NEWSLETTER of March 21, 2025

The following content has been added at finexpert:

Bain & Company
GLOBAL PRIVATE EQUITY REPORT 2025
Through one lens, 2024 can be considered the year of the partial exhale. Interest rates and inflation finally came down. Economic growth in many markets remained stable. In response, deal investment and exit value increased. Alas, fund-raising struck a discordant note, but as we know, fund-raising is a lagging indicator for deal activity. The real culprit behind lackluster fund-raising is a persistent liquidity situation for global limited partners (LPs). While exits grew, distributions as a portion of net asset value sank to the lowest rate in over a decade. Positive signs? Rates appear poised to remain stable or decrease in many markets. Dry powder is still mountainous and aging. General partners are finding creative ways to boost LP liquidity. More dollars should flow from sovereign wealth funds and private wealth. And most important, returns remain strong. We will see if private equity can avoid black swans in 2025 and get firmly back on the growth track. >more

EY
STATE OF PRIVATE EQUITY (PE) REPORT EUROPE 2024 REVIEW
This report provides a comprehensive analysis and review of European PE activity for 2024, including investments, holding periods, exits and valuation gaps. It draws valuable insights from interviews with Jan Kallmorgen, Partner, EY Strategy & Transactions and Peter Witte, Director, EY Global Private Equity Lead Analyst, who share their views on Trump 2.0, geopolitical uncertainty and its impact on PE. The State of PE Report gives a strategic view of the year through deep dives across countries and regions in Europe. >more

Institut der deutschen Wirtschaft
AKTUELLE ERGEBNISSE DES ZIA-IW-IMMOBILIENSTIMMUNGSINDEX (ISI). DIE IMMOBILIENWIRTSCHAFT BLEIBT SKEPTISCH
The business situation is now rated at 11.1, which corresponds to a drop of 6.9 points compared to the previous quarter. Expectations, on the other hand, improved by 6.9 points to a value of 21.7. The real estate climate thus remains almost constant with a value of 16.3 (-0.1 points). In the previous quarter, expectations were assessed slightly worse and the business situation slightly better. Overall, companies expect the situation to improve over the next 12 months, but they remain skeptical - which is easy to understand given the political and economic uncertainties. >more

KfW Research
GRÜNDUNGSTÄTIGKEIT IN DEUTSCHLAND: KLEINES PLUS BEI EXISTENZGRÜNDUNGEN 2024
Start-up activity in Germany rose to 585,000 start-ups in 2024. This corresponds to a slight increase of 3%. Nevertheless, the trend in start-up activity was better than expected. The increase is mainly reflected in the number of sideline start-ups, which rose to around 382,000 (+5%). In contrast, the number of full-time start-ups fell slightly to around 203,000 (-1 %). This is shown by a preliminary evaluation of the current KfW Start-up Monitor. >more

CLIMATE DISCLOSURE AND DIRECTOR ELECTIONS
Alexandre Garel, Roni Michaely, and Arthur Romec
2025
This study investigates the impact of climate-related disclosure on investor support for directors in board elections. Firms not disclosing carbon emissions receive significantly lower support for their directors, a trend robust to various controls, including governance proxies and ESG incidents. Firms initiating climate disclosure see increased director support. Sustainable funds and universal investors are key drivers of this trend. Moreover, investors supporting shareholder-sponsored climate proposals are more likely to vote against directors in firms lacking carbon disclosure. These findings highlight the increased tendency to vote against directors as a mean to change boards' approach towards climate change issues and climate disclosure in particular. >more

DECENTRALIZED CRYPTO GOVERNANCE? TRANSPARENCY AND CONCENTRATION IN ETHEREUM DECISION-MAKING
Cesare Fracassi, Moazzam Khoja, and Fabian Schär
2024
The regulatory treatment of cryptoassets depends primarily on three main governance characteristics: transparency, decentralized decision-making, and the effect of governance on token prices. We offer the first comprehensive analysis of the decision-making process of Ethereum, the leading programmable blockchain. We find that its governance is open and transparent, with all Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs) disclosed and discussed in public venues, engaging thousands of people. At the same time, EIPs are predominantly shaped by a core group of influential authors: 10 individuals are responsible for proposing 68% of all implemented Core EIPs. The success of these proposals is significantly associated with key attributes of the proposers, including their social outreach, community engagement, and company affiliation. Furthermore, we observe a notable concentration in client development, where on average 10 people per client implementation are responsible for 80% of all software changes, and identify stablecoin issuers and oracle providers as potential governance centralization vectors. The governance concentration has been slowly decreasing over time, with the Ethereum Foundation still playing an important role. Finally, we find that governance decisions influence crypto prices: Ether price increases 12% leading to the final discussion of Core EIPs. >more