Nearly half of billionaires plan to increase exposure to direct private equity investments in 2026

The majority of capital in private equity funds is provided by institutional investors

The individuals who invest this initial capital are called the firm's limited partners. Private equity firm LPs include sovereign wealth funds, university endowments, high-net-worth individuals, and more.

71% of equity investments in Q1 2025 went to AI companies

That's up from just 14% in 2020, according to JPMorgan, which recently conducted an analysis of venture capital investment trends in the US.

In 2024, US private equity posted an 8.1% return

Tracked by Cambridge Associates, 2024 performance saw limited partner distributions overtake contributions for the first time in years. Cambridge Associates, a leader in the space, typically uses a 2.0x+ MOIC (Multiple on Invested Capital) as a benchmark for top-quartile PE fund success.

Pension funds' allocations to risky, alternative investments increased by 25% between 2001 and 2021

The portion of pension funds' risky investments, including alternative investments such as private equity, increased from 14% in 2001 to 39% in 2021. Analysts say private equity investments have delivered higher returns than traditional assets like stocks and bonds. Increased investment in private equity has also given pensions a way to recover from the 2008 financial crisis without necessarily investing more money.

More than half of family offices have succession plans in place

The UBS annual report on family offices found that its clients are preparing for trade wars, generative AI, and generational wealth transfers.

The 'ultrawealthy' in 2026 hold $30M or more

This group of ultra-high-net-worth individuals holds more than double the assets of the top 1% of Americans (and this group holds over a third of all American wealth). These folks go beyond a well-funded retirement plan and a paid-off home common to middle-class households with investments in private equity, commercial real estate, and alternative assets like art.

The number of billionaires in Saudi Arabia is projected to increase by 183% by 2031

Countries in the Middle East and Asia are projected to have some of the largest economic expansions by 2031, including within their billionaire populations. The global average growth projection for billionaires is 26% between 2026 and 2031.

Kohlberg Kravis Roberts was the world's largest private equity firm as of 2025

Headquartered in New York City, KKR raised more than $117B between 2020 and 2024. KKR is credited for pioneering the leveraged buyout strategy for private equity in the 1970s and now owns nearly 300 companies.

Billionaires are racing to space to control future markets

Although different companies have described focuses ranging from luxury tourism to Martian space colonies, all are building infrastructure to capitalize on the shift away from government-only control and betting big on reusability and scale. By securing public contracts and subsidies, they aim to develop strategic partnerships toward dominance in low Earth orbit.

Roughly 10% of US apartments were owned by private equity firms as of 2025

Almost half of those apartments were purchased after 2021. However, local community groups across the country are experimenting with ways to put residential and commercial real estate in the hands of community members.

The world's 50 most valuable private companies

While public companies typically have the highest valuations, private companies get close. This list breaks down the top 50 as of 2025, with SpaceX at the top with a value of $350B, followed by ByteDance. Over three-fifths of the list are located in the US, with eight in China.

Look inside a retail investor's portfolio

Online investing platform eToro conducted a survey of retail investors in June 2024. It explored what assets they held and what types of stocks they liked to purchase. The most commonly held asset was cash, with 76% of retail investors holding cash in their portfolios. The next most popular asset was domestic stocks, with 49% of investors.

In 2023 and the first half of 2024, Berkshire Hathaway bought back more than $12B of its own stock

In the second half of 2024, the company—and Buffett—decided to buy up shares of Domino’s Pizza, Pool, Sirius XM Holdings, and Liberty Media. They also decided to sell Capital One, Ulta Beauty, and Nu Holdings, among others. Learn why Buffett is buying and selling these stocks and what it could mean for the financial conglomerate.

Between 2016 and 2023, PE spent more than $200B buying British companies

Between the COVID-19 pandemic and the United Kingdom's official departure from the European Union, the UK's economy struggled to recover. This economic strife led to British companies receiving steadily lower valuations than American companies, prompting a huge increase in PE investment. However, interest rates began increasing in 2022, putting pressure on the numerous leveraged buyout deals that took place between 2020 and 2021.

Should companies be owned by their workers?

In the last half-century, so-called private equity has transformed industries by purchasing private companies, cutting costs, loading up debt, and then selling the business at a premium—all at a huge profit to the investors. Workers, on the other hand, are often left with nothing. Listen to how both pro-worker economists and a private equity stalwart are trying to shift ownership to workers—a growing tactic proven to improve worker satisfaction and company value.

17% of US adults said they had invested, traded, or used cryptocurrency in 2023

A survey from the Pew Research Center found that 63% of US adults have “little to no confidence that current ways to invest in, trade, or use cryptocurrencies are reliable and safe.”

A group of billionaires and millionaires wants to pay more taxes

Hundreds of billionaires and millionaires have signed a letter called “Proud to Pay More,” in which they ask world leaders to tax the wealthiest individuals more than they currently do. The group, which includes Disney heir Abigail Disney and Valerie Rockefeller, re-upped their call at the World Economic Forum in Davos this year. Learn about the “Proud to Pay More” letter in this article.

