Leon Stephenson
Leon is co-head of the Reed Smith fund finance team, based in London. Leon and the team work with banks, other financial institutional lenders, managers, general partners and limited partners of funds on specialist fund financing transactions with private equity, secondaries, real estate, direct lending and infrastructure funds.
Leon has particular specialist knowledge of NAV/asset-backed and hybrid facilities, secondary funds facilities, capital call facilities, co-investment and GP/manager support facilities and other types of liquidity facilities provided to funds.
Leon is recognised as a Leading Individual in Fund Finance by The Legal 500 UK 2021 and the team was awarded Band 1 in Fund Finance by The Legal 500 UK 2021. Leon was recognised as “Partner of the Year for Banking” at the Client Choice Awards 2017. Leon represents a large proportion of lenders that provide fund financing as well as a number of private equity and other funds on complex fund finance transactions.
Practice Area
Panel
- Contributing Author
1 Contributions by Leon Stephenson
PRACTICE NOTES
Capital call (subscription line) facilities: commercial uses, due diligence, security, borrowing base and facility terms, with NAV and hybrid comparisons
This Practice Note discusses
the meaning of capital call facilities, 'NAV' or asset-backed facilities, and hybrid facilities
the commercial applications of capital call facilities
the due diligence that lenders will undertake
the standard security package typically required by lenders
the principal terms of capital call facilities
'Capital call facilities' and other types of fund finance
A capital call facility, also known as a subscription line facility, is financing extended by a lender to a fund and is ordinarily collateralised by investors’ undrawn commitments. Accordingly, funds tend to obtain these lines early in their life cycle, when unfunded commitments are at their highest yet the fund holds few or no investments that can be charged in favour of lenders. Nevertheless, particularly where recallable capital commitments persist (see below), capital call facilities can remain beneficial well into the fund’s term.
By contrast, funds that are at the halfway stage or approaching the end of their life cycle may find that 'NAV' or asset-backed facilities are better suited to...
Banking & Finance
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