US President Donald Trump signed an executive order on August 7 directing the Department of Labor and SEC to issue guidance on the inclusion of private market assets in 401(k) plans, marking a pivotal step toward unlocking a major new source of demand for private assets and substantially accelerating the democratization of the asset class. […]
August 2025
With a backdrop of strong, yet concentrated public markets, US private equity and venture capital posted mid to high single-digit returns in 2024, as venture capital bounced back from its two-year streak (2022–23) of negative returns. For 2024, the Cambridge Associates LLC US Private Equity Index® returned 8.1% and the Cambridge Associates LLC US Venture […]
August 2025
Economic activity is fundamentally driven by the size of the labor force and the productivity of that labor. With working-age populations expected to stagnate or decline in many countries due to falling birth rates, future economic growth will increasingly depend on productivity improvements rather than workforce expansion. Yet, recent years have seen disappointing productivity gains, raising […]
July 2025
Generative AI marks a pivotal moment in AI, with the 2022 public release of OpenAI’s ChatGPT as a major milestone. As discussed in Part 1 of this three-part series, AI is a transformative technology paradigm that will continue to evolve over the next decade and beyond. While significant investment has fueled rapid growth in AI […]
July 2025
Introduction Aaron Costello, Head of Asia, and Vivian Gan, Investment Director, Capital Markets Research Asian and global market volatility surged in early 2025 as US tariffs triggered global growth fears. Given the export-oriented nature of most Asian economies and their sensitivity to global growth and demand, the region may bear the brunt of US tariffs. […]
April 2025
With events unfolding daily (even moment to moment), it is not yet clear how the nearly $2 trillion of assets in the private equity and venture capital market will be impacted. However, given the diversity and breadth of industries across the private markets, it is clear that the impact won’t be uniform. Private company valuations […]
April 2025
The complexities of ever-changing markets present both challenges and opportunities for compounding wealth over time. Amid significant market volatility, investors should stay focused on sticking with their long-term strategy while looking for opportunities as they evolve. Shifting geopolitical alignments, the prospect of persistently high tariffs, rising sovereign debt in developed markets, and the end of […]
April 2025
In the first half of 2024, returns from US private equity and venture capital (PE/VC) were modest; the Cambridge Associates LLC US Private Equity Index® earned 3.4% and the Cambridge Associates LLC US Venture Capital Index® earned 1.4%. Within PE, buyouts and growth equity posted similar results (3.3% and 3.6%, respectively), but PE/VC returns generally […]
March 2025