S&P Global Market Intelligence presents a wrap-up of earnings conference calls from Jan. 23 to Feb. 11.
Net positivity scores determine the overall sentiment of speakers on a call by accounting for positive and negative statements and the total word count of the presentation. A higher score signals higher positive sentiment.
EQT aims for more than 30 exits in 2025
EQT AB (publ) management said the firm had approximately 30 exit events across key funds in 2024 and disclosed plans to execute about a similar number in 2025, anticipating a favorable M&A environment.
"We're entering 2025 optimistic about the deal environment," EQT CEO and managing partner Christian Sinding said. "We expect high exit activity and high deal activity for the year with more than 30 exit events planned."
The Swedish firm also revealed that its EQT Transition Infrastructure fund, announced in December 2024, is expected to attract significant capital.
"We typically say that the smaller [funds] are in the ... [€1 billion to €2 billion fund sizes] and the larger ones are [in the €3 billion to €5 billion fund sizes]," EQT head of Business Development Gustav Segerberg said. "We will categorize Transition Infra in the larger bucket."
Although fundraising for the vehicle has just begun, EQT expects to start deploying capital within the current quarter.
"Activation will happen ... during [the first quarter] of this year. And I would assume that the fundraising will continue for a good part into 2026 as well," Segerberg said.
Net positivity score of 0.90%, slightly below the 0.91% financial industry average.
Read the call transcript.
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Hamilton Lane to cater to retail investors with blockchain partnership
Hamilton Lane Inc. management said the firm was preparing to serve retail investors interested in private equity through its recently announced partnership with blockchain developer Republic Crypto LLC.
"We intend to launch digital blockchain solutions for retail investors, featuring low investment minimums and the potential for increased liquidity compared to traditional private market funds," Hamilton Lane co-CEO Erik Hirsch said. Republic "will enable us to offer individual investors the opportunity to tap into Hamilton Lane's long-standing private markets expertise, scale and platform, and the first offering is expected sometime in the first half of this year."
Hirsch noted that competition in the industry for retail investors is tough, with multiple firms launching new products.
"Our view is that retail investors are going to want sort of simple, faster, cheaper, easier ... And we think the token world [of] blockchain really offers that," Hirsch said.
Total assets under management across the firm's five retail evergreen funds, including the newest infrastructure offerings, was $9.5 billion at 2024-end, up about 66% for the full year.
Net positivity score of 1.36%, higher than the financial industry average of 0.91%.
Read the call transcript.
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Ares Management ready for increased investment activity with record dry powder
Ares Management Corp. reported robust results, with AUM up 15% annually to about $484 billion, driven mainly by organic growth. Fee-paying AUM was up 12% to $293 billion. "[O]ur portfolio has continued to perform very well," said partner and CFO Jarrod Phillips. "For the full year, we experienced double-digit returns in our US and Europe Direct Lending strategies as well as in our alternative credit, opportunistic credit, and APAC credit strategies."
Management forecast increased investment activity this year, driven by several factors, including a relaxed regulatory environment and pressure to deploy capital.
"We believe that there is a meaningful amount of pent-up demand to transact, driven by the need for PE exits," co-founder and CEO Michael Arougheti said. "As an illustration, there's over $3 trillion of unrealized value across 28,000 unsold companies in global buyout portfolios, and more than 40% of these investments are 4 years or older."
The firm raised a 2024 fourth-quarter total of $28.3 billion in new capital commitments and hit a record $92.7 billion for full year 2024. "This fundraising momentum helped our assets under management grow by 16% year over year to over $484 billion."
Arougheti also downplayed the idea of tough competition between private credit and bank loans. "I want to make sure that we say maybe louder this time, the banks are more important partners of ours than they are competitors. And I think that the narrative of fierce competition between direct lending and banks is overblown."
The executive believes the expectation of reduced bank regulation leading to banks becoming significant competitors is misguided. The growth of private credit markets has resulted from bank consolidation and established regulatory frameworks, making it challenging for banks to compete in core markets, Arougheti said.
Net positivity score of 1.25%, above the financial industry average of 0.91%.
Read the call transcript.
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TPG to ramp up fundraising, capitalize on rising energy demands
TPG Inc. reported a strong year for fundraising despite 2024 being a down year for the global private equity market, which saw a 30% drop.
TPG raised $30 billion in 2024, marking a 54% increase from 2023 on a pro forma basis.
Of the total, about $14 billion was raised across private equity and infrastructure strategies, while credit strategies pulled in more than $12 billion, TPG CFO Jack Weingart said.
Weingart listed several reasons for a significant increase in aggregate capital raising in 2025 compared to 2024, including scaling the credit platform, additional closes for the firm's climate private equity and infrastructure vehicles, and initial closes for its flagship buyout funds. He also cited "increasing penetration of the high net worth market generally."
Founder and Executive Chairman James Coulter said that despite the new US administration moving against government subsidies in the renewable energy sphere, he sees opportunities with TPG's climate product, which has an investor base mainly outside the US.
"[T]here's a lot of attention right now on what's happening in Washington," Coulter said. "Hence, effect on things like offshore wind and [electric vehicles], which were areas we've been quite vocal about avoiding historically. While that debate has been going on, we're seeing an absolute explosion of spending around the grid in the US, driven in part by data centers, but really a more broad-based electrification of our economy."
"You'll see a series of announcements from us of other opportunities to build out clean power backbones for what's happening in AI."
Net positivity score of 1.25%, above the financial industry average of 0.91%.
Read the call transcript.
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Read the previous earnings calls wrap-up.
