Comparto vs SPV

An SPV (Special Purpose Vehicle) is a company incorporated specifically to carry a single transaction. Unlike a Comparto, an SPV starts from a blank page: it has to be incorporated, given a board, provided with bank accounts, assigned an auditor, and surrounded with a full issuance infrastructure built from scratch.

A Comparto, by contrast, is a cell within a securitisation platform that already exists and already operates. The infrastructure — administration, paying agent, calculation agent, settlement channels — is in place. Only the documentation specific to the transaction remains to be drafted.

That difference translates directly into time and cost: an SPV generally takes two to four months to set up and carries incorporation, governance and ongoing account-keeping expenses. A Comparto is operational in two to four weeks, with no additional company to administer.

Legally, both offer a form of segregation, but by different means: an SPV isolates by creating a separate legal person; a Comparto isolates through compartmentalisation inside a single vehicle, a mechanism recognised by Luxembourg securitisation law. The intended outcome — a dedicated pool of assets, isolated from other transactions — is comparable, but reached without multiplying entities to create, govern and wind up at the end of life.

For a manager structuring several transactions over time, the difference compounds: every new SPV repeats the same fixed costs, whereas every new Comparto simply adds to an infrastructure that is already amortised.