The Connecticut Retirement Plans and Trust Funds is not concerned with the growing sizes of HarbourVest Partners‘ flagship secondaries funds, and even sees that scale as an advantage.
During a meeting of the pension’s Investment Advisory Council on 14 January, principal investment officer Mark Evans said the growing sizes of the Dover Street series funds are not a concern due to the growth of the secondaries market overall.
The pension’s CIO has recommended an up to $200 million commitment to Dover Street XII, according to material prepared for the meeting. The fund is targeting $20 billion, according to Secondaries Investor data. Dover Street XI closed on $15.08 billion in 2024, and Dover Street X closed on $8.12 billion in 2020. Connecticut committed $175 million and $100 million to those funds, respectively.
Rather than doing more transactions, Evans said HarbourVest has done larger deals, putting them among the largest buyers in the secondaries market. The pension feels confident that the firm has the capacity to take on market opportunities and maintain discipline on transactions, he added.
“[HarbourVest is] looking at portfolios when there are LP trades of $1 billion-plus, where, oddly enough, it’s less competitive because there are fewer secondary managers that can acquire a portfolio that size,” Evans said. “In some ways, their scale has become a bit of a competitive advantage.”
In addition to the flagship commitment, the pension is also considering an up to $200 million commitment to HarbourVest’s Secondary Overflow Fund VI. The vehicle will co-invest with Dover Street XII in transactions that require more capital than the flagship can commit due to size or concentration limits, according to the meeting materials. The fund is available to investors who make a minimum commitment of $100 million to the flagship.
Connecticut is targeting a 5-15 percent exposure to secondaries, the meeting materials show. Its exposure was at about 11 percent as of 30 June 2025.
The pension has committed more than $1.3 billion to various secondaries funds since December 2024, with the largest being a $450 million commitment to Ardian CT Private Equity Partners, according to Secondaries Investor data.
While secondaries funds may not outperform the multiples of invested capital generated by top buyout, growth and venture capital managers, Evans said Connecticut has found the secondaries funds it has backed over the last six years to be “nice, consistent performers – maybe slightly better on the IRR because of some of the machinations that happen in the model”.
Evans said the continued growth of the secondaries market is a good thing and a sign of a healthy market, and that people are not bailing out of their positions.
“Institutions that have large portfolios – larger PE portfolios than us – have decided that they want to trim certain parts of their portfolio, or they want to take down the overall exposure modestly to redeploy the capital,” Evans said. “It’s more of a readily accepted portfolio management tool than a sign of distress.”
HarbourVest declined to comment on both funds.
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