MSCI, UBS partner to boost private-market transparency

MSCI Inc. and UBS Group AG announced a strategic partnership to increase transparency in private markets by extending MSCI’s AI-powered platform with UBS’s alternatives expertise and global client insights.

MSCI will supply its data, analytics, models and AI capabilities. UBS will contribute perspectives from its Limited Partner, Wealth Management and Asset Management businesses and will act as an early adopter, providing client use cases and product requirements to guide development.

The firms said the platform will integrate fund discovery, portfolio management, analytics and benchmarking within a single environment. Automated data ingestion and MSCI’s independent performance data are intended to give investors timelier and more consistent portfolio information and to enable comparison between private and public market holdings.

The collaboration is designed to connect general partners with institutional and private wealth investors and to streamline data management across the investment lifecycle.

MSCI and UBS said they will promote broader adoption of common data formats and independent benchmarks to improve manager comparisons and performance reporting across private markets.

Henry Fernandez, MSCI’s chairman and chief executive officer, commented that combining MSCI’s data infrastructure with UBS’s client and alternatives expertise aims to develop infrastructure for private-market investing that brings greater independence, transparency and access to analytics.

Sergio P. Ermotti, UBS group chief executive officer, noted that UBS’s Unified Global Alternatives business will provide industry knowledge and client requirements to help shape next-generation private-markets portfolio management tools.