AGM Alts Weekly | 6.21.26: A better sandwich
AGM Alts Weekly #160: Making private markets more public, every week.
For too long, private equity funds have relied on manual processes — spreadsheets, scattered documents, disjointed data — to track complex investment and ownership structures. It’s slow, error-prone, and not scalable. And when regulators, investors, or auditors come knocking, it’s a fire drill every time.
At DealsPlus, we help private equity funds digitise investment and ownership structures, eliminating data silos. Our software helps power key workflows such as: quarterly reporting, audits, compliance, and exits.
Good afternoon from London.
The convergence of public and private markets continues to charge ahead at full steam.
This week’s news saw Morningstar’s wealth business partner with both traditional and alternative asset managers to launch a series of public-private model portfolios later this year.
This new development in private markets isn’t the first model portfolio to enter the market, as I wrote in the 9.15.24 AGM Alts Weekly and in the 12.1.24 AGM Alts Weekly about the growing trend of “model behavior” in private markets. iCapital launched a number of private markets model portfolios in 2024. Other asset management firms and private markets infrastructure platforms have done so in various ways, shapes, and forms to try to bring the best of public and private together into packaging that makes it easier for wealth managers to integrate private markets exposures into their asset allocation models through partnerships, as BlackRock and Partners Group, Blackstone, Vanguard, and Wellington, Apollo and State Street, and KKR and Capital Group have done (amongst others).
This model portfolio is particularly interesting for a few reasons.
One, the model series will see an independent ratings firm, Morningstar, take the lead on asset allocation, manager research, and due diligence. The asset managers, JP Morgan Asset Management and Franklin Templeton, will deliver public markets strategies across ETFs and interval funds, and Apollo and Franklin will provide the private markets strategies.
The “buy button?”
Two, the models will have 12-20% allocation to private markets across private credit and real estate asset classes. This quantum represents a sizable allocation to private markets and, most pertinent to the growth of private markets AUM flows, it will enable a “one-click” solution. I’ve written about private markets needing a “buy button” in the 7.14.24 AGM Alts Weekly, noting:
Integrating pre-investment, execution, and post-investment data and portfolio management tools all in a single place is critical to increasing advisor adoption of private markets products. Solutions that provide the connective tissue that serves to bring together data and information will also be part of the equation here. All of this is coming in private markets. Perhaps then we’ll see private markets funds go from sold to bought — and the “buy button” will be part of the continued evolution in private markets distribution.
Sharing perspectives on the announcement of the “Morningstar Public / Private Select Series” this week, Apollo President Jim Zelter alluded to the notion of a “buy button” with his assertion that models make “private markets [a] core portfolio building block.”
“The next generation of model portfolios will blend public and private markets, and offer investors greater diversification, more yield and better reflect the full breadth of the economy. These models reflect what clients are seeking, private markets as a core portfolio building block, rather than an allocation to the side.”
The evolution of private markets may very well mean that private markets products move from sold to bought over time.
The ETF comp
It’s useful to look at the evolution of another innovative product structure, ETFs, in order to understand what this means for the distribution evolution and marketing revolution occurring in private markets.
ETFs are not, for the most part, new investment strategies, but rather new ways to invest.
Investors, either individuals or intermediaries, have always invested in equities. ETFs gave them a new structure to invest vis-à-vis equities.
Passive investing and ETF AUM have seen staggering growth, with an 18% CAGR from 2009 to 2019.
The uptick in ETF AUM growth between the early 2000s to 2014 in the above graph is notable. What’s clear from the graph is that AUM growth started to pick up steam between 2009 and 2014. That coincides with a number of key industry developments, notably BlackRock’s $13.5B acquisition of Barclays Global Investors, a leading ETF platform that had almost $500B of the $1T total industry AUM in 2009. From 2009 to 2020, ETF AUM has been party to staggering growth — 18% CAGR — making it an unquestionable breakthrough technology innovation that has reshaped financial services.
BlackRock and iShares, amongst others, became synonymous with ETFs. Why? Because they invested heavily in educating the market — from financial advisors to individual investors — about the merits of ETFs.
