Morgan Stanley’s Blowout Quarter Fueled by Chinese Baby Formula
Morgan Stanley’s Blowout Quarter Fueled by Chinese Baby Formula
(Bloomberg) -- Morgan Stanley’s secret sauce last quarter was baby formula.
A Morgan Stanley private equity fund in Asia was a major shareholder in China Feihe Ltd., the nation’s biggest producer of milk for babies. Its public offering in October and subsequent rally brought the fund’s stake to a value of almost $2 billion, leading the bank to recognize performance fees and gains in the quarter.
The windfall spurred an eightfold leap in the asset-management unit’s investments revenue to $670 million. The stake came from an investment of just $50 million more than six years ago, Morgan Stanley Chief Financial Officer Jon Pruzan said Thursday.
“The company has been quite successful and grown quite nicely,” said Pruzan, who didn’t identify the company.
--With assistance from Jenny Surane.
To contact the reporters on this story: Sridhar Natarajan in New York at snatarajan15@bloomberg.net;Max Abelson in New York at mabelson@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Michael J. Moore at mmoore55@bloomberg.net, Daniel Taub
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