Private markets secondaries volumes are set to surpass $225bn (£169.5bn) in 2025, driven by a continuation of slow distributions and growth in non-buyout strategies such as infrastructure and private credit.
Houlihan Lokey’s survey of active secondary buyers and sellers reported record-high private equity secondary volumes in 2026. The survey defined private equity broadly to encompass buyout, growth, venture capital, credit and real asset strategies.
The report found that the main drivers of secondary market volumes include a slow pace of distributions, cited by 81 per cent of respondents, a slowdown in mergers and acquisitions (71 per cent) and growth in non-buyout strategies such as infrastructure and private credit (69 per cent). Other factors included evergreen funds and new capital from institutional investors.
Buyout strategies continue to lead investor interest at 86 per cent, followed by growth at 47 per cent and private credit at 24 per cent.
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“Apart from temporary growth drivers, namely a slowdown in distributions, responses make it clear that several long-term factors are also powering secondaries,” said Matt Swain, managing director and global co-head of equity capital solutions at Houlihan Lokey. “These include the spread of secondaries beyond the core private equity strategy of buyouts, into areas like credit and infrastructure, and inflows of new money from both institutional investors and retail investors. These are all engines of growth that could drive rising volumes across economic cycles, regardless of the health of distributions.”
The report also found that investors favour certain geographies, with 86 per cent backing the US and nearly three-quarters keen on Europe. Asia currently appeals to only around one in six investors.
On pricing, some 96 per cent of respondents expect LP-led and GP-led pricing to remain stable or increase in 2026, with none forecasting a significant decline.
Read more: Delayed refinancing drives surge in private debt secondaries
The survey also found that return expectations for single-asset GP-led secondaries are higher than for either LP-led or multi-asset GP-led transactions.
“GP-leds have a long runway as the fastest growing part of the secondary market. They amount to slightly less than half of annual volume today, up from a tiny fraction just 10 years with the vast majority of Compass respondents giving these deals their stamp of approval,” Swain added.
Read more: LPs back private credit but fear wider performance gap
