Ares said on Thursday it has raised $4.2 billion for its first fund financing private equity managers, more than four times the target. Meanwhile, Partners Group proposed this morning to split its €6.6 billion Global Value evergreen fund in two, four months after it capped withdrawals. In addition, Excellere Partners filed on Thursday for a continuation vehicle for AIS Healthcare, a company it has owned since 2013.

The tape

• DEAL  Schiehallion, Baillie Gifford's growth trust, cut its Stripe and SpaceX positions through secondary sales in the half-year to July, its results of 25 September say.
• LP  UTIMCO's board voted on 18 June to raise the illiquidity limit of Texas's endowment funds from 75% to 80%, its latest board book shows.
• PEOPLE  StepStone hired Yoshitaka Todoroki, a private markets executive at Japan's GPIF, as vice chairman in Japan, Alternatives Watch reported on Thursday.
• DATA  Forge's update of 22 September put the median August trade 3% below the last round, from 7% in July, with buyers 45% of indications.
• DATA  Apollo will give investors daily prices across its credit business from 30 October, after Cox bid for its Debt Solutions shares, read here on Monday.
• DATA  Powerlaw, the listed venture vehicle, filed on Thursday to issue new shares from time to time while its stock trades 32% below its August NAV.
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Ares' GP solutions fund closed at four times target

Ares has closed its first fund of structured capital for private equity managers at about $4.2 billion, against a $1 billion target. Its head of private equity secondaries, Nate Walton, told Bloomberg that investor demand was stronger than the firm had expected. So it set a much larger final size. The firm also says it can commit more than $1 billion to one transaction with its other pools, Bloomberg reported via Private Equity Wire. Its fund will mostly provide preferred equity to managers. Those managers want money to increase their own commitment to a new fund, to seed a strategy or to pay for a succession. And Ares funds have put nearly $9 billion into such deals since 2013, the release says.

The money arrived in steps, the filings show. First, Ares filed the fund's first Form D in August 2024. By August 2025 the fund had raised $1.06 billion from 16 investors, a filing of that month shows. In May this year Ares filed for a rated-notes feeder for insurers. The same team raised $1.15 billion for a private equity secondaries fund, read here on Tuesday.

Ares is one of four managers to close a fund for such deals this year. Such deals made 14% of GP-led volume in the first half, from 10% in 2025, Lazard counts. First, Arctos closed Keystone Partners I at $6.2 billion in July against a $4 billion target, read here on 15 July. Second, Hunter Point raised $4.3 billion in June for its NAV lending and preferred funds. So what changes for a manager planning a succession or a larger commitment is the number of bidders. Those four pools closed this year with more than $15 billion between them, and a preferred deal is now priced in competition.

Four GP solutions funds closed this year with $15bn between them

Final sizes and targets, 2026

Source: Secondaries Investor, 15 July 2026; Hunter Point Capital, 8 June 2026; Business Wire, 1 October 2026; AltAssets, 7 April 2026.

Partners Group split its gated evergreen in two

Partners Group has proposed to split its €6.6 billion evergreen fund Global Value SICAV into two portfolios, Bloomberg reported this morning via Private Equity Wire. The fund capped withdrawals in June at 5% of net assets a quarter, after investors asked for 9.8%, read here on 19 July. So the plan gives the older assets to a distributing fund, which would sell them to pay the investors who want out. Meanwhile, a compounding fund would make the new investments and take new money. Those investors could keep their shares, switch into the compounding fund, or redeem from either portfolio, the firm's announcement says. However, the split needs a shareholder vote, and no date is given.

The firm is putting its own money behind the half that stays. It will make a further balance-sheet commitment to the compounding fund alongside new institutional investors, the announcement says. Its incoming co-chief executive Roberto Cagnati said the proposal "enables investors to align capital with their liquidity needs without compromise". So the distributing fund becomes a seller with a queue to pay, and its sales will set the price at which the leavers get out. The same firm has 29% of its $186 billion in evergreen vehicles, Bloomberg says. So the split could serve its other funds if their queues grow.

Blackstone's BCRED gave its own answer to its queue on Wednesday. Its board told shareholders to reject Cox Capital's offer of $20.65 a share, 12.5% below the August value, a bid read here on 28 September. The offer "appears designed to transfer value from BCRED shareholders to Cox Capital", the board wrote. The same board said holders who asked for cash in the last two quarters "will have received an estimated 75%" of it at full value. So a BCRED holder now has two prices for the same share. The first is 100 cents on the dollar for three quarters of the request, from the fund. The other is 87.5 cents at once from Cox, until 3 November.

Investors asked for more than the 5% a quarter the funds pay

Redemption requests, latest quarter reported, as a share of NAV or of shares outstanding

Seen before the press

Excellere Partners has set up a continuation vehicle for AIS Healthcare, and Evercore is placing it. The vehicle is named Excellere Capital AIS CV, and it filed its Form D on Thursday from the firm's office in Denver. It has nothing raised yet and no size set. Its sponsor backs founder-led companies in healthcare, business services and industrial growth, the firm's site says.

AIS Healthcare is the oldest company on that list. It makes patient-specific medications in Dallas for chronic pain patients with implanted pumps, and it has been in Excellere's portfolio since April 2013. Excellere sold Biocare Medical in June and Concord Technologies in July, so AIS is now the longest-held company it still owns. Therefore the vehicle was most probably raised to keep a company held for thirteen years beyond the life of the fund that bought it. It could also take only part of the position, and nothing has been announced officially yet.

On the radar

• Monday 5 October, Guernsey. Partners Group Private Equity publishes the result of its realisation-share election, whose deadline was today at 1pm, read here yesterday. The EGM follows on Wednesday 7 October.
• October, Guernsey. HarbourVest Global Private Equity publishes the full timetable of its $400 million tender with its half-year results, read here on 20 September. The tender is priced around 10% below the 30 September NAV and opens in November.
• Thursday 22 October, 9am, New York. Blackstone's third-quarter call, the first since it shelved Eclipse, read here on 24 September.
• Friday 30 October. Apollo's investors get asset-level daily prices across its credit funds.
• Tuesday 3 November. Cox Capital's offers for BCRED and HLEND shares expire. Its offers for Apollo Debt Solutions and Ares Strategic Income run to 14 November.
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