By Nick Pollard, Managing Director, Asia Pacific
According to research highlighted in CAIA’s recent report: The Window Narrows: Evergreen Funds and the Choice Before the Industry, assets in evergreen private-market funds doubled from approximately US$265 billion in 2022 to more than US$530 billion by the end of 2025. What was once a niche corner of alternatives is rapidly becoming one of private markets’ fastest-growing segments.
The growth is striking. More interesting, however, is what is driving it.
For decades, private markets were largely the preserve of institutions. Pension funds, sovereign wealth funds and insurers accepted capital calls, long lockups and administrative complexity because they had the scale and governance structures to manage them.
Today, many of the world’s largest alternative asset managers believe the next phase of growth will come from private wealth rather than institutions. That shift is particularly visible in Asia.
Managers including Blackstone, KKR, Apollo, Partners Group, Hamilton Lane and EQT have all expanded evergreen offerings aimed at wealth investors. In 2026, EQT launched Nexus Asia, its first APAC-focused evergreen strategy, reflecting the industry’s growing conviction that wealth channels will become increasingly important sources of capital.
The logic is straightforward. Wealth investors want private-market exposure, but many have little interest in managing multiple capital calls, vintage-year funds and fundraising cycles. Evergreen structures offer a simpler proposition: a single investment providing diversified, ongoing exposure to private markets.
Why Asia Matters
The opportunity is particularly compelling because of where wealth is being created and managed.
Hong Kong and Singapore have emerged as the region’s two most important wealth-management centres, although for different reasons.
In 2025, Boston Consulting Group identified Hong Kong as the world’s largest cross-border wealth centre, while Hong Kong regulators reported approximately US$5.4 trillion in assets under management. Those figures help explain why global alternatives managers regard Hong Kong as a critical distribution market.
Singapore, meanwhile, has established itself as one of the world’s leading family-office centres and a major hub for internationally mobile wealth. Its concentration of family offices, private banks and sophisticated investors has made it a focal point for many private-market distribution strategies.
Importantly, much of the story extends beyond those two cities.
Where’s China?
China is often missing from discussions about evergreen funds, despite being central to the region’s wealth story.
China’s influence on the evergreen market is often indirect rather than domestic. As wealthy Chinese investors increasingly seek diversification beyond local assets, Hong Kong and Singapore have strengthened their positions as key gateways into international private markets.
This helps explain why global managers continue investing heavily in both markets. They are not merely targeting local wealth. They are seeking access to a much broader pool of Asian capital.
In many respects, Greater China wealth may be one of the most important forces behind the growth of evergreen distribution in Asia, even if many of the products themselves are domiciled and distributed elsewhere.
Different Markets, Similar Direction
Elsewhere in the region, the drivers differ but the direction is remarkably consistent.
Australia’s sophisticated adviser market and large retirement system have long encouraged innovation in managed-investment structures. Evergreen funds fit naturally into an ecosystem where investors are already comfortable accessing diversified portfolios through pooled vehicles.
Japan presents a different opportunity. Years of low yields have encouraged investors to search for alternative sources of income and diversification. Interest in private credit and alternative income strategies has steadily increased as investors look beyond traditional fixed income.
India remains at an earlier stage, but rapid wealth creation and growing familiarity with alternatives suggest significant long-term potential.
Throughout the region, investors are looking for easier and more scalable ways to access private markets.
A Success Story, With Caveats
The appeal of evergreen funds is easy to understand.
Investors gain diversified private-market exposure without building complex programmes from scratch, can access more mature portfolios, and may reduce some of the effects of the J-curve.
But the industry’s enthusiasm deserves some balance.
One of the central themes of CAIA’s Evergreen Funds research is that evergreen funds should not be confused with liquid funds. Private assets remain private assets.
The defining challenge is liquidity. Evergreen structures offer periodic redemption opportunities, but the underlying portfolios may still contain private companies, infrastructure assets or private loans that cannot be sold quickly.
Consider a private-bank client in Hong Kong seeking to redeem during a period of market stress. Managers may need to rely on cash reserves, secondary-market sales, redemption limits or temporary gates to protect remaining investors. These mechanisms do not represent a failure of the structure. They are often working exactly as intended. But they reinforce an important point: periodic liquidity is not the same thing as immediate liquidity.
Valuation presents a second challenge. Because investors can subscribe and redeem at different times, fair treatment depends heavily on robust governance, transparency and disciplined valuation processes.
In short, evergreen funds are not “private markets made liquid.” They are a different way of accessing private markets, with a different set of trade-offs.
Their long-term success will depend not only on investment performance, but on whether managers can successfully balance liquidity, valuation, governance and investor expectations.
Education
During a whistle-stop tour across the APAC region, CAIA CEO John Bowman and I heard the same question from institutions and regulators alike: “How do we encourage the growth of this phenomenon while at the same time protecting investors?”
What steps can product developers, distributors, advisors and clients take to ensure they have a shared understanding of the good, the bad and the ugly of evergreens? The consensus is that there is much more to do to ensure all parts of the value chain are educated to a level of understanding to make informed decisions about the risk/return dynamic of potential investments.
The Bigger Question
Evergreen funds are unlikely to replace traditional drawdown vehicles. Closed-end structures remain well suited to many institutional strategies and will continue to form the backbone of private markets.
The more interesting question is what evergreen growth tells us about the future of the industry.
The world’s largest managers appear to be making the same bet: future growth will increasingly come from wealth investors seeking simpler and more scalable access to alternatives.
Given the concentration of private wealth in Hong Kong, Singapore and Greater China, combined with growing alternatives adoption across Australia, Japan and India, Asia is likely to play a central role in that evolution.
The evergreen story may be global, but many of the investors shaping its next phase are likely to be found in Asia.
