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Not long after his firm broke up with its previous opportunity fund partner, The Mooch has found a replacement.
SkyBridge Capital, the hedge fund founded by Anthony Scaramucci, will use Westport Capital Partners as its adviser for its planned $3B opportunity fund, The Real Deal reports. The partners plan to structure the fund as a real estate investment trust, and don't expect the plans to change aside from the new partnership.
SkyBridge Capital announced in November that it planned to raise $3B to launch a REIT focused on opportunity zone investments alongside Virginia-based EJF Capital. But the arrangement went south earlier this month, with Skybridge reportedly saying it was concerned that EJF, led by Manny Friedman, didn’t have enough experience with real estate funds. An EJF official declined to comment when reached by Bisnow when the split became public.
SkyBridge President Brett Messing told TRD that new partner Westport and its founder, Russel Bernard, are “a perfect fit for this.” Westport has offices in Connecticut, California, Montana and the United Kingdom.
“He’s got a great track record,” Messing said. “He’s done significant amounts of development and redevelopment which ... is what’s required under the opportunity zone regulations, and he specializes primarily in distressed real estate throughout the country.”
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