Apollo chief wary of 'brain damage' that comes from asset manager M&A

Apollo chief wary of 'brain damage' that comes from asset manager M&A Apollo CEO Rod James Wed, August 5, 2026 at 10:09 PM GMT+2 2 min read APO Apollo Global Management CEO Marc Rowan, shown at the 2025 Milken Institute Global Conference. Patrick T. Fallon/Getty Images The head of Apollo Global Management has said that any new acquisitions will be to help the firm expand into new market segments, rather than to consolidate its strength in existing ones.

Speaking on the firm's Q2 earnings call Tuesday, CEO Marc Rowan said the "brain damage" associated with buying people-oriented businesses means it is generally not worth it unless the deal brings something new. "You probably have to pay twice, both to the equity owners and then to the employees. But most importantly, it gets you more of the same," Rowan said, adding that Apollo is not "a big proponent of asset manager M&A" in general.

There were $15. 2 billion in M&A deals centered on private asset managers this year through July 30, exceeding all previous full-year totals—as buyers moved to boost their fee-earning assets, enter new corners of private markets and add distribution networks to reach a growing universe of individual investors. Last week, the Financial Times reported that Ares Management had held talks with Leonard Green & Partners about a potential acquisition, which would bring Ares $85 billion in PE assets under management.

The listed giant's existing corporate PE funds have received around $20 billion in aggregate commitments since 2012 . Apollo President James Zelter said that growing by acquisitions runs counter to the firm's plan to deepen integration across its platform, as any firm Apollo acquires will want to "control their own destiny. " But Apollo has made a couple of such acquisitions over the past year and a half.

In January 2025, it picked up Argo Infrastructure Partners in a deal that gave the firm a foothold in middle-market core- and core-plus infrastructure, defined by lower-risk investments that produce predictable cash flows. In September, it also acquired Bridge Investment, bringing roughly $50 billion in assets to a real estate equity business that Apollo had described as sub-scale. Apollo's corporate PE business saw a 40% decline in realized performance fees in Q2 compared to the same period of a year ago, in contrast to listed counterparts like KKR and Blackstone .

Zelter said Apollo is not concerned about quarter-to-quarter performance, adding that the IPOs that boosted the realizations of its rivals in Q2 were more focused on fast-growing companies than on the value-oriented investments Apollo targeted. "Over any 12- to 14-month period or 16-month period, we feel pretty good about the aggregate numbers," he said. Apollo has collected more than $12 billion so far for its 11th flagship buyout fund.