Recap: Kroll's 2026 Private Markets Conference

The rapid growth of private capital markets and emerging trends were the focus of nearly 400 industry leaders who gathered at Kroll’s 20th annual private markets conference on October 29th in New York City. 

Kroll Executive Chairman kicked off the conference with opening remarks that set the tone for the day and articulated the firm’s role in helping grow the asset class. “Kroll has spent decades building expertise and providing pragmatic advice across private and adjacent markets,” Crawford said. “Combined with proprietary data and increasingly powerful analytics, it allows Kroll to turn complexity into actionable insight. More importantly, it gives our clients peace of mind, knowing that our work is accurate, stress-tested and will stand up to scrutiny.”

Four panel discussions led by industry experts reiterated how private markets have grown from a nascent, alternative asset class to a mainstream, multi-trillion-dollar industry. The day concluded with a keynote discussion on SEC enforcement and closing remarks from Kroll CEO Jake Silverman that emphasized the importance of fact-based judgement, governance and trust in a growing market. 

Since 2006, private markets have not only grown monetarily but have become more nuanced and complex. The expansion of private assets to retail investors has required operational changes that allow valuations to be made more frequently. Exit dynamics have shifted, with continuation vehicles increasingly becoming an established way to reconcile investors’ need for cash with sponsors’ desire to hold assets longer. AI is changing the speed at which portfolio companies need to manage cyber risk. Valuation rigor, processes and compliance are becoming crucial as the SEC grapples with rapid shifts. Private assets are moving increasingly closer to becoming an investment option in defined contribution plan target-date-funds, making layers of fiduciary oversight paramount.

With these complexities in mind, the importance of education rang through each panel. Retail investors who invest in private markets must understand how liquidity provisions differ from public markets; fund managers have to find ways to meaningfully educate those investors beyond disclosure notes. How private markets evolve next hinges on bridging an education gap that was magnified by redemption concerns earlier in 2026.

The conference also highlighted a gap between market performance and media narrative over the past year, further stressing the value of data and analytics in unlocking the next phase of growth. Panelists discussed how the Kroll StepStone Private Credit Benchmarks have continually pointed to relatively stable fundamentals in a competitive environment despite heightened noise citing industry concerns. The Benchmarks’ newly released payment-in-kind (PIK) indicators add to an array of risk tracking metrics available on the platform and point to tightening lending standards over the past year. 

Visit the Kroll Private Markets Conference 2026: Perspectives Hub for individual panel recaps throughout the month of November.