Blackstone plans to list some of its biggest investments

Blackstone, the world’s largest private capital firm, is looking to list some of its biggest investments in a move which could reignite the IPO market.
Speaking alongside a third-quarter trading update to Wall Street today, Jonathan Gray, president of the New York listed-investment giant, said he expected initial public offerings would pick up next year and it was planning to take some of its portfolio companies public.
Blackstone manages a record $1.1 trillion of assets globally and is one of Britain’s biggest foreign investors.
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Although Blackstone is understood to be looking more at its assets in the United States, his comments could boost confidence in European markets.
Globally the amount raised from IPOs fell by almost a quarter in the first nine months of the year to $77.6 billion, according to figures from EY last month. Meanwhile, the MSCI World index has gained 18 per cent so far this year.
In the UK there were just ten listings on the London stock market in the first three quarters, raising £584.6 million, down 47 per cent year-on-year.
During the past 20 years Blackstone has invested more than £70 billion across more than 100 businesses and investments in Britain. Its portfolio includes Bourne Leisure, the owner of Haven Holidays and Warner Leisure, Merlin Entertainments, the theme park group, Sage Homes, the affordable homes provider, and the National Exhibition Centre.
This year it started work on a new 226,000 sq ft European headquarters in London, expected to be ready in 2028.
Gray told Wall Street analysts on Thursday that the IPO market has been a “laggard” with 2022 and 2023 “very slow years”, but said that “as the price of the public market goes up, it’s like a magnet pulling private companies into the market. And so I think you’ll begin to see more.”
He added: “I walked into a meeting yesterday and we were talking about a potential IPO. And we’ve really gone from sort of this theoretical to the practical.”
“So my expectation is the IPO market, which is historically cyclical, will pick back up. The private market has grown … I think we will see a much better IPO market in 2025.”
Gray’s comments came as Blackstone beat Wall Street’s expectations in its quarterly update. The investor saw $41 billion of inflows during the third quarter and deployed and committed $54 billion of capital, the highest in more than two years, lifted by a revival in deal making activity as the Federal Reserve cut interest rates.
Stephen Schwarzman, Blackstone’s chief executive, said the results showed a “broad-based acceleration across our business”.
Shares in Blackstone closed up $9.88, or 6.2 per cent, at $169.59 in New York on Thursday.