What is the most prestigious PE firm?

Privateer Holdings.

1. KKR 2. BX 3. Carlyle

Mitt Romney's bain capital.

TPG

ThaVanBurenBoyz:

Privateer Holdings.

^this

KKR and TPG

Megafunds: KKR, Apollo, BX

Non-megafunds: Berkshire Partners, Oaktree

BC123:

Megafunds: KKR, Apollo, BX

Non-megafunds: Berkshire Partners, Oaktree

Agreed. KKR is probably the most prestigious for people who aren't in the industry. Otherwise, Apollo is probably the most respected by other PE firms.

Haha TPG? Watch them miss their fundraising target this cycle. As for Bain, their "operations" focus really hasn't given them any edge in recent years.

I might add centerbridge to the list.

BC123:

Megafunds: KKR, Apollo, BX

Non-megafunds: Berkshire Partners, Oaktree

Remind me, what constitutes a mega fund these days....>$80bn AUM? Would hate to embarrass myself at the next WSO circle jerk.

Megafunds : KKR, BX, TPG & Bain Capital.

Surprised to see so many people put TPG on their top list and leave Carlyle out...

roofstreet:

1. KKR 2. BX 3. Carlyle

That is exactly what I was thinking. Of these three, who else agrees that they should be in this order?

Bateman Begins:

roofstreet:

1. KKR 2. BX 3. Carlyle

That is exactly what I was thinking. Of these three, who else agrees that they should be in this order?

agreed.

ibplanet:

TPG hires a bunch of really smart guys. Carlyle has a bunch of non targets thrown in there.

Or were we talking about Preftige instead?

Carlye's recent fund performance absolutely blows TPG's out of the water. That's way more important than the schools their associates went to.

If you want to talk about performance...Apollo's funds blows all of the other megafunds out of the water. Plus they pay like $100k more than other megafunds at the associate level.

Also, Carlyle partners V returned like 11%...better than TPG's 6% but nothing to pat yourself on the back about

ibplanet:

TPG hires a bunch of really smart guys. Carlyle has a bunch of non targets thrown in there.

TPG's classes are way too fratty in my opinion...

bugattiveyron:

If you want to talk about performance...Apollo's funds blows all of the other megafunds out of the water. Plus they pay like $100k more than other megafunds at the associate level.

Also, Carlyle partners V returned like 11%...better than TPG's 6% but nothing to pat yourself on the back about

Tough to compare because the vintages don't perfectly match, but for boom-era vintage funds , per Calpers its Carlyle 13.6% ('05) or 9.4% ('07) Apollo 7.9% ('06) KKR 5.6% ('06) Blackstone 2.7% ('06) TPG -2.6% ('06)

TPG's '08 fund's not doing much better, despite being raised in what will probably end up being the best performing PE vintage of the past decade

frank_reynolds:

bugattiveyron:

If you want to talk about performance...Apollo's funds blows all of the other megafunds out of the water. Plus they pay like $100k more than other megafunds at the associate level.

Also, Carlyle partners V returned like 11%...better than TPG's 6% but nothing to pat yourself on the back about

Tough to compare because the vintages don't perfectly match, but for boom-era vintage funds , per Calpers its
Carlyle 13.6% ('05) or 9.4% ('07)
Apollo 7.9% ('06)
KKR 5.6% ('06)
Blackstone 2.7% ('06)
TPG -2.6% ('06)

TPG's '08 fund's not doing much better, despite being raised in what will probably end up being the best performing PE vintage of the past decade

Not sure why you chose to only looked at '06 vintages for the other players but...

Apollo 22% ('08) TPG 7% ('08) Bain Cap 11% ('04) KKR 16% ('03) TPG 15% ('03)

Also, you said Carlyle's RECENT fund performance blows TPG's out of the water...but 9.4% on an '07 vintage was average at best.

bugattiveyron:

Also, you said Carlyle's RECENT fund performance blows TPG's out of the water...but 9.4% on an '07 vintage was average at best.

Yes, both points can be true at the same time. Not arguing with you there. Carlyle's recent returns have been average at best, and yet they blow TPG's out of the water.

