Over the past five years, there has been a slow, yet steady, increase in private market adoption against a backdrop of market volatility. This year, while market volatility has remained, investment attitudes are shifting and leading to a sharper increase in take-up.
Private market investments are proving resilient and are available to a wider swath of investors, leading to increased adoption, according to State Street’s Private Markets Study 2026: Resilience Meets Opportunity.
For more stories like this, sign up for the PLANADVISERdash daily newsletter.
Even with high inflation and the conflict in the Middle East’s effect on global oil supplies and prices, only 7% of global asset owners were planning to reduce their exposure to private markets in the next two years, according to the study. Fifty percent said they were planning to increase their investments, and 43% were planning to keep roughly the same investments.
Heightened global interest in private assets comes alongside the U.S. government’s efforts to increase access to private markets, such as the safe harbor proposed rule by the Department of Labor.
“Democratization is raising the bar for how private markets are structured and supported,” said Scott Carpenter, State Street’s global head of alternatives, in a statement. “Delivering these strategies at scale requires more than product innovation.”
According to the study, 70% of institutions viewed the democratization of private markets as an opportunity, rather than a challenge.
Private equity was favored globally across alternative assets, with 48% of private market executive respondents planning to increase their investments in PE, and 39% of respondents planning to increase their investments in private credit.
When investors were asked why they were increasing private market allocations, 82% of all respondents said they expected higher long-term returns.
The second-most-popular reason cited for increasing private market investments was volatility reduction, cited by 42% of surveyed private market executives in the Americas, 52% from EMEA, and 58% from APAC.
“Even in a more uncertain environment, private markets are increasingly where investors access the most important long-term growth themes, serving as a critical source of returns and diversification,” said Donna Milrod, State Street’s chief product officer, in a statement.
Most private market asset and wealth managers (84%) already offer or plan to offer private market investment vehicles, and uptake in these vehicles came largely from investors in the Americas. Nearly half (49%) of surveyed asset and wealth managers from the U.S. said they already offer and use such vehicles for private market investments.
State Street surveyed 480 senior private market executives, including asset owners, mainstream asset managers and private-markets specific management firms, in March and April.
Effects of Market Volatility
Across the five years that State Street conducted its private markets study, geopolitical risks have remained, from COVID-19 market effects and the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 to the accession of U.S. President Donald Trump in 2025, which resulted in escalating U.S. tariffs last year and attacks on Iran this year. Other ongoing factors affecting economic markets include high inflation and interest rates and the rise of generative artificial intelligence.
With these market effects in mind, a separate study from Allianz analyzed how U.S. retail investors are thinking about their investments in current conditions.
According to the Quarterly Market Perceptions Study from the Allianz Center for the Future of Retirement for the year’s second quarter, most respondents (62%) worried that a major recession will occur soon, up from 54% in Q1.
This anticipation for the worst is affecting real investments, with 50% of investors surveyed saying they decreased risk in their portfolios due to recent market volatility.
While Allianz did not specifically mention private market investments, investors’ attitude toward financial markets suggest that private markets may be interpreted by Allianz study respondents as a “risky investment,” considering that many are new to the class.
Only 25% of investors surveyed by Allianz reported believing that current market conditions are good enough to invest in, a decrease from last quarter’s 34%.
“Market volatility makes it more difficult for Americans to feel confident about your financial future,” said Kelly LaVigne, Allianz Life’s vice president of consumer insights, in a statement. “During times of volatility like we have experienced recently, Americans may pull back or reduce risk exposure.”
Allianz’s market perceptions study was based on a May survey of 1,003 U.S. adults.