Effective education and marketing of the “why” of ETFs as a product construct were so critical in making ETFs go mainstream.
The why became the how. Education led to allocation. The why (invest in low-cost, passive investment products that are convenient and easy to use) became the how (invest in iShares ETFs).
A “profitability paradox”
But as ETFs grew in size, scale, and AUM, the fees went in the opposite direction.
Enter the “profitability paradox,” as I wrote about in the 11.30.25 AGM Alts Weekly.
A chart from PwC illustrates this trend line: the asset and wealth management industry now earns less for every dollar managed — and profit per AUM (US$M per US$1B of AUM) is projected to decrease from 1.18 in 2024 to 1.07 in 2030 (this figure is down from 1.46 in 2018 and 1.68 in 2021).
The decline in fees is quite stark for mutual funds and ETFs, as the chart below from Bain & Company’s 2025 Global Private Equity Report illustrates.
It has taken years for fees to decline sharply in the ETF and mutual fund worlds, but asset managers have had to trade off scale for lower fees year after year.
I’m sure the world’s largest asset managers would have preferred to march onward with high fees (as would everyone, right?), but it is a trade that the largest, scaled players have been able to handle, however begrudgingly.
Difficulties in differentiation: who has the better sandwiches?
With fees on a secular decline, and the shrinking dispersion of product performance in public markets, the rise of passive has coincided with a more difficult battle for differentiation.
Armies of distribution professionals were complemented by the aerial support of a steady stream of marketing and content to educate advisors and end wealth clients on the virtues of ETFs.
While education and marketing efforts themselves could be a differentiating feature, as BlackRock’s iShares marketing proved, differentiation became more difficult over time as fees declined and performance converged.
The ETF distribution war became about which firm had better sandwiches at lunch for advisors (ok, I know this is not entirely accurate, and there’s a lot more involved in distributing ETFs than that, but I am trying to prove a point).
Scale is paramount in the game of distribution. Winning the distribution war often requires boots on the ground.
The question of how asset managers market private markets products, however, remains more elusive.
Wealth channel distribution strategies in private markets products have mirrored those of public markets.
Will marketing strategies in private markets mirror those of ETFs and mutual funds?
Perhaps the evolution in marketing should study what is occurring in “new media.”
I’ve talked about the importance of “owning the narrative” in private markets. Owning the narrative has never been more important, particularly at a time when companies need to go direct and “be their own media.”
Some firms, like Blackstone, have cracked the code on “new media.” They have figured out how to leverage the power of going direct with authenticity, but also maintaining the institutional quality and level of seriousness required to capture the trust of allocators that are entrusting the firm with hundreds of millions or billions of dollars.
A post this week by Andreessen Horowitz’s Erik Torenberg highlights some of the features that define “new media.”
New Media is about being interesting and saying what you really mean, versus Old Media where you were mostly trying to stay on message and keep out of trouble. That’s because, in the old world, you were entirely dependent on other people’s channels to get your word out. There were a select set of newspapers or TV shows that could legitimize you, and if you ever made them mad, you were in serious trouble.
Erik’s quote above highlights a crucially important point about “new media”: authenticity.
The next line in his post reads, “There was no category in the middle, if your goal was, “I want to tell my story and be authentically understood (my emphasis).”
In the sea of sameness where most asset managers swim because they do not dare to be different (and, in many cases, it’s for good reason and reasons I understand), authenticity is what is now required in order to stand out from the crowd in the wealth channel.
An interesting feature of “new media” emerges when one looks at “new media” through the prism of speaking to “insiders.”
As Anu Atluru wrote in her recent essay, “New Media is Insider Media,” on “Working Theorys,” “new media” is media “for insiders, by insiders.”
Audience Market Cap
In Atluru’s view of the world, both the creator and audience belong to the same in-group. The topic is less important than the audience whose opinion matters, she writes.
Atluru goes on to assert that “insider audiences are more valuable than their size.”
