What is tactical opportunities / opportunistic investment
Is Blackstone Tac opps a private equity business? Or is it a non-PE type of alternative investment?
Or is tactical opportunities a form of hedge fund strategy?
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non-PE
bx tax ops only writes equity cheques, mostly minority stakes and in FIG (london team)
Very insurance focused tho
Is this technically true?
And how does Tac opps compensation compare to traditional PE?
Blackstone Tactical Opportunities was established to take advantage of market dislocations, special situations, and other time-sensitive opportunities that may not fit within the traditional private equity framework. The tactical opportunities team has a flexible mandate, which allows them to invest across a wide range of industries, asset classes, geographies, and capital structures.
The main difference between BTO and traditional private equity lies in the investment approach, time horizon, and fund flexibility.
Investment approach: Traditional private equity typically focuses on acquiring controlling or significant minority stakes in established, cash-generating companies with the intention of improving their operations and financial performance over time. These firms typically use a combination of equity and debt financing to make their investments. In contrast, BTO employs a more opportunistic approach, targeting special situations, distressed assets, or other unique opportunities that may arise from market dislocations or specific circumstances.
Time horizon: Traditional private equity investments often have a longer-term horizon, typically between five to seven years, as firms work to improve the performance of their portfolio companies and ultimately exit through a sale, merger, or public offering. BTO, on the other hand, can have a shorter investment horizon due to the nature of the opportunities they target. These investments may be held for a shorter period, depending on the specific situation and exit strategy.
Fund Flexibility: BTO has a more flexible investment mandate compared to traditional private equity. This allows them to invest in a wider range of asset classes, including public and private equity, credit, real estate, and infrastructure. Their opportunistic approach also enables them to invest in various capital structures, such as equity, debt, or hybrid securities.
Can you give an example of a market dislocation investment?
Oh I have no idea, I just typed the question into ChatGPT and it spat out my comment
Let’s not sugar coat it guys. Tac ops basically just gets the deals that BCP / BIP / BREA don’t want.
They act like it’s these super esoteric special sits deals meanwhile at best, it’s pref / debt + w / some stupid co-invest. Nothing special at all. Just the shit that the other groups don’t want to touch (aka garbage).
following
They buy a lot of non-performing loans from European banks that are over leveraged. They hire a lot from lev-fin teams as a result.
They don’t just take the deals the other teams don’t want:
BIP, BREP, etc don’t have distressed credit mandates and Credit has too low a risk tolerance for the type of deals Tac Opps does. Back in the GSO days there mightn’t have been room for Tac Opps but that time has passed.
No, tac ops doesn't do distressed. Just because people call it a "special sits" group doesn't mean it's true. Comps here are ASOF and APO HV. Maybe ASOF has a distressed "tilt", but certainly not BTO. Not at all. People stretch the definiton of special sits very far and Tac ops does just that. Yes GSO's distressed team lost a lot of heavy hitters (richman / JJ / Mollett / CDS dude) and had a string of very bad bets, but BX has other vehicles that can (and do) distressed -- tac ops is not one of them.
They do boing deals (imo) and have a strange culture. People joke about it and like to talk about how kids on WSO put it on this huge pedestal. And euro NPL is not distressed. Maybe 20 years ago lol but real distressed is very different. Does that mean it's a bad seat? No. I've seen some sharp ppl out there (and some very stupid). Just saying the BCP / BIP guy will be put above the BTO guy (again, my experience and views). Would shoot for BCP if I we're you. BCP probably best PE seat out there and no unique negative comments
Thoughts on BIP? Also, is it the BAAM team that does distressed that you were referring to?
Under the impression BX is not raising another distressed private credit private fund once this current one is done, that's the end of the strategy
Isn't BTO literally a meme now in some circles?
Had an interview with the London team for off-cycle last week in tac opps...trust me it isn't PE lmao
You literally work on some crappy minor stakes and you cannot exit into any reputable firm...its literally for PE rejects and the compensation/pay is horrible
Sounds like you were rejected tbh
But is he right?Is it true that Tac Opps is more similar to HF than PE (the very name sounds HF-ish)? Or is it in any way still a form of PE
BX Tac Opps is for PE reject... comp is low, exits are non-existent...what else do you want
Saw someone exit from tac ops to SKKY Partners
The only fund that legitimately has an edge in cpg
It is true...I know ppl who work at BX PE and they tell me Tac Opps are literally full of PE rejects (check by their Linkedins they will have IB stint then end up in Tac Opps lmao)
What doesn't fit as vanilla PE investments are handed by TacOps e.g. a 30% LBO with another co-investor in a smaller company compared to the sizes in which PE tends to invest.
So TacOpps is largely about non-PE?
No, they also take PE deals but only those that don't fit the traditional modus operandi of the PE side (e.g. companies with capital need but where traditional financing may not be beneficial for the target because of existing covenants).
Illustratively, for example, while PE may do mainly buy-outs, TacOps may do mainly structured equity.
TacOpps in my eyes also falls under PE, although not buyout. I work for a competitor within the space and if they are anything like us, they also approach diligence from a PE perspective (i.e. DD as if you would end up owning the business)
Back in the day I rejected an internship offer in TactOps mostly because everybody was asking « what is TactOps » and though it was a sud-division of transaction services..
You guys need a reality check lol
You are acting like getting BCP/BIP is easy and BTO is filled with some 2nd tier analysts lol
i would be very happy to exit to BTO and if you think the exits are mediocre, check again
On the street, if you say you work at Tac Opps in BX everyones assumption (which is true) is that you didn't get a MF PE offer so you had to stick to BX TO...BX Tac Opps are literally for PE rejects simple tbh
I agree...I work at BX Infra PE in NYC and all the Tac Opps kids didnt have PE offers so are laughed at on the street for it
“Ops on the street” says the literal Arma Partners AN1 who didn’t secure anything in his first entire analyst year and has the most BS track record of making shit up and posting spam.
You’d be sobbing on the crying wall if bx tacopps rescued you from whatever MM ur at mate have some honesty
.
Your are such a loser, you are jealous from this guy and I will bet an arm that you don't work in BX, probably rejected by Tacc Opps and every other team.
The level of retard in this post is outstanding
Why is the general outlook on BX Tac Opps so negative whereas groups that do similar-sounding investments like Apollo Hybrid Value and Bain Capital Credit are highly revered?
Bump
Still laughing at the fact that these guys call themselves TacOpps as if they're a finance version of the Navy Seals lmao
There's so much non-sense on this thread. As someone that worked at BX, tacopps was a very legit team of investors with a strong reputation. It was founded a decade+ ago with several senior guys from BCP and other teams around the firm (and no, they weren't rejects or people getting pushed out). The group was doing interesting / unique deals and raised a ton of money over the next several years, as they educated investors and companies that the 50-80% LTV, mid to high-teens part of the capital structure was here to stay. However, over time, groups within BAAM and GSO were launched with mandates that partially overlapped with BTO's mandate. So BTO's wings started to get clipped and there was more and more infighting over allocations on certain attractive deals. And then turnover at the mid-level started to bubble up as the pathway to being named an MD started to elongate. Then came the BXG incubation period. BXG did deals under the BTO banner, which helped boost returns for the BTO franchise for some period of time - until BXG launched its own fund and BTO lost the uplift it was receiving from BXG. Then they raised a smaller fund and lost some more people. At this point, it's still a highly reputable shop and great training ground that sends people to tier 1 funds (to places like Elliott, but not like Tiger). The slander is so overblown.
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