Blackstone Reports Record AUM, Strong Earnings Powered by Data Centers, AI – Commercial Observer

Blackstone’s growth continued unabated in the first half of 2026, as the firm leveraged its enormous data center and AI platform to report strong shareholder returns. 

In the second quarter, the firm delivered more than 20 percent year-over-year growth across total revenues, fee revenues, fee-related earnings, net realization and distributable earnings, according to Michael Chae, vice chairman and chief financial officer.

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“The firm’s continued evolution and the expanding scope of our activity have fundamentally transformed our earnings power, both in terms of the magnitude and breadth and sources of earnings,” said Chae.  

The private equity powerhouse reported that its distributable earnings increased 26 percent year-over-year to $2 billion, with fee-related earnings growing 22 percent to $1.7 billion, or $1.29 per share, and net realizations rising by 27 percent, all despite geopolitical headwinds. 

Capital inflows into Blackstone reached $70 billion in the second quarter, and now stand at $260 billion in the last 12 months alone, increasing the firm’s total assets under management (AUM) 11 percent year-over-year to a firm-record $1.35 trillion.

“Blackstone reported outstanding second-quarter results,” said Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman. “The most significant driver of these strong results continues to be the large-scale investments we’ve made in artificial intelligence-related areas, including data centers, energy and power, and the frontier AI companies themselves.” 

Schwarzman noted that Blackstone has become one of the biggest private capital providers in the entire AI ecosystem, largely by building what he called “the largest data center development business in the world.” That growth has come through the firm’s 2021 acquisition of QTS Data Centers, and its direct investments into Anthropic, OpenAI, Google and SpaceX.  

Schwarzman also pointed out that in the second quarter Blackstone launched Blackstone Digital Infrastructure Trust (known by its stock symbol BXDC), a real estate investment trust (REIT) focused on acquiring stabilized, newly constructed data centers, and one that saw its $2 billion offering become the largest blind pool REIT IPO in history. 

“The market for long-term ownership of stabilized data centers is nascent today, but we think it can grow to $1 trillion over time, and beyond, representing massive potential for BXDC,” said Schwarzman. 

Chae, speaking to the firm’s broader commercial commercial real estate portfolio, noted that the firm’s QTS Data Centers business was the single driver of appreciation across infrastructure and commercial real estate in the second quarter, mainly through its “continued extraordinary leasing momentum” and the “significant gains” the firm saw across its data center investments in Europe and Asia. 

Value appreciation in data centers offset declines in life sciences and office, and 80 percent of the firm’s global CRE equity platform is invested into three asset classes: data centers, logistics and rental housing, according to Chae. 

“In logistics, our largest exposure in real estate, we’re seeing U.S. leasing activity meaningfully re-accelerate,” he said. “And for data centers, it’s hard to overstate their impact.”

Chae noted that Blackstone’s global and Asia data center strategies appreciated 7 percent and 3.7 percent, respectively, in the second quarter, and that all of the firm’s real estate funds, particularly Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust  (BREIT), have “benefited significantly from their growing exposure to data centers.”  

Housing also was a topic of interest. During the second quarter, on May 11, Blackstone announced that its Blackstone Real Estate Debt Strategies (BREDS) — a $78 billion real estate debt platform — would invest a still-to-be-determined amount of financing toward the construction of more than 50,000 for-sale homes annually across the U.S., a first-of-its-kind initiative for the firm.

Blackstone will enlist a portfolio company, Brio Homebuilder Solutions, and partner with numerous third parties to fund the construction of these new single-family homes, which comes at a time when the nation is mired in a housing crisis.

Jonathan Gray, president and chief operating officer of Blackstone, credited the firm’s investment performance in the second quarter to the trust it has gained with the investment community, noting that institutions, insurance companies and institutional investors have committed “robust inflows” into all of the firm’s fundraising channels. 

Gray highlighted BXMA (Blackstone Multi-Asset Investing), the firm’s global alternative asset management division, which saw its assets increase to $109 billion, up 21 percent year-over-year. This fund has delivered 25 consecutive quarters of positive returns for its largest strategy, he said.  

Gray noted that Blackstone’s combined corporate and real estate private credit platform has grown to $550 billion, up 13 percent year-over-year, with inflows hitting $33 billion in the second quarter, almost 50 percent of the firm’s total. 

BREIT, the firm’s private real estate investment trust and its largest private wealth vehicle by net asset value, raised $1.2 billion in the second quarter, while repurchases fell 42 percent on the year, improving net inflows to its best performance in four years. 

“The vehicle has generated a 9.4 percent net return for its largest share class since inception nine and a half years ago, approximately 40 percent above the public REIT index,” said Gray. “BREIT’s investment in data centers, now comprising 27 percent of the portfolio, has been particularly helpful.”  

Schwarzman said the firm has seen “extraordinary momentum” in its overall data center platform, which now has a total value of $185 billion, up from $130 billion at the start of the year, with the firm expecting to lease three times its capacity in 2026 than in any other year. He predicted the firm can double the size of its data center platform in a few years, if the strategy is executed properly. 

In his closing remarks, Schwarzman likened the growth of artificial intelligence, which are powered by data centers, to the same epoch-changing events that defined the industrial revolution and the commercialization of electricity in the 19th and early 20th centuries. 

“Each time in history, there’s been this type of dramatic change, economies have adjusted and the standard of living of virtually everyone in society has improved over time,” said Schwarzman. “We believe the future impact of AI will echo these previous periods, but with more rapid implementation and greater complexity.”

Brian Pascus can be reached at bpascus@commercialobserver.com.