She writes:
A show with 50,000 highly valued viewers can matter more than one with five million random ones. Audience Market Cap is the metric that matters.
The concepts of “1,000 True Fans” and “Audience Market Cap” arguably matter even more in the world of asset management, where one fan can mean a multi-million- or multi-billion-dollar allocation decision.
The right marketing in asset management?
It will be authentic. It will capture culture. It will be a tastemaker. It will be leveraging “Knowledge Creators,” as I wrote in the 4.5.26 AGM Alts Weekly.
It will be a “cultural power player,” as the chart below from Alturu illustrates.
As I wrote in the AGM Alts Weekly 6.1.25: Brand Equity:
If an alternative asset manager was a consumer brand, who would they be?
Consumer brands can capture culture.
Capturing culture results in brand equity that can be hard to replicate.
To own the narrative, firms must capture culture. They need to be tastemakers. Being a tastemaker will lead to exerting soft power because, as Joseph Nye said, “soft power arises from the attractiveness of a [country’s - but here insert asset manager’s] culture, … ideals, and policies.”
Culture matters more than ever in asset management marketing. As I wrote in the 8.17.25 AGM Alts Weekly, in the collision of culture x finance, asset managers need to become more like consumer brands — and build their brand in ways that are more consumer-oriented.
Asset managers must think about building their brand for the investor of tomorrow — who wants a brand that operates at the “collision of culture x finance.”
There are a host of tactics that will take to win the battle of the brand. It’s not an easy balance for firms to strike, particularly in a regulated industry. Firms are constrained by both regulations and the responsibility of being a fiduciary. Both of these marketing features in asset management must be respected, and I understand when firms err on the side of caution. But firms also need to explore how to be authentic while coloring within the lines. They need to balance how to be both informal and relatable, but simultaneously serious and institutional.
That’s why, in asset management, it all comes back to the DNA.
Authenticity is why “the DNA” matters for asset management marketing. And that comes down to knowing yourself and knowing your brand equity.
AGM Index
AGM has created an Index to track the leading publicly traded alternative asset managers.
Some of the industry’s largest alternative asset managers are publicly traded — and their net inflows can serve as a window into how private markets are perceived by investors and allocators allocating capital to alternative investments.
Note: AUM figures are based on fee-paying AUM where applicable.
“Alt Goes Mainstream is category of one.” Global Head of Marketing & Communications, $X00B AUM alternative asset manager.
“When it comes to the intersection of alternative investments and wealth management, Michael just gets it.” CIO, $18B AUM RIA.
🤝 Interested in the AGM RIA Field Trips? 🤝
The inaugural AGM RIA Field Trip took place on May 19–20 in New York City. We had an exceptional group of RIAs and GPs joining for a highly curated, uniquely structured, exciting 2-day program.
If you’re an RIA or a GP and you’re interested in joining the waitlist for the next Field Trip on October 6-7 in NYC, please reach out or click on the links below.
Who is hiring?
In order for alts to continue to go mainstream, we need the best talent to go into the space. Here are some openings at private markets firms. If you’d like to connect with any of these teams, let me know, and I’m happy to facilitate an introduction if appropriate. If you’re a company or fund in private markets, feel free to reach out to share a job description you’d like to be listed here to highlight for the Alt Goes Mainstream community.
🔍 Blackstone (Alternative asset manager) - Blackstone Private Wealth - Product Specialist, Vice President (Real Assets). Click here to learn more.
🔍 KKR (Alternative asset manager) - VP - Social Media Strategist. Click here to learn more.
🔍 Apollo Global Management (Alternative asset manager) - Director, Transformation Management - Private Credit & Private Markets. Click here to learn more.
🔍 Blue Owl (Alternative asset manager) - Private Wealth, Portfolio Strategist Real Assets, Vice President. Click here to learn more.
🔍 Franklin Templeton (Asset manager) - Portfolio Manager, Private Markets. Click here to learn more.
🔍 Goldman Sachs Alternatives (Alternative asset manager) - Asset & Wealth Management, Client Solutions Group, Wealth Alternatives Specialist, New York - Vice President. Click here to learn more.