Continuing to take this thread in a more educated direction, can people comment on where they are getting their fund performance numbers from? Not that i doubt you...just would like to look for myself too.

09grad:

Continuing to take this thread in a more educated direction, can people comment on where they are getting their fund performance numbers from? Not that i doubt you...just would like to look for myself too.

calpers is a good place to start for most of the megafunds. If you have access to preqin that will have a more comprehensive database.

http://www.calpers.ca.gov/index.jsp?bc=/investments/assets/equities/pe/…

~

Apollo

Centerbridge, but that's not true PE in the sense that Associates are staffed across both strategies (distressed PE and public market distressed securities).

For the megafunds, it's Apollo by far. Anyone who says Bain is clearly still in college or banking.

KKR BX Carlyle TPG Apollo Bain Capital Goldman Providence Warburg Pincus Apax Advent Thomas H. Lee Golden Gate / Silver Lake Oaktree

Megafund greater than 20bn

I'm a bit biased but I think it's between Apollo, BX, and KKR

parvenu:

I'm a bit biased but I think it's between Apollo, BX, and KKR

I throw in Carlyle and GSCP and say

/thread

Doesn't really matter between 1-5, but those are on a top tier. Bain isn't what it used to be IMO.

When pension fund managers get together to chat with each other about who the best funds are, they are usually saying stuff like "nah, those guys are too fratty ... but then again those guys hire a lot of non-targets, so it's a tough call."

peinvestor2012:

parvenu:

I'm a bit biased but I think it's between Apollo, BX, and KKR

I throw in Carlyle and GSCP

I find it interesting that these threads generally focus more on fund size/AUM rather than performance.

time to bring this back to the top of the discussion list in honor of on-cycle recruiting kicking off

Hellman & Friedman if you’ve ever actually worked in the industry. Everyone is in awe of them

probably kkr and blackstone

As someone in industry, definitely KKR, BX, APO. TPG / CG have so many internal problems that few people who are in industry try to lateral there. Would argue within industry that TPG is less respected than most privately held large cap funds, and Carlyle is headed in that direction too. Many of my friends have left TPG / CG to other PE funds (to actually make carry dollars), but my friends who have left KKR / BX go to public equities, rarely to other funds.

Carlyle just laid off their CEO for contentious reasons, many of the partners left (including their only partner in Menlo), and their funds are performing terribly. One of my friends in consumer told me they might completely stop investing in consumer because of how poorly that team has performed. Tech is undifferentiated and they will never be as good at tech as TB / Vista / SLP. Their bread and butter is and always will be A&D. They've been so focused on credit and non-PE assets that they've lost their edge.

TPG has had terrible fundraising because of subpar performance and instead of performing, they launch every ESG fund you can think of to save their relationships with LPs. Everyone is leaving the consumer / IDMC team to private large cap funds that have better fundraising / performance (ie Advent). Burning franchise that hasn't raised a fund as large as it had pre-GFC...even after 15 years.

H&F and Warburg Pincus

KKR, BX, Carlyle, TPG, Bain. If you're a MF, you're pretty prestigious by default.

1. Solidified 'institutional' asset managers that are clearly real businesses and have built / continue to build real competitive moats (e.g., diversified funds, fee-driven earnings, backward integration to lock in owned-capital) - most likely to still be operating 50 years from now:

• BX, KKR, Apollo 
• Carlyle - basically worse-run, sub-scale version of the above - probably won't disappear anytime soon, but certainly gap between Carlyle and the rest is increasing

2. Strong private equity / investment funds that are very good at their specialty area and have some sort of fly-wheel building (in this case, buyout PE)

• Advent, H&F
• Bain - although based more on historical track record than anything else

3. Funds that are basically 1-2 bad funds from disappearing.

• Everyone else 

Edit: So this is a bit provocative but really think about it - private equity are just like any other business in that it's highly competitive and over time as with any industry, there are very few long-term sustainable winners. What makes PE really hard is that the results are 100% measurable - and at the end of the day, there is virtually nothing proprietary about any of it - it's just people - and people leave, retire, die. Companies like Google, J&J, Costco, Walmart, Coca Cola, McDonalds will far outlive the vast majority of PE funds.