Evercore: Credit Secondaries Are Accelerating
Fundraisings from Tikehau, GoldenTree, GCM Grosvenor and Mercia
👋 Hey, Nick here. A big welcome to the new subscribers from Morningstar, MA Financial, and Golborne Capital. You’re now one of the 3,210 subscribers, and you’re reading the 177th edition of my private credit newsletter.
After nearly three and a half years of writing The Credit Crunch, I finally achieved a major breakthrough: my wife was genuinely impressed by one of my newsletters.
Two weeks ago, I wrote about Apollo’s memorable “Don’t mistake the sprinkle for the cupcake” campaign. Apollo’s team followed up with the most convincing piece of marketing yet: a box of cupcakes for me and my friends.
Not wanting to get carried away, but if there is any read-across here, I may have to start writing about private jet finance and see whether Apollo can persuade Perseus Aviation to send a little something my way.
Reading on Outlook? The charts won’t render - Read it online
📕 Reads of the Week
Market Updates
Private Credit's Much Warranted Reset: Three Lies and a Truth
It’s great to see Joshua Easterly join the Substack community.
As expected, his first post is definitely worth reading.
👉 Private Credit’s Much Warranted Reset
Private Credit Leads the Next Wave of Institutional Allocations
Aviva’s 2026 private market study taps into the views of 500 institutional investors managing $6.5 trillion in assets.
Nearly half of these investors plan to increase private market allocations over the next two years. Infrastructure and Private credit stand out as the asset classes with the strongest net increase intentions.
Real estate shows the weakest allocation momentum. The gap between those investors planning to increase exposure versus those intending to reduce is small, reflecting the impact of higher interest rates, valuation resets, and structural challenges.
👉 Aviva’s Private Market Study
Borrower Defaults Remain Below the Long Run Average
Borrower defaults across the direct lending market remain low at roughly 2.0%, below the historical long-term average of 2.7%.
Manager & LP Updates
Cox Capital Announces Three BDC Tender Offers
Cox Capital launched a tender offer targeting investors in HLEND, ADS, and ASIF.
Cox is initially looking to acquire $30.5 million, at discounts of 15% to 30% to each fund’s reported Class I NAV as of May 31, 2026.
“Repurchase demand ran well ahead of issuer program capacity again last quarter, and we believe the industry needs a standing utility for the unfilled remainder. For a holder seeking full liquidity, the practical arithmetic is a blended exit: shares accepted by an issuer program are repurchased at or near net asset value, remaining shares can be sold to us.”
John Cox, Chief Executive Officer and Chief Investment Officer of Cox Capital Partners
It’s important to flaf these offers are very small relative to the total universe of investors in these funds. For context, the three funds hold roughly $38–40 billion in aggregate NAV, making the $30.5m tender about 0.1% of the combined NAV.
BlackRock’s $12Bn Meta Deal
BlackRock is preparing a debt sale of more than $12 billion to help finance a Meta data center project. The transaction combines investors from Global Infrastructure Partners and HPS Investment Partners, who are reportedly offering a single tranche of notes due in 2048, priced at a premium of about 2.875 percentage points over Treasuries (~7.1% all in).
Proceeds from the sale will fund a 1 GW data center campus in El Paso, Texas.
👉 Announcement 1 and Announcement 2
AustralianSuper targets $20bn private credit portfolio
AustralianSuper’s plans to double its private credit portfolio to $20 billion within four years.
As more members move into decumulation, super funds need to think about how portfolios deliver more predictable income streams and support members throughout retirement.
Against that backdrop, AustralianSuper has broadened its approach to credit investing by bringing private credit into its wider fixed income portfolio, allowing investment opportunities to be assessed across public and private markets rather than in isolation.
TD Asset Management launches its global private credit strategy
The fund is integrated into the TD Greystone private markets platform that manages $30 billion of assets. It invests in direct lending (middle market corporate credit), real estate debt, infrastructure debt, and specialty finance markets. It will target an unlevered yield of an 8% to 10%.
Partnership Updates
Wellington, Vanguard, and Blackstone Launch All-Private Fund
The partnership provides Merrill and Bank of America Private Bank clients with a simple access point to Blackstone’s perpetual private markets platform. This includes private credit, private equity, private infrastructure, and private real estate, in a single allocation. They will also explore additional distribution opportunities across the wealth ecosystem over time.
