Stan Perromat, co-founder of Privatam, answers SCI's questions

Q: How and when did Privatam become involved in the securitisation market?
A: Privatam was founded in 2014 with the aim of shaking up customised investments for wealth managers. Our four founders saw an opportunity to introduce technology and flexibility into a still quite traditional industry with no real independent actors.

We wanted to simplify the process of customised investments that was exclusively managed by the investment banks. In 2018, we wanted to enlarge our capacity of tailoring investments and we started to work on the OptiAssets project. In 2019 the joint venture with OptiAssets was created.

Q: Which key securitisation asset classes do you focus on?
A: We can securitise any type of asset class from traditional liquid (bankable) and real economy assets to alternative non-liquid assets, offering a tailor-made solution.

Q: What is your strategy?
A: We want to make customised investments available for everyone, so our strategy is to simplify the life of money managers by providing more tools to make customised investments, more easily and from lower amounts. This allows developers and portfolio managers to quickly raise money for their strategy and allows Privatam’s community of wealth managers to also access very niche strategies.

With OptiAssets, we have trusted experts in structured finance, securitisation and assets repack onboard, offering a production and issuance platform of next generation tailor-made investment vehicles which enable asset managers to get access to global capital markets, worldwide distribution and to efficiently raise capital, monetising their investment strategies and projects.

Q: What has been the impact of the joint venture with OptiAssets?
A: The securitisation joint venture with OptiAssets allowed us to diversify our offer, proposing different kinds of products and solutions to our wealth managers clients. It also allowed us to propose options to any financial professional seeking a simple and affordable way to securitise assets. Overall, the market is looking for more flexibility, democratisation and cost- efficient investment vehicles and with this joint venture we can offer this to our investors.

Q: What impact has the digital platform PARity had and how do you see it developing?
A: PARity has been a real game-changer for us and led the way for the transformation of the industry as a whole. It changed the customer experience in the field of customised products, simplifying transactions and enabling transparent access to customised investments and securitisation.

Through the tool, users can discover investment ideas and price the products quickly, which helps them to find the best investment opportunity for their unique needs across a range of providers, compared to banks which typically only offer customers their own products. Then, investors can follow the progress of their own investments all in one tool. Customers and investors can easily monitor each OptiProduct and follow their product lifecycle and monitor payoffs, distribution schedules and performance of an OptiProduct.

Since we launched PARity, this technology-driven approach has been adopted by other players in the industry, so our challenge is to stay ahead as a constant pioneer and continue to innovate and add more personalised content and investment ideas to improve the service to customers. The combination of our team’s financial expertise leveraged by PARity technology is key to our success.

Q: What is the significance of technology in the future of investing?
A: Technology has transformed many other industries, but the financial industry is still only really at the beginning of its digital transformation journey, so there is still lots of opportunity ahead. Technology is an accelerator that speeds up the whole transaction process, allowing customers to find products and compare prices in seconds instead of hours or even days through a manual approach. We expect to see many more big changes in the coming years, which will open up the market and make it more accessible to a broader base of investors.

Q: What differentiates you from your competitors?
A: We are a first-mover in the field of technology and customised investments and continue to innovate, offering our clients the best possible service with a state-of-the-art securitisation platform. OptiAssets provides next generation customised investment vehicles (OptiProducts) with integrated administration.

Apart from technology and transparency, with OptiAssets we have a partner who works with top tier service providers from each industry within its securitisation platform, while implementing the highest level of protection, controls and transparency for the benefit of its customers and their investors.

Privatam clients benefit from our team’s deep industry expertise, leveraged by best-in-class technology. Our clients remain at the centre and take the lead in their investment decisions, but we are there to provide all the useful information to allow them to make the best decisions for their unique needs and follow their underlying investments.

Q: Which future challenges may arise?
A: We think that the transformation process of the technology is very important for the creation of interfaces between the different players in the market. Moreover, security remains an acute and ever-more important challenge that must always be front of mind.

The new generation of investors expects to see more and more personalisation in their interactions, so we need to be able to meet that expectation. Investors increasingly want to do more themselves and want immediate access to all the necessary information, anywhere, anytime.

Q: Which opportunities do you expect to see?
A: Securitisation is becoming more popular with a growing market of alternative assets (including real assets, private equity and infrastructure projects), apart from traditional bankable assets. With more tools and information easily available, we expect to see project managers, portfolio and wealth managers play a greater part in investment strategy. We have made the securitisation process simpler and more accessible and we will continue to work on this path.

Jasleen Mann