Lazard completed its purchase of Campbell Lutyens on Monday and opened Lazard CL. Its new business has more than 300 advisory professionals, and Lazard expects it to earn about $500 million in 2027. Meanwhile, Chrysalis Investments marked Starling Bank up by £47.9 million in the quarter in which the bank's founder sold her last shares. Her price valued the bank at £1.7 billion, half the trust's mark.

The tape

• FUND  Asia Alternatives, the Asian fund of funds, has raised $45.2 million from 11 investors for a secondaries top-up vehicle beside its seventh fund.
• DATA  Blue Owl Credit Income's redemption requests fell for a second quarter, its CFO said on Thursday, before Cox Capital's bid closes on 25 November.
• FILING  Pantheon, whose eighth flagship closed at $6 billion, registered a Canadian access fund on Thursday for its evergreen infrastructure secondaries strategy, sold outside the US.
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Lazard keeps Campbell Lutyens' partners with shares

Lazard has paid for Campbell Lutyens mostly in its own shares, locked up for as long as three years. So the advisers who sell fund stakes and continuation vehicles for a living now own a piece of the bank that bought them. Their bank closed the purchase on Monday and opened the two firms as Lazard CL the same day, it said. Lazard CL has Gordon Bajnai and Holcombe Green as co-chief executives, more than 300 advisory professionals and 19 offices. Its owner expects it to earn "approximately $500 million of estimated combined revenue" and to add to earnings in 2027.

Campbell Lutyens is the London placement agent and secondary adviser founded in 1988, and Lazard's own private capital advisory team was its rival in both trades. Lazard agreed to buy it on 30 April, the sale agreement filed on 1 May shows. That agreement sets the price at $460 million at closing, $115 million more two years later and up to $85 million of earn-out. The closing payment is mostly Lazard shares at a reference price of $46.50, and part of them cannot be sold for three years, in roughly equal yearly installments. In addition, the earn-out depends on revenue growth of the combined business measured through 2030. So the partners who led Campbell Lutyens get their last $85 million only if the merged firm keeps growing, and their shares only as the lock-ups lapse.

Lazard pays $460m at closing and up to $200m more for Campbell Lutyens

What Lazard pays, $m, from the sale agreement of 30 April 2026

Source: Lazard, Form 8-K of 1 May 2026 on the sale and purchase agreement of 30 April 2026; the stock and lock-up terms from Lazard's release of 2 November 2026.

The combined firm says it has advised on "more than $1 trillion of primary capital raised and secondary transaction volume" in about 1,300 mandates over four decades. Its distribution team of more than 60 people connects about 4,000 institutional investors to funds and to secondary deals. Its owner's chief executive, Peter Orszag, called it "our third global business". Bajnai, who runs the new business with Green, said: "Today, Lazard CL opens its doors as the largest integrated platform in private capital advisory anywhere in the world." Lazard CL's parent told its own investors on 22 October that Campbell Lutyens was "performing ahead of the assumptions" behind the deal, and the release of Monday repeats it.

The merger also joins two of the market's counts. One count is Lazard's, $233 billion of secondary volume in 2025, on page 3 of its February report. The other is Campbell Lutyens', $225 billion, on page 3 of its own. The same two houses counted $124 billion and $120 billion for the first half of 2026. Neither the release nor the agreement says which series continues, and neither names who runs secondary advisory inside the new firm. Its first report under one name is due with the full-year count, in late January or February, and the earn-out clock runs to 2030.

Chrysalis marks Starling at twice the founder's price

The largest listed holder of Starling Bank values it at about twice the price its founder just sold at, and that holder is itself a seller. Chrysalis Investments raised the fair value of its Starling stake by £47.9 million to £403.9 million in the three months to 30 September, the trust said on Monday. The stake is 65.6% of its net asset value. That value rests on an additional valuation report that the board commissioned from a strategy consultancy, and the report "resulted in a 5-6x gross revenue multiple". The board took the midpoint of its range, and Jefferies' analysts translated that mark into an implied valuation of about £3.4 billion for the bank, QuotedData reported on Monday.

The other price came from Anne Boden, who founded Starling and left it in 2023. She sold her remaining 2.7% of the bank to existing shareholders at a price that valued it at £1.7 billion, Sky News reported, as City AM relayed on 20 October. That price is less than half the £4 billion that Starling sought in a secondary share sale last year, the same report says. Chrysalis answered the sale in one sentence of Monday's announcement. Its board and valuation committee "have considered its nature and do not believe that it impacts the Company's valuation".

Starling's founder sold at half the mark its largest listed holder keeps

Implied valuation of Starling Bank, £bn, three prices from 2025 to 2026

Source: Chrysalis Investments, quarterly NAV announcement of 2 November 2026; the £3.4 billion from Jefferies' analysts as QuotedData reported them on 2 November 2026; the £1.7 billion and the £4 billion from Sky News as City AM relayed them on 20 October 2026.

The two prices differ because they measure two different trades. The founder's price is what the bank's own shareholders offered for 2.7%, with no auction and no outside bidder. By contrast, the trust's mark applies a revenue multiple drawn from comparable companies, adjusted for illiquidity. That multiple is applied to a bank whose pre-tax profit fell to £217.1 million in the year to March from £223.4 million. For instance, take Chrysalis's mark and the £3.4 billion together: they imply a holding of about 12% of the bank. The same holding at Boden's price is worth about £200 million, which is about 44 pence less on a net asset value of 133.54 pence a share. The shares traded at 65 pence on Monday, 51% below that value, QuotedData says.

Chrysalis is a London-listed growth trust that has been winding itself down since February, with cash budgeted to last until March 2029. In the quarter it sold its last Klarna shares for £39.9 million, £17 million below their June value. It then returned £25 million to shareholders through a compulsory redemption on 29 September. From 5 November it runs itself, after its adviser's notice period ended in August, with a budget below £4 million a year. Its two largest holdings, Starling and Smart Pension, are 88% of what is left. Its chair, Andrew Haining, wrote that "the Company is well capitalised and is not a forced seller of assets", and he sees "viable pathways to liquidity within the realisation period". That path "is still unclear", in Jefferies' view as QuotedData gave it. Its annual report, with the team's incentive plan, is due in late December.

On the radar

• Today, 3pm, London. HarbourVest Global Private Equity holds a private markets update for shareholders, two weeks before they vote on its $400 million tender at 10% below the 30 September net asset value. The trust paid for its last tender with a sale of fund stakes at 94% of value.
• Tuesday 3 November, New York. Apollo reports its third quarter at 8:30am, with the quarter of its S3 secondaries unit, and Hamilton Lane its fiscal second quarter at 11am, with its evergreens' flows. At 5pm Cox Capital's bids for Blackstone Private Credit Fund and HPS Corporate Lending Fund shares expire, the first two of its six.
• Thursday 5 November, 8:30am New York, then London. Carlyle reports its third quarter, the quarter in which AlpInvest agreed to buy Oakley Capital Investments' fund stakes at 94.25% of value. The same day NB Private Equity holds its capital markets day, on the companies it says could be sold in the next six to twelve months.
• Monday 9 November, 10am New York, then Luxembourg. KKR reports its third quarter, its first call since its credit continuation vehicle closed. The same week the shareholders of Partners Group Global Value SICAV vote on splitting the €6.6 billion gated fund in two, at two thirds of the votes cast. A yes puts about €5.2 billion into a run-off fund that pays out at most 2.5% a quarter.
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