Evercore: Credit Secondaries Are Accelerating
I’ve written about the credit secondaries already this year (Link), but Evercore has since published some excellent data on how this year is playing out.
Below are my key highlights.
GP-led pricing has held firm,
GP-led transactions continued to price at ~99% of FMV on average, supported by greater access to information, direct sponsor engagement and increased buyer confidence in the ability to underwrite borrower-level performance.
While buyers became more selective during periods of volatility, competition for high-quality, senior-secured portfolios remained strong.
GP-led Credit Secondary Transaction Pricing
(% of FMV Before Post-Reference Date Cash Flow Adjustments)
Beware of Discrete Discounts
Nick here, it’s generally worth treating secondary discount numbers with a pinch of salt.
A transaction reported at 99% of fair market value does not necessarily mean the seller received 99 cents on the dollar relative to the portfolio’s original carrying value.
First, the portfolio may have been marked down shortly before the transaction. Pricing at 99% of an already reduced valuation can conceal a larger economic discount.
Second, headline pricing may include post-reference-date cash flows that accrue to the buyer. Interest payments, repayments, and other distributions received between the reference date and closing can improve the buyer’s effective return without appearing in the stated discount
In this case, the second point doesn’t apply as Evercore has explicitly stripped out PRD Cash Flow.
LP-led Credit Secondary Transaction Pricing
(% of NAV Before Post-Reference Date Cash Flow Adjustments)
The majority of available capital is focused on senior
Buyers typically target 10%-15% levered net IRRs (with transactions generally levered at or around 50%+ LTV).
Second Lien / Mezzanine and Opportunistic strategies target progressively higher returns.
Buyer Target Returns by %
BDC Rising Redemptions Have Yet to Translate into Secondary Sales
Redemption requests have increased more than sixfold since 3Q25
Elevated redemption requests have not yet resulted in meaningful secondary market activity. (See Cox’s Press Release for $30m or 0.1% of BDC Persistent redemption pressure could therefore create additional secondary opportunities over time.
Default rates have remained relatively stable with historical norms
💰Fundraising News
Tikehau’s $6 billion European Direct Lending VI
Tikehau Capital, a Paris-based alternative asset manager, closed its $6 billion European Direct Lending VI. The strategy has already completed 30 transactions and realised four exits, generating double-digit returns, and is already 44% deployed. The portfolio has an average net debt to EBITDA of 3.5x.
GoldenTree $2.75 bn Fund II
Goldentree, a New York-based manager, closed its $2.75 billion Private Credit Fund II. The Fund has already deployed close to 40% of commitments across approximately 50 investments and is delivering a net IRR of over 20%.
GCM Grosvenor $1.2 bn Credit Secondaries
GCM Grosvenor, a Chicago-based alt manager, closed its inaugural $1.2 billion Credit Secondaries Fund. The strategy focuses on opportunities across credit sub-strategies, with a particular focus on opportunistic corporate and asset-backed investments.
👉 GCM Grosvenor’s Announcement
NXT Capital $1.8 bn Capital Senior Loan Fund VIII
NXT Capital, a Chicago-based lender, announced a first close of $1.8 billion for its eighth direct lending fund. It finances sponsored middle market companies with earnings of $5 million to $50 million.
Dignari Capital Partners $500m from ADIA
Dignari Capital Partners, a Hong Kong private credit investment manager, raised $500 million from ADIA for its APAC real estate private credit strategy. The strategy invests in real estate opportunities in residential, office, retail, student accommodation, serviced apartment, co-living, data centers & logistics.
👉 Dignari Capital’s Announcement
Mercia $580 million UK Real Estate Development Debt Fund
Mercia Asset Management, a UK-listed, multi-asset investment manager, is raising up to $580 million for its UK Real Estate Development Debt Fund. The fund provides institutional investors with access to a specialist private credit strategy focused on UK industrial and logistics developments. The fund will finance experienced real estate developers with secured loans and will focus on opportunities within the industrial and logistics markets.
This newsletter is for educational and entertainment purposes only. It should not be taken as investment advice.
Each time I try opening the second Evercore link I’m taken to a Marsh website. Is there a way to post that report in the comments?