🔍 HarbourVest (Alternative asset manager) - Senior Associate, Business Intelligence - Global Private Wealth. Click here to learn more.
🔍 iCapital (Private markets infrastructure investment platform) - Chief Risk Officer, Managing Director. Click here to learn more.
🔍 Ultimus Fund Solutions (Fund administrator) - Managing Director, Fund Accounting. Click here to learn more.
🔍 Krilogy (Wealth manager) - Senior Wealth Advisor. Click here to learn more.
🔍 MSCI (Data services) - Sales Executive, VP - Private Capital Solutions. Click here to learn more.
The latest on Alt Goes Mainstream
Recent podcast or video episodes and blog posts on Alt Goes Mainstream:
📝 Read The AGM Op-Ed with Permira’s Partner, Executive Committee Member at Permira, and Investment Committee Member at Permira Credit Benoit Vauchy on credit underwriting in the age of AI and uncertainty. Read here.
🎥 Watch Juventus Director of Football Strategy Giorgio Chiellini share life lessons in sports and business from a world-class performer on and off the field. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Bank of America’s Head of Alternative Investments Mark Sutterlin share why being a good investor in private markets is table stakes. Watch here.
🎥 Watch iCapital’s Managing Director, Head of Private Asset Research & Model Portfolios Kunal Shah share lessons learned from being an institutional allocator and the private market mindset wealth managers need in the 20th episode of the Alts Pulse podcast recorded live at the iCapital Connect conference. Watch here.
📝 Read The AGM Op-Ed with Arcesium Private Markets Head Cesar Estrada on how consolidating data can enhance the LP / GP relationship. Read here.
🎥 Watch Benefit Street Partners’ Senior Managing Director, Head of Real Estate and Portfolio Manager Michael Comparato discuss the opportunity in commercial real estate credit. Watch here.
🎥 Watch 73 Strings’ CEO and Co-Founder Yann Magnan discuss how technology innovation is unlocking valuation intelligence in private markets. Watch here.
📝 Read “Alternative Thinking: Connecting the dots with the data with RIA CIOs and KKR’s 2025 RIA Private Markets Survey,” a recap of a conversation with Beacon Pointe CIO Michael Dow, Cary Street Partners CIO Matt Rubin, and KKR MD Matt Magill about how RIA CIOs are allocating to private markets and tying two live examples to data gleaned from KKR’s 2025 RIA Private Markets Survey. Read here.
🎥 Watch Hamilton Lane’s Executive Co-Chairman Hartley Rogers share perspectives from 40+ years of pioneering in private markets in a podcast recorded live at the iCapital Connect conference. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Lincoln International’s Managing Director and Global Head of the Portfolio Valuations practice Brian Garfield share perspectives on how AI is impacting private markets valuations. Watch here.
📝 Read The AGM Q&A with Davidson Kempner Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer Tony Yoseloff and Partner and Head of Research Suzanne Gibbons for opportunities in credit amidst a capital structure reset. Read here.
🎥 Watch Bridgepoint’s Partner and Chief Investment Officer Xavier Robert provide a masterclass on the European middle market investing landscape. Watch here.
🎥 Watch AlphaCore’s CEO & Founder Dick Pfister share his perspective on building a wealth management firm with “alpha at its core” in a podcast recorded live at the iCapital Connect conference. Watch here.
🎥 Watch HarbourVest’s CEO John Toomey discuss how private markets have changed and how HarbourVest has been “earning investors’ trust” for over 40 years. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Stonepeak’s Partner and Senior Managing Director, Stonepeak Credit Ryan Roberge on the evolution of infrastructure credit. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Bloomberg’s Head of Fixed Income & Private Markets Brad Foster on the convergence between public and private markets and how the market structure evolution in private markets might unfold. Watch here.
📝 Read The AGM Q&A with MSCI Head of Private Assets Luke Flemmer for perspectives on how market structure is evolving to build increased transparency in private markets. Read here.
