John Toomey
CEO, HarbourVest Partners · 2 appearances on the record.
computed by AI from the episodes · how this works → · full disclaimer →
executiveinvestorharbourvest.com ↗
John Toomey is the Chief Executive Officer at HarbourVest Partners, a global private markets investment firm. He joined the firm in 1997, focusing on secondary investments and previously serving as CFO during the IPO of HarbourVest Global Private Equity Limited.
57statements → 26claims → 13claims resolved → 77%fully supported → 3.7/5average certainty → 1.91/5average debate potential → ≈4.5/5argument clarity, estimated →
10 supported 1 partly supported 2 contradicted 1 not yet assessed 12 not checkable as stated how the 26 claims stand · each chip opens the sources
9 predictions · 17 assertions · 3 opinions · 21 insights · 7 disclosures · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 26 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 13 are resolved, 1 is not yet assessed, and 12 name no date, number or outcome precise enough to check. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.
The record, in short
What the tape says about how John argues and how the claims held up. Everything they said, and everything said about them, is in the tabs below.
Their most notable supported claim
Toomey: Broad Buyout Valuations Declined Only 5% in 2022
“And frankly, we didn't see that underlying in company performance continue to be strong even in the second half of the year. And we saw, I'd say, low single digit declines even at year end. For the broad buyout market, probably plus or minus five percent.”
Their most notable contradicted claim
Toomey: Private equity is the only asset class driving excess pension returns
“And if anything, it's the only place over the last decade where That has contributed the excess return when they're trying to meet their eight percent or seven and a half or seven percent total asset return. They're not getting returns in a lot of places, and …”
Expressed certainty vs assessment result
weighted support: a fully supported claim counts one, a partly supported claim counts half. Each filled bar is clickable and opens exactly those claims; "none yet" means nothing said at that certainty level has resolved yet
How they sound: not measured why? →
We measure speaking style by listening to the audio itself, and a fair number needs at least 2,000 words from one person on tape we have measured. There is too little of John Toomey on measured tape to publish a rate. This says nothing about how they speak.
Everything John Toomey said on Capital Allocators that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →
Toomey: Market Dislocation Will Force Consolidation of PE Brand Extensions
“I mean, just like in other periods of dislocation in the market, I do think you'll see a consolidation of the brand extensions that we've seen to Mario's point.”
Toomey: Private markets cannot easily be timed, but markets easily time allocators
“We have a saying here that it's very difficult to time private markets, but it's very easy for the markets to time you.”
Toomey: Under-allocated LPs can now access previously closed top-tier managers
“If you are a newer investor in the asset class, if you are sitting on an allocation of five, six, seven percent, and you're trying to get to 10, I think it's actually a pretty interesting time to create investable opportunities and to create exposures that, an…”
Toomey: Private equity co-investment deal flow is rising despite overall deal declines
“We've seen already an uptick in the deal flow on the co-investment side. So although overall private equity deals are down, managers, because they're either overcapitalizing from the equity standpoint, or they're reserving more than they once did, or they now …”
Toomey: Core ESG principles align directly with economic benefit and risk management
“I actually think a lot of the principles of ESG, as Mario articulated in the FTX example, actually align quite well with economic benefit and managing risk.”
Toomey: Western Capital Flowing to China PE and VC Slowed Dramatically
“I think from an investable universe, half of the private equity in Asia had really ultimately been within China, and a lot of that was actually USD offshore. What's been interesting to watch is the size of the China private equity and venture market from a fun…”
Toomey: Market Fixation on Banking Stress Is Stalling Capital Deployment
“So for me, like the biggest sea change has been the rubbernecking, which has kind of gummed up the investable opportunities or the capital that would otherwise flow to what I think of as a pretty expansive universe of opportunities.”
LPs starting diligence when a private equity PPM prints are already late
“So if you're showing up with the PPM as it's printed, you are late. Like you are at the back of the line.”
Toomey: Secondary buyouts in private equity did not exist before 2002-2003
“And the fact that for the last 20 years, there's been secondary buyouts in this industry. That didn't exist before 2002, 2003.”
Co-investments where the lead sponsor holds only 20% lack sufficient alignment
“And the lead sponsor, this again, back to alignment, if the lead sponsor is 20% of the capital and co-investors are 80% of the capital, that's not very good alignment.”
Toomey: Co-investing in club deals reveals which PE sponsor truly leads
“In the club deals, you have the advantage point of, well, whoo, Who's actually doing the work? Who's actually just a financial investor? And who does management call when they have issues? Who does management defer to in the board meetings? And so that is inva…”
Secondaries shifted from distressed LP sales to GP-led liquidity solutions over 20 years
“And for 20 years, it was largely a distressed seller market. For the most part, the secondary market existed only because An owner of a limited partnership interest decided it didn't want to own that asset anymore. And what has changed in the last, say, five t…”
Toomey: International PE markets develop faster and differently than the US
“I think it would be a misconception to think that a market outside of the U.S. Is just X years behind the U.S. Or Y years. I mean, these are developing in their own ways. They're developing in a much faster pace than the U.S. Private equity markets have.”
Japan has the lowest developed-market private equity penetration but is becoming attractive
“A place like Japan, where the private equity as a percentage GDP is probably the lowest of any developed market in the world, as you see some of the daily headlines, that is changing, that is evolving, and so that's a quite attractive market today.”
Toomey: HarbourVest's Largest Historical Exits Came From China Venture Portfolio
“We've had some of the largest exits. That we've ever had across the history of our firm come out of our China venture portfolio because the numbers are just so unbelievable.”
Numerical investment committee ratings filter out lukewarm deals better than binary voting
“What we heard from TA was they adopted a numerical rating, one through five, and you had to have a collective number across The total voting members. And the reason why is, what they were trying to do was control for what I'd call the, I'm willing to go along …”
Private equity managers entering at 12x EBITDA underwrite exits at 10x
“What we see is managers who, when they're underwriting a company and going in at 12 times, they're not underwriting to exit at 15. Actually, they're underwriting to exit at 10, because the market does go through cycles, and all that does is to get to your unde…”
Toomey: ODD, ESG, and D&I Were Absent from PE Diligence 20 Years Ago
“And then I'd say the ODD, ESG, and DNI, those are all new dimensions that are very important today that really weren't part of the consciousness of us or even the industry 20 years ago.”
Toomey: Best test of GP credibility is tracking multi-year commitments
“To me, there's no greater way to measure or test a manager's credibility Then to verify that they did what they said they would do a year or two or three ago.”
Toomey: Private equity co-investing only became an asset class in the past 5–10 years
“That market has really become a bonafide sub-asset class unto itself. That's really only a five or 10 year development. In the nineties, it wasn't even a cottage industry. It was nascent.”
LPs demand co-investments to blend down overall private equity management fees
“The other reason the co-investment markets exist today is general partners know and limited partners demand that, hey, look, this is just part of our relationship, and I'm going to invest X into your fund, and I'm going to pay one and a half and 20, and on the…”
Toomey: HarbourVest commits to giving GPs a 24-hour co-investment response
“On the co-investment side, what we found they value the most is, frankly, a quick no is always better than an elongated no. And so we just have this commitment, you know, 24 hour period, we will get back to the manager with a quick read.”
Appearances (2)
| Episode | Date | Speaking time |
|---|---|---|
| Mario Giannini & John Toomey – Private Equity Panel (Capital Allocators EP.309) | Apr 17, 2023 | 29m |
| Private Equity Masters 1: John Toomey – HarbourVest Partners (Capital Allocators, EP.200) | Jun 21, 2021 | 50m |