Competing interests for private equity Download PitchBook’s Report here. Private equity has lots of money at the ready—the question is what they will use it for. In the months ahead, investors will be looking at an unprecedented opportunity to buy. On the other hand, they’re also in very familiar territory of keeping their current crop of

The private markets aren’t immune Download PitchBook’s Report here. Much was made of the “buoyant” nature of the SuperReturn conference earlier this month. The gathering took place just as stocks began stuttering and the opportunity for turnaround artists looked vibrant. Three weeks later, that consensus appears to be shifting as the underlying economy itself shifts....

Coronavirus and private equity Our 2020 PE predictions did not include a potentially global pandemic, which continues to roil the markets. It’s impossible to know where things will go from here—at least as panics go, this brings flashbacks of 2008 but feels fundamentally different. For private equity, the only playbook to consult is 2008-2011, since

The ups and downs of secondaries Download PitchBook’s Report here. Last week we highlighted our new analyst note on extended holding periods. Now available, the note dives into the pros and cons of GP-led secondaries, which have steadily become more popular. The market has become the industry standard for handling successful assets that can’t be held

Holding on to winners Last month we wrote about the decline in PE holding times, with the median dropping below five years for the first time in almost a decade. These figures represent portfolio companies and not fund durations (longer-dated funds are relatively new and don’t move the needle yet). PEGs are simply turning companies

The humbled FoF market Download PitchBook’s Report here. We’ve wondered before if funds of funds are becoming obsolete. Perhaps a hyperbolic word choice but probably only a couple standard deviations from the truth. FoF fundraising has nosedived over the past decade, as has its industry clout. Our most recent overhang numbers, dissected in PitchBook’s just-released Private

Cash flow positive Download PitchBook’s Report here. Net cash flows have been hugely positive for private debt funds recently. PitchBook’s Global Private Debt Report showed a record $24.6 billion funneled back to LPs in 2018, alongside a strong start to 2019 numbers as the data slowly rolls in. Private debt treaded water in terms of net

Is there “too much” private debt floating around? Maybe not The boom in direct debt lending has directly coincided with the PE boom over the last decade. No surprise there—a decade ago was the global financial crisis and its aftermath, when traditional lines of credit from Wall Street suddenly dried up. Direct lenders, with fewer

What is a private capital fund worth? Download PitchBook’s Report here. Valuing PE management companies can be extremely difficult, but the rise of GP stakes investing is making the task more common. In recent years, many GPs have been valued predominantly on cash flows, management fees and accrued performance fees....

PE hold times keep falling Download PitchBook’s Report here. Now down to 4.9 years, the median holding time of PE assets continues to fall. That’s the first sub-5 year reading since 2011, a timeframe that saw a peak of 6.2 years back in 2014, according to PitchBook’s latest Breakdown Report. Much of the overall downfall—a good