Carlyle Group on Tuesday filed to sell shares in an IPO, joining rivals Blackstone Group and KKR & Co., which are already trading on the New York Stock Exchange.
Carlyle, which hasn’t set a price range or the number of shares it aims to sell, registered for an IPO of $100 million by next year, according to the filing Tuesday with the SEC. That amount is a placeholder to calculate filing fees and the final amount may vary.
The filing is the first formal step toward joining publicly traded rivals Blackstone, KKR and Apollo Global Management. The firm has internally debated an IPO since at least 2007, the year that Blackstone first sold shares to the public. The financial crisis brought leveraged buyouts to a halt and prevented Carlyle from moving forward.
Carlyle co-founder William Conway told Bloomberg News last year that the firm was gearing up for a public share sale to amass permanent capital. The offering will also help create an exit for Carlyle’s co-founders and help it compete with Blackstone, whose assets have surged 43% year-over-year to a record $159 billion.
The filing required Carlyle for the first time to publicly disclose earnings. The firm said net income attributable to Carlyle Group rose to $1.27 billion in the first six months of the year, from $304.3 million a year earlier. Revenue increased to $2.07 billion from $762.5 million. Assets under management were $107 billion as of June 30 and increased to $153 billion this quarter, helped by the acquisition of AlpInvest Partners.
Blackstone reported revenue of $2.46 billion for the first half, up from $1.25 billion a year earlier. Net income attributable to shareholders rose to $128.9 million from a loss of $314.7 million a year earlier.
Shareholders who bought private equity firms at their offering prices haven’t done well so far. Blackstone, which completed its $4.8 billion IPO in June 2007, trades 58% below the offering price.
Apollo ended last week 36% below its IPO price. The firm, founded by Leon Black, raised $565 million in its March 29 offering, and its shares have never ended a day of trading above their $19 offer price.
Fortress Investment Group has lost 83% of its market value since the firm raised $729 million in a February 2007 IPO.
Carlyle is proceeding with the offering even as at least 24 U.S. initial offerings seeking a total of more than $3.4 billion have been shelved or scrapped in the last three months through Tuesday.
Carlyle picked J.P. Morgan Chase, Citigroup and Credit Suisse Group to underwrite the offering.
