Ninety One has announced the final close of its Africa Credit Opportunities Fund 3 (ACO3 Fund) with commitments totalling $404m (£298.6m) from institutional investors.

The fund secured commitments from development finance institutions, pension funds, and family offices across Africa, Europe, the UK, the US and Canada.

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The third vintage in Ninety One’s emerging market senior credit series invests mainly in senior secured private credit opportunities with “conservative levels” of financial leverage and “good structural protections”. 

It provides flexible financing to businesses and critical infrastructure projects across Africa and other emerging markets.

Led by managing directors Steven Loubser and Kobina Sam from the firm’s emerging market alternative credit team, the ACO3 Fund has a portfolio comprising more than 30 investments in Africa, Latin America, Asia and Central and Eastern Europe, with exposure to communications, consumer, financials, healthcare, industrials, and materials.

The ACO3 Fund applies a proprietary sustainability framework to promote “positive outcomes” for the people, the environment and economic productivity across the regions in which it invests.

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Nathaniel Micklem, co-head of emerging market alternative credit at Ninety One, said the successful close of the fund reflected investors’ “continued confidence” in the opportunities available in Africa and emerging markets private credit.

“We continue to see a significant financing gap for high-quality businesses and infrastructure projects across Africa and other emerging markets. This creates attractive opportunities for experienced lenders with deep local origination capabilities,” Micklem added. “Our long-standing presence, local expertise and partnerships position us to identify resilient investment opportunities that we believe can deliver compelling risk-adjusted returns while supporting sustainable economic growth.”

Since inception, Ninety One’s emerging market senior credit strategy has raised $815m across three funds and deployed more than $1.4bn in over 100 counterparties across 30-plus countries.

Earlier this year, Ninety One positioned emerging markets private debt as an alternative to US private credit, following negative headlines around defaults and increased use of payment-in-kind structures.

The global investment manager argued that emerging markets private debt offered stronger protections and higher yields.