With Leonard Green Stake, Blackstone Harks Back to Its Roots
ByThe Blackstone Group’s diversification drive is circling home.
Over the years, the group, run by Stephen A. Schwarzman, has expanded far beyond its leveraged-buyout roots. Now it is using capital that had been focused on hedge funds to take a stake in a rival private equity firm, Leonard Green. The return comparisons are too stark to ignore.
Though it started 32 years ago as a merger advisory shop, Blackstone raised its first leveraged buyout fund soon after the October 1987 market crash. With real estate, credit and hedge funds fully in the mix, private equity now accounts for just over a quarter of the firm’s nearly $370 billion under management…
With Leonard Green Stake, Blackstone Harks Back to Its Roots