Who Are the Biggest Private Lenders? Top Firms in 2026

The biggest private lenders are the largest private credit fund managers. By capital raised over five years, the 2026 PEI Private Credit 200 ranks Ares Management first, Blackstone second and HPS Investment Partners third. Which firm counts as "biggest" depends on the measure: fundraising, assets, or loan volume in a specific niche such as home and small-business lending.

The largest private credit fund managers

The PEI Private Credit ranking looks at the world's largest private credit fund managers by capital raised over the past five years. For 2026, PEI Private Credit 200 reports that Ares Management retains the top spot with $117.997 billion raised. Blackstone climbs to second with $111.529 billion, and HPS Investment Partners ranks third with $107.495 billion.

The same ranking notes that North America-headquartered managers dominate capital raising, and that firms in the top 10 are close to the leader. Goldman Sachs Asset Management, ICG, Apollo Global Management, The Carlyle Group, Oaktree Capital Management and BlackRock also appear in the top 10 list.

The PEI list also includes a separate ranking of business development companies (BDCs), which are public or private investment vehicles that lend to mid-sized companies. If you are comparing BDCs, use that ranking rather than the fund manager list, because the two measure different things.

Why the answer changes by market

"Private lender" covers several kinds of firm. Fund managers raise money from investors and lend it to companies. Specialist lenders focus on real estate or small loans. Scotsman Guide's 2025 Top Overall Private Lenders ranking is built on the previous year's production, so it measures loan volume, not fundraising. In that list, Kiavi, Inc. ranks first on 2024 volume, with the list filtered by bridge and term loans, and the ranking also tracks years in business, number of originators and number of states.

That means a firm can be a large private lender in one ranking and absent from another. Fundraising is a measure of how much money a firm controls. Production is a measure of how many loans it actually made in a given year.

How big is the private credit market?

The market is large. According to the Federal Reserve's FEDS Notes on bank lending to private credit, the asset class totaled $1.34 trillion in the U.S. and nearly $2 trillion globally by 2024-Q2. The same note says it has grown roughly five times since 2009, and that it has become one of the fastest-growing segments of non-bank financial intermediaries.

That growth is one reason policymakers now study how banks lend to private credit