🎥 Watch Brookfield Asset Management’s President, Private Equity Group David Nowak discuss what “earn your seat” private equity means and how Brookfield’s owner-operator and industrial heritage have shaped the firm’s private equity investment business. Watch here.
🎥 Listen and watch EQT’s Deputy Managing Partner and Chairperson of EQT Real Assets Lennart Blecher share the history, background, and evolution of the firm’s infrastructure investment business and how EQT takes an active ownership approach to real assets. Listen here and Watch here.
🎥 Watch Stable Asset Management’s Founder & CEO Erik Serrano Berntsen discuss the evolution of the GP seeding market and what it takes to build a great alternative asset management firm. Watch here.
🎥 Watch MSCI’s Head of Private Assets Luke Flemmer discuss the evolution in private markets market structure and how standardization, normalization, and transparency of data will transform private markets. Watch here.
🎥 Watch AGM Unscripted at the Goldman Sachs Alternatives Summit with Partners Matt Gibson (here), James Reynolds (here), Kristin Olson (here), Harold Hope (here), Michael Bruun (here), and Jeff Fine (here).
🎥 Watch Lexington Partners’ Partner Taylor Robinson share details about the evolution of the secondaries market and why secondaries are in the spotlight. Watch here.
📝 Read The AGM Q&A with Blue Owl Senior MD and CEO of Global Private Wealth Sean Connor on how they are serving the wealth channel in 2026 and beyond. Read here.
🎥 Watch Ultimus Fund Solutions’ CEO Gary Tenkman discuss how Ultimus is helping to build core fund administration infrastructure that powering the evergreen evolution and is helping to make private markets go mainstream. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Goldman Sachs’ Partner and Global Head of Private Wealth Management Capital Markets and Global Head of Goldman Sachs Apex Family Office Coverage Sara Naison-Tarajano discuss how Goldman Sachs has built its Apex Family Office Coverage group to serve UHNW families and family offices. Watch here.
📝 Read about the expansion of Alt Goes Mainstream, with the announcement of AGM Community, the creation of the AGM Community RIA Advisory Board, and why we believe that the industry should have small, curated events and community-building efforts. Read here.
🎥 Watch Stonepeak’s MD and CEO of SP+ INFRA Cyrus Gentry discuss the why and the how of bringing infrastructure investing to the wealth channel. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Blue Owl’s Senior MD and President & CEO of Global Private Wealth Sean Connor discuss the firm’s focus on the wealth channel and how the firm is a growth company in a growth industry that is investing in megatrends. Watch here.
🎥 Watch the latest Alts Pulse with iCapital Chairman & CEO Lawrence Calcano where we go global and discuss Lawrence’s recent trip to Asia to peer into the nuances of the different wealth management markets around the globe. Watch here.
🎥 Listen and watch EQT’s Chairperson EQT Asia and Head of Private Capital Asia Jean Eric Salata share reflections on leadership, culture, and values from one of the world’s largest investment firms. Listen here and Watch here.
🎥 Listen and watch EQT’s Founder and Chairperson Conni Jonsson discuss how EQT has built a global private equity firm the Nordic way. Listen here and Watch here.
🎥 Watch Vista Equity Partners’ President and COO David Breach discuss how Vista has built a software investing powerhouse in the age of AI. Watch here.
🎥 Watch ING’s Anneka Treon, Global Head of Private Banking, Wealth Management & Investments, and Johan Kloeze, Head of Private Banking & Wealth Management NL, ING, share lessons learned from building a private markets platform for private wealth clients. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Oaktree Capital Management’s Co-CEO and Head of Performing Credit Armen Panossian share why investors shouldn’t “have to reach for risk to generate the right return.” Watch here.
🎥 Watch Franklin Templeton’s COO - Global Wealth Management Alternatives George Stephan discuss the evolution of Franklin Templeton’s Alternatives business and how the firm has brought public and private together. Watch here.
