2026 Market Overview: Private Credit

Despite the noise, private credit fundamentals are solid. Our annual report offers a unique perspective on private credit and the broader industry, leveraging our firm’s expertise, research capabilities and expansive database to help investors navigate the evolving investment landscape. 

Read the Narrative
With the increased capital available, the increase in market share, and the ongoing press about the pressures on private credit, the casual observer would think that yields and spreads of private credit over broadly syndicated loans were collapsing. That would be a completely incorrect assumption.
Mario Giannini
Executive Co-Chairman, Hamilton Lane

Today’s Credit Landscape

It is difficult for anyone who has been in this asset class for less than 10 or 15 years to imagine what private credit was like before that. It was a cottage industry with primarily mezzanine and distressed managers. Only 466 funds as recently as 20 years ago. Now, 10 times that number and about 24 times the market size.1

Private Credit Evergreen AUM

The evergreen world has gone from, effectively, $0 to $500 billion in that last decade. We think the share of private credit dollars allocated to evergreen funds will only increase. We heard a top executive at one of the large U.S. investment banks say that their internal view is that closed-end funds in the credit space will largely disappear in a few years. Hyperbole, but we agree it is directionally accurate.2

Leveraged Buyouts (LBOs)

From being a relatively minor player up to 2018, private credit took almost 50% of the LBO financing market from public and syndicated bank lending markets. The last couple of years have seen the broadly syndicated market take back share. Let’s ask a question about that: At what cost? Do we think the recent spate of defaults and frauds that have made headlines are a function of private credit actions or syndicated loan actions? 3


Market Overview

Our annual report unpacks the conflicting market signals, AI obsession, private market realities and structural shifts reshaping portfolios in 2026. 


About Hamilton Lane

Our purpose is simple: To provide enhanced financial well-being for those who depend on us. We do that by seeking to deliver tailored, solutions-oriented private markets exposure and industry-leading client service. We’re an organization built on over three decades of client-centricity, candor and authenticity and powered by intellectual rigor and data-driven insight. 

Our commitment to serving those who depend on us has remained steadfast, while our focus on growth and transformation has only strengthened. Today, we serve institutional and private wealth investors around the world, helping them tap into the opportunities afforded by this maturing asset class.

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Footnotes

1Source: Hamilton Lane Data as of 3/31/25 (October 2025)  

Private Credit AUM  

2Source: Hamilton Lane Data via Cobalt as of 9/30/25 (January 2026), Goldman Sachs Research as of 9/30/25 (December 2025), S&P Global Data as of 3/31/2025 (December 2025) 

Leveraged Buyouts (LBOs) 

3Source: Pitchbook, LCD, Data as of 9/30/25 (October 2025)