The world's largest private equity firms

At a time when fundraising congestion has left many PE firms fighting over a finite pool of LP capital, standing out from the crowd is no mean feat. It is all the more impressive, then, that this year’s leading firm has taken the top spot for the very first time, but has done so by an enormous margin.

After eight years in the top three, KKR has dethroned Blackstone, which had sat comfortably in pole position since 2019 and, in total, for five of the past 10 years. This year, however, KKR’s record-breaking sum of $126.5 billion exceeded Blackstone’s $82.46 billion tally by more than 53 percent. It also accounted for more than 20 percent of the fundraising total for the entire top 10, driven to some extent by the $19 billion final close of its largest-ever fund – KKR North America Fund XIII – in April.

To qualify for the 2022 ranking, firms needed to raise a minimum of $1.85 billion over the past five years, compared with $1.55 billion last year and $868 million a decade ago. This year’s cadre raised $2.6 trillion between them, smashing last year’s $2.25 trillion total capital record.

Aside from the new leader, there was no shortage of fresh faces on the 2022 ranking, with 26 new entrants to the list. Six of these were China-headquartered. Overall, 48 managers in the Asia-Pacific region made it into this year’s ranking, compared with 41 in 2021. With APAC private equity funds targeting a colossal $151.6 billion between them as of April, versus $99.5 billion in Europe, according to PEI data, next year’s ranking may well shift even further east.