BlackRock says investor demand and improvements in underlying fund technology have supercharged ETF availability in 2025

Investors are likely most familiar with ETFs that invest in an index or other grouping of stocks. However, BlackRock breaks down a wide variety of options, including commodity ETFs, currency ETFs, and bond ETFs.

Evaluating college endowment returns

According to a new study, US college and university endowments achieved an average net return of 11.2% in fiscal year 2024. Harvard University maintained its position as the largest endowment, valued at $53.2B. Read this Forbes article to learn more about how institutions manage and grow their financial resources through endowments.

Ray Dalio and his wife signed Warren Buffett's Giving Pledge in 2011

That means Dalio and his wife, Barbara Dalio, committed to donating at least half of their net worth by the time they die. The couple also founded Dalio Philanthropies in 2003, with their main causes including advancing education and investing in ocean protection and research.

Around 60% of female billionaires in the US are considered self-made

There are 154 female billionaires in America, and around 60% of them are considered at least partially self-made—meaning some of their wealth comes from a business venture launched on their own. Alice Walton, the founder of Walmart's daughter, is the richest woman in the US, clocking a net worth of $138B. (Some users may experience a paywall.)

Many investment bankers work on IPOs

When a company undertakes an IPO, investment banks often buy many of the organization’s shares directly from the company, in order to sell the shares on the stock market. The bank stands to profit after marking up the shares.

Hedge funds, the private investment firms that trade a wide swath of financial assets, make money by imposing steep fees on investors and from the fund's investment performance.

Find out how venture capitalists make decisions

More than 30% of venture capital deals come from leads courtesy of a VC’s former colleagues or professional network. You can learn more about how venture capitalists decide which companies to invest in by reading this article.

PayPal's Peter Thiel turned his Roth IRA into $5B

In 1999, tech titan Peter Thiel had a Roth IRA with roughly $2K in it. By 2019, that tax-free account was worth $5B. For context, the average Roth IRA was worth roughly $39K at the end of 2018. Naturally, Thiel had a few investment options that the average person probably doesn’t have access to—but the story of his IRA’s boom is nonetheless fascinating.

Eleven of modern history's greatest investors

The greatest investors have all made a fortune off of their success and, in many cases, have helped millions of others achieve similar returns. Read about the lives and approaches of Carl Icahn, Warren Buffett, George Soros, and more.

While the first exchange-traded fund (a 'basket' of different assets that can be bought and sold on a stock exchange) in the US only launched in 1993, the global ETF market has grown to more than $10T in the short time since.

An initial public offering or 'IPO' is the process of a private company becoming public by putting shares of the company on the stock market for purchase.

SpaceX's S-1 or 'prospectus' revealed many previously unknown details about the company, including its unprofitability despite doing $18.7B in revenue in 2025, exactly how many voting shares Elon Musk will have in the company (roughly 85%), and more.

Dozens of S&P 500 stocks, including Coca-Cola and Walmart—known as the dividend aristocrats—have increased dividends every year for 25 years

In 2025, four executives from large tech companies were given positions in the US Army Reserves—including Palantir Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar, which reinforced Palantir's ties with the US military and its role as a leading defense partner.

US housing costs have risen by roughly 175% between 1991 and 2026—but a growing number of Gen Zers are becoming homeowners anyway. In 2025, 4% of homebuyers were Gen Z, up from 3% the year before.

The Nasdaq's 'Magnificent 7' companies are responsible for roughly 40% of the Nasdaq 100 index's gains, while the remaining 93 companies account for the other 60%.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

Watch this video that uses Lego bricks to explain how venture capital works.

Electrical grids worldwide must double their power delivery capacity by 2050 to meet surging demand from AI and electric vehicles.

The USPS spent $3.97B in 2024, accounting for .058% of the federal budget.

Children are now three times more likely to say they want to be a YouTuber when they grow up than an astronaut, with some even attending 'YouTube camps' that teach kids how to create content for the platform.

The 2026 Ebola outbreak in the DRC is spurring new Ebola vaccine development for the Bundibugyo species.

Fireworks-related ER visits are on the rise—in 2024, they increased by 52% as compared to the prior year.

44% of Americans say they pray at least once a day—discover how your state's religiosity stacks up against the rest of the country.

Art theft is the third-largest source of criminal revenues worldwide, thanks in part to the subjective nature of valuing a work of art.

A Yale student wrote a profound essay about the consulting industry's influence on elite college students that was published in a book of her writing after she died in a post-graduation car accident.

Most of the observable universe's volume consists of voids and supervoids—enormous regions of space with little to no galaxies, stars, or light.

In 2026, Finland was named the world's happiest country for the ninth consecutive year based on its wealth, social safety network, and high life expectancy, among other factors.

Scientists testing how climate change affects plants found, in a years-long simulation study, that poison ivy grew 70% faster with the resulting extra carbon dioxide.

The idea for the Federal Reserve was conceived in secret in 1910—with bankers donning duck hunt gear for disguise while traveling to a remote country club on Georgia's Jekyll Island

Despite being favored by 87% of Americans, Congress does not have term limits.

Double world record holder Hunter Ewen helped conquer his fear of balloons, called globophobia, by training to win Guinness World Record titles for balloon inflation.

US intelligence allegedly pursued more than 600 schemes to assassinate Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro.