(Bloomberg) JPMorgan Chase & Co. is in the final stages of selling its Brazil private-equity and hedge-fund company Gavea Investimentos Ltda. back to the firm’s founding partners, which include former central bank president Arminio Fraga.

The term sheet was signed late last year and the deal should be finalized in a few weeks, Fraga said in an interview at his office in Rio de Janeiro. That puts the founders back in control of the company Fraga started in 2003 after leaving the central bank.

Fraga and the partners are keeping the hedge fund and the private-equity business funds, with a little less than 100 employees, while JPMorgan will keep about 10 money managers that make up the equity and real estate teams, Fraga said, declining to give financial details on the transaction.

“It’s done. It feels good,” he said in an interview at Gavea’s headquarters. “It’s completely natural and desirable for JPMorgan to grow their businesses here, starting new businesses. But it’s not something we personally wanted to do. We don’t want to start anything beyond what we have. Veronica Espinosa, a JPMorgan spokeswoman, declined to comment.

Separating the two entities would allow Gavea to do more business with the U.S. bank because restrictive regulations due to the previous ownership structure no longer apply, Fraga said.
“We’re paying JPMorgan over time, and I think it will be a good thing for everyone in the end. I’m certain of that,” he said.

JPMorgan bought 55 percent of Gavea in 2010 without saying how much it paid. It purchased an additional 22.5 percent in 2013 in a deal that gave it the right to acquire the rest by the end of 2015, Gavea said at the time.