Fintech startup Nao offers retail investment in private equity funds

For its launch, NAO started offering exclusive reverse convertible bonds with monthly interest payments in collaboration with UniCredit. Now, the Berlin-based company is launching Private Equity (PE) investments starting from €1,000 in the German market - without the use of tokenization. This is made possible through NAO's novel co-investment approach via the NAO platform.

Investment option in Private Equity with NAO app © NAO

NAO significantly reduces minimum investment for direct investments in Private Equity
Private equity investments typically yield higher returns than traditional capital market investments. PE funds invest in non-public companies in their early growth stages and/or with high growth potential. However, the minimum investment threshold has traditionally been one million Euros or even higher. This has limited PE investments to institutional and high-net-worth investors, excluding smaller individual investors. Some FinTech’s and asset managers have already eased the access, but now, NAO is lowering the investment barrier even further with its platform approach down to only €1,000.

Novel investment solution provides access to PE secondaries funds
NAO's co-investment approach allows participation in a private equity secondaries fund managed by UBS, one of the largest asset managers in the world. Access to the fund is available to semi-professional investors with a minimum investment amount of €50,000. NAO reduces this threshold to €1,000 on its platform. The semi-liquid fund can be redeemed on a quarterly basis, unlike the usual capital lock-up period of up to ten years in PE funds.

Portfolio diversification opportunity for retail investors
Private equity investments involve private, not publicly listed companies that often belong to the hidden champions of the SME sector. "Innovative FinTechs have pioneered and enabled consumers to engage in direct Private Equity investments starting from €50,000. With our multi-asset platform, we're taking it a step further. With NAO, we want to make even more investment possibilities accessible. We empower people to choose from all the asset classes available in the market and to invest from as little as €1,000," explains Robin Binder, CEO and Co-Founder of NAO. “Private equity as an asset class has traditionally been inaccessible for many investors. However, this asset class typically offers attractive double-digit returns and good portfolio diversification, independent of the capital markets.”