus bringing the investment back to being unlisted in nature.
Here are some useful links on Private Equity:
http://www.people.hbs.edu/jlerner/link.html
http://www.london.edu/facultyandresearch/researchactivities/collerinstituteofprivateequity.html
http://www.privateequitycentral.net/splash.cfm
http://www.privateequitycouncil.org/
http://www.theprivateequitymasters.com