Blackstone Inc. towers over most of its private-equity peers with $731 billion in assets, but the firm has had a soft underbelly for years: its sluggish lending business. Now, credit has become one of the firm’s fastest-growing segments, part of a broad shift under the leadership of President Jonathan Gray.
Assets under management in the unit, which makes corporate loans backing leveraged buyouts for other private-equity firms, jumped 22% to $188 billion this year through Sept. 30. Private-equity assets under management rose 17% to $231.5 billion over the same period.