🎥 Watch iAlta Holdings’ Founding Partner Bill Crager discuss the evolution of wealthtech from building Envestnet as Co-Founder and CEO to why today is a “transformational moment” in wealth management. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Vista Equity Partners’ Founder, Chairman, and CEO Robert F. Smith discuss who will benefit from AI and how he built a $100B enterprise software scaled specialist firm. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Nomura Capital Management’s CEO Robert Stark discuss how they have built a private credit firm within a global bank. Watch here.
📝 Read The AGM Op-Ed with Blue Owl Senior MD and Head of Digital Infrastructure Matt A’Hearn on building the backbone of the digital economy. Read here.
🎥 Watch PGIM’s Global Head of Alternative Investments Dominick Carlino discuss the evolution of distributing alternative investments to the wealth channel. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Blue Owl’s Senior MD and Head of Digital Infrastructure Matt A’Hearn share why he believes there’s a generational opportunity in financing digital infrastructure. Watch here.
🎬 Watch AGM Originals The DNA - Season 1 with conversations with EQT’s Conni Jonsson, Jean Salata, Lennart Blecher, Geraldine O’Keeffe, Peter Beske Nielsen, Peter Aliprantis, Hari Gopalakrishnan, William Vettorato, and Ken Wong about the firm’s DNA and its different investing capabilities. Watch here.
🎥 Watch PGIM’s Head of Multi-Asset and Quantitative Solutions Phil Waldeck discuss the intersection of insurance and asset management. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Stonepeak Chairman, Co-Founder, CEO Mike Dorrell share his story as a pioneer in infrastructure investing. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Hg Partner and Head of Value Creation Chris Kindt discuss AI’s transformative role in value creation for private equity. Watch here.
🎥 In Permira Part 2, watch Permira Co-Chairmen & Co-CEOs Brian Ruder and Dipan Patel discuss how the collaborative leadership model in action has helped the firm scale to an €80B alternative asset manager. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Permira Co-Chairman & Co-CEO Dipan Patel discuss how to scale an €80B alternative asset manager. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Morningstar CEO Kunal Kapoor cover the most pressing topics in private markets today, including the convergence of public and private, liquidity vs illiquidity, investor education, the importance of transparency, and the why, what, and how behind evergreen funds. Watch here.
🎥 Watch The Compound and Friends (TCAF) Co-Hosts and Ritholtz Wealth Management Partners Downtown Josh Brown and Michael Batnick and I go back and forth about private markets on TCAF Episode 207. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Stonepeak Co-President Luke Taylor discuss what it takes to be a great infrastructure investor. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Arcesium MD and Head of Client and Partner Development David Nable discuss how to architect private markets technology infrastructure for the future. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Hg Senior Partner and Executive Chairman Nic Humphries discuss how Hg has grown into a $100B scaled specialist and how one of the industry’s leading private equity technology and services investors is “navigating investing at an inflection point in history.” Watch here.
🎥 Watch EQT Partner, Head of Private Wealth Americas Peter Aliprantis live from Miami on how EQT is bringing global local. Watch here.
📝 Read The AGM Op-Ed with Arcesium SVP, Business Development - Private Markets Jean Robert on why asset managers need to rethink reporting as a strategic advantage. Read here.
🎥 Watch Blue Owl Co-President and Global Head of Real Assets Marc Zahr share the story of how he built Oak Street from $17M in AUM in 2009 to what is now Blue Owl’s $67.1B AUM Real Assets business in a live Alt Goes Mainstream podcast at Future Proof Citywide. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Hg’s Partner and Head of Hg Wealth Martina Sanow discuss how Hg has unlocked opportunities for the wealth channel to invest in Europe’s largest portfolio of software and services businesses. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Goldman Sachs’ Partner and Global Co-Head of the Petershill Group at Goldman Sachs Robert Hamilton Kelly discuss the evolution of the GP stakes industry and how Goldman has become a market leading GP stakes investor. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Blue Owl’s MD, Head of Alternative Credit Ivan Zinn unpack private credit and why ABF has become a prominent part of the private credit ecosystem. Watch here.
📝 Read The AGM Op-Ed with Blue Owl Head of Alternative Credit Ivan Zinn on why “asset-based finance today mirrors the evolution of corporate direct lending from over a decade ago.” Read here.
🎥 Watch Krilogy’s Partner and CIO John McArthur discuss how an RIA can chart a growth path by building out its private markets capabilities. Watch here.
🎥 Watch New Mountain Capital’s Founder & Chief Executive Officer Steve Klinsky discuss how $55B AUM New Mountain has built a business that builds businesses. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Arcesium’s Private Markets Head Cesar Estrada discuss data silos and technology integrations in private markets. Watch here.
🎥 Watch GeoWealth President & COO Jack Hannah and iCapital SVP, Partnerships Michael Doniger discuss the ground-breaking BlackRock, iCapital, and GeoWealth unified managed account partnership live from iCapital Connect. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Goldman Sachs’ Managing Director, Global Head of Alternatives, Third Party Wealth Kyle Kniffen discuss how they are “standing on the shoulders of Goldman Sachs to be a complete partner” for the wealth channel. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Fortress Investment Group Managing Director & Co-Head of Private Wealth Solutions Adam Bobker discuss how Fortress has built a wealth solutions business from a whiteboard, leaning on the firm’s pioneering history of innovation. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Constellation Wealth Capital President & Managing Partner Karl Heckenberg on why there will be a $1T independent wealth management firm. Watch here.
🎥 Watch BlackRock Managing Director, Co-Head of US Wealth Business, Senior Sponsor for Retirement Business Jaime Magyera and iCapital Chairman & CEO Lawrence Calcano discuss the ground-breaking BlackRock, iCapital, and GeoWealth unified managed account partnership live from iCapital Connect. Watch here.
🎥 Watch KKR Partner & Co-CEO of KKR Private Equity Conglomerate LLC (K-PEC) Alisa Wood discuss how the firm has innovated in private markets, why KKR came up with the Conglomerate structure, and how evergreens can play a role in investors’ portfolios. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Cantilever Group’s Co-Founder and Managing Partner Todd Owens in a live podcast from BTG Pactual’s NYC office share why GP stakes can be the best of all worlds. Watch here.
📝 Read The AGM Op-Ed with Arcesium Private Markets Head Cesar Estrada on the rise of asset-based finance and why it’s the next growth engine for private credit. Read here.
🎥 Watch BlackRock’s Head of the Americas Client Business Joe DeVico, Head of Product for US Wealth & Head of Alts to Wealth Jon Diorio, and Partners Group's Co-Head of Private Wealth Rob Collins discuss their landmark private markets model portfolio partnership that could be the industry’s “iPhone Moment.” Watch here.
🎥 Watch Brookfield Oaktree Wealth Solutions CEO John Sweeney discuss how to build a high-performing wealth solutions team and why the word “solutions” matters when working with the wealth channel. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Cerity Partners’ Partner & Chief Client Officer Tom Cohn and Partner Amita Schultes talk about how and why they have combined a leading OCIO with a $100B AUM wealth management practice. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Marc Lipschultz, Co-CEO of Blue Owl, talk about how they have aimed to skate where the puck is going as Blue Owl has grown its AUM to $265B in nine years. Watch here.
📝 Read The AGM Q&A with Blue Owl Co-CEO Marc Lipschultz, where he highlights some of the trends that have propelled alternative asset management into the mainstream: scale, a focus on private credit, and a focus on private wealth. Read here.
🎙 Listen to Stephanie Drescher, Partner & Chief Client & Product Development Officer of Apollo, discuss what is safe and what is risky as she dives into both the convergence between public and private and the nuances of asset allocation. Listen here.
🎥 Watch Joan Solotar, Global Head of Private Wealth Solutions at Blackstone share why it’s not even early innings, but that it’s “spring training” for private markets adoption by the wealth channel. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Venkat Subramaniam, Co-Founder of DealsPlus on building a single source of truth for private markets. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Hamilton Lane Managing Director, Co-Head US Private Wealth Solutions Stephanie Davis and iCapital Co-Founder & Managing Partner Nick Veronis discuss the evolution of evergreen funds on the third episode of the Investing with an Evergreen Lens Series. Watch here.
