Private credit grew from a niche corner of finance into a $1.7 trillion force that reshaped global lending, while private markets more broadly pulled in everyday investors at a record pace. 2026 is the year the model met its first serious test. This page collects Khan Capital’s coverage of the asset class, from the decade-long boom to the redemption gates now testing the promise of liquidity. Each section links to our detailed analysis.
Latest in this story
BlackRock Record AUM: The $15.3 Trillion Quarter · 21 Jul 2026
How private markets got so big
Start with the ascent. The rise of private credit traces the journey from niche to $1.7 trillion. The same era produced new ways to package illiquid assets for liquid investors: the rise of semi-liquid funds, the private equity secondaries boom that became the industry’s liquidity release valve, and the broader democratisation of private markets that drew retail capital in at a near-60 per cent annual rate.
The first real tests
The boom had never faced a genuine downturn. Private credit faces its first real test set out the stakes; the private credit crackup examined Blue Owl, redemption gates and the liquidity illusion as the cracks appeared; and the Q2 reflexivity trap explains why redemptions across the largest non-traded BDCs look set to get worse before they improve. The cycle’s July 2026 escalation, with $14 billion trapped behind gates and PIMCO’s confidence gap widening, is covered in The $14 Billion Gate. And at the very top of the market, the largest private credit deal on record, the $35bn Broadcom-Anthropic chip financing, began moving toward secondary trading.
Cracks in the model
Two structural pressures run beneath the headlines. Private credit and AI disruption asks what happens when the software borrowers at the core of the loan book see their collateral re-rated overnight, and KKR, Apollo and the alternative asset manager model under pressure examines the listed managers whose growth story now faces scrutiny. Their reach keeps growing regardless: Apollo’s contested £5.7bn bid for easyJet shows permanent capital now competing to take household-name FTSE companies private outright.
BlackRock Record AUM: Inside the $15.3 Trillion Quarter
The world’s largest asset manager printed a record $15.3 trillion quarter, with HPS contributing its first $230 million of base fees and infrastructure assets up five-fold on the GIP integration. Why the private markets build-out, not the AUM headline, is the story.
From private to public
The other side of the private-markets story is the exit. The largest listing ever attempted runs through SpaceX’s $1.75 trillion IPO filing and the subsequent SpaceX IPO pricing, a test of how much the public market will pay for a private champion. The exit route reopened in earnest in 2026, a shift traced in the IPO window reopens.
The through-line
The common thread is liquidity: a decade of selling illiquid assets as if they were liquid, now meeting a cycle that asks whether that promise holds. We update this hub as the test plays out; the latest analysis always appears first on our analysis page.