The new platform, based in Europe, will also be available for clients in certain other regions; it is an example of the spread of the perpetual, or "evergreen" funds model.

US-listed asset management titan BlackRock has launched a private markets platform for wealth investors in Europe, which is also accessible to clients in the Middle East and Asia-Pacific.

The platform provides wealth clients with “evergreen,” multiple fund exposure to institutional-quality alternative investments under the new European Long-Term Investment Fund (ELTIF) 2.0 framework.

“Our goal is to revolutionise access to private markets for wealth clients. By launching this evergreen platform under the ELTIF 2.0 framework, we are breaking new ground in making institutional-quality alternatives accessible to a wider range of investors,” Stephen Cohen, chief product officer, BlackRock, said. 

The development comes at a time of continuing focus on how to make non-public assets, such as private equity, venture capital, private equity, infrastructure and forms of property more accessible to affluent and high net worth investors. At present, many of these areas are restricted to wealthier HNW clients and ultra-high net worth individuals and require minimum ticket sizes of $1 million or more. 

The ”evergreen,” or perpetual, model of fund is gaining ground. Blackstone (see here), BNP Paribas Asset Management (see here) and HarbourVest (see here), for example, have also pushed into this area. “Perpetual” is a term describing a structure of funds that doesn’t come with the drawdowns, capital calls, exit deadlines and other traditional features of private market entities. These “perps” don’t carry the kind of liquidity constraints that might be a problem for investors in more established fund structures.

BlackRock cited Preqin data that shows the global alternatives market is forecast to exceed $30 trillion by 2030. Research from the BlackRock Investment Institute (BII) suggests that some investors might benefit from portfolio allocations of up to 20 per cent in private markets.

The strategies blend the Luxembourg Part II SICAV structure with the ELTIF 2.0 wrapper.

The platform has launched with two initial funds in private equity and multi-alternatives. BlackRock Private Equity Partners will manage the BlackRock Private Equity Fund, a global diversified private equity portfolio across industry sectors and company stages, targeting buyout and growth opportunities via direct co-investments and secondaries. BlackRock Alternative Portfolio Solutions will also manage the Multi-Alternative Growth Fund, a global multi-alternatives portfolio across geographies and sectors, offering exposure to private equity, private credit, real assets and opportunistic investments aiming to increase capital growth over the long-term. 

The firm manages about €1.4 billion ($1.47 billion) of client capital across its four existing ELTIF funds as of June 2024.