🎥 Watch KKR Managing Director, Head of Americas, Global Wealth Solutions (GWS) Doug Krupa and iCapital Co-Founder & Managing Partner Nick Veronis discuss the evolution of evergreen funds on the second episode of the Investing with an Evergreen Lens Series. Watch here.
🎥 Watch Vista Equity Partners Managing Director, Global Head of Private Wealth Solutions Dan Parant and iCapital Co-Founder & Managing Partner Nick Veronis discuss the evolution of evergreen funds on the first episode of the Investing with an Evergreen Lens Series. Watch here.
📝 Read about a year in the book of alts — a compilation of the 1,000+ pages written in weekly newsletters on Alt Goes Mainstream in 2024. Read here.
📝 Read about the launch of the AGM Studio, a collaboration between Alt Goes Mainstream and Broadhaven Ventures to incubate, invest in, and help scale companies and funds in private markets. Read here.
🎥 Watch Stepstone Private Wealth CEO Bob Long discuss StepStone Private Wealth’s edge and nuances with their evergreen structures in the first episode of “What’s Your Edge.” Watch here.
🎥 Watch Co-Founder & Managing Partner of Cantilever Group and former Goldman Sachs and Broadhaven Capital Partners Partner Todd Owens discuss the middle market opportunity in GP stakes investing. Watch here.
🎙 Hear me discuss why and how alts are going mainstream on The Compound’s Animal Spirits podcast with Ritholtz Wealth’s Michael Batnick and Ben Carlson. Listen here.
📝 Read about the evolution of GP stakes, why alternative asset management business models are better than SaaS, and our partnership with Todd Owens and David Ballard at Cantilever, a mid-market GP stakes firm anchored by BTG Pactual. Read here.
🎙 Hear how Chris Long, Chairman, CEO, and Co-Founder of Palmer Square Capital Management has built a $29B credit investment firm and a winning NWSL soccer franchise, the KC Current. Listen here.
🎙 Hear stories from building market-defining companies Blackstone, Airbnb, and private markets from Laurence Tosi, former CFO of Blackstone and Airbnb and Managing Partner & Founder of $7.6B investment firm WestCap. Listen here.
🎙 Hear Chris Ailman, the CIO of $307B CalSTRS, discuss how he manages a portfolio with ~40% exposure to private markets. Listen here.
🎙 Hear Blackstone CTO John Stecher discuss how technology is transforming private markets. Listen here.
🎙 Hear investing legends John Burbank and Ken Wallace of Nimble Partners provide a masterclass on investing with both a macro and VC lens. Listen here.

Thank you for reading. If you like the Alts Weekly, please share it with your friends, colleagues, and anyone interested in private markets.
Subscribe below and follow me and Alt Goes Mainstream on LinkedIn (and AGM’s LinkedIn page), Twitter (@michaelsidgmore), and YouTube to stay up to date on all things private markets.
If you have any suggestions, would like me to feature an article, research, or would like to recommend a guest or topic for the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast, reach out! I’d love to include it in my next post or on a future podcast.
Special thanks to Cameron Molnar, Ryan McCormack, Nick Owens, Michael Rutter for their contributions to the AGM Index section of the newsletter.
Disclaimer: Alt Goes Mainstream is an independent newsletter focused on the private markets industry. It is published for informational and educational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice, financial advice, legal advice, or any other form of professional advice. Nothing contained herein should be construed as a recommendation to buy, sell, or hold any security or investment product. The views expressed are solely those of the author and do not represent the views of any affiliated organization, employer, or third party. Some companies, individuals, or organizations featured or mentioned in this newsletter may be current or past sponsors of Alt Goes Mainstream. Sponsorship does not influence editorial coverage, but readers should be aware that a relationship might exist. The author may hold direct or indirect investments in companies, funds, or other entities mentioned in this newsletter.







