Blue Owl backed Fifth Season launches life settlement investment platform

A new life settlement investment platform, Fifth Season Investments LLC, has been launched with the backing of $132 billion alternative asset manager Blue Owl Capital.

The market for life settlement investments has been steadily growing and still some of the established insurance-linked securities (ILS) investment managers we report on allocate to life settlements within their life ILS fund strategies.

While we don’t make life settlement investing part of our core coverage, where there are notable updates on that alternative asset class we do like to report on them for our readers.

In this case, what’s notable about the news of the launch of Fifth Season Investments LLC, is mainly the size and notable name of its backer, Blue Owl Capital, as it signals another major asset manager getting into the life settlement investment arena, another sign of its growth potential.

Fifth Season Investments has taken an investment from Owl Rock business development companies, which are externally managed entities and indirect subsidiaries of Blue Owl Capital Inc., Owl Rock being a division of the asset manager.

The transaction has involved rolling-up a number of existing life settlement investment entities into a single venture, as Fifth Season Investments LLC acquired these assets to form its new life settlement investment platform.

It has acquired all of the life settlement business assets of Fifth Season Financial, LP, and substantially all of the life settlement investment positions and loans secured by life insurance policies owned by two structures Chapford Capital II, LP and Chapford Diversified Fund, LP, (each entities owned by Chapford Capital Group) in a transaction valued at $220 million.

The employees of Fifth Season Financial, including founding partners Adam Balinsky and Scott Rose (who also co-founded Chapford Capital Group), have all moved to now work for a Fifth Season Investment affiliate, Fifth Services, LP.

The new platform will manage and invest in life insurance backed assets, including secondary and tertiary life settlements, with an existing performing portfolio of life insurance policy investments and an experienced team.

Adam Balinsky, President of Fifth Season Investments commented, “We are all very excited about growing this business with the investment from the Owl Rock BDCs.   This new platform gives our team the financial backing and long-term investment horizon that will allow us to build on our ten years of success in our prior business.  We can now expand our footprint and purchase criteria to take advantage of the excellent investment opportunities available in the life settlement market.  Our goal is to build a large, diversified life settlement portfolio that provides stable, attractive, uncorrelated returns in the form of a long-dated asset.”

Balinsky added, “Our goal is to substantially grow our life settlement portfolio over the coming years and to become one of the largest life settlement investors in the market. With backing from the Owl Rock BDCs, we are now capable of expanding our buying parameters beyond our prior focus on highly impaired individuals with short life expectancies to take advantage of opportunities in the main senior life settlement secondary and tertiary markets.”

As we said, some ILS funds invest into life settlement related deals and portfolios and life settlements are typically backed by institutional investor clients including pension funds and family offices, while specialists act as advisors and assist in originating policies for investors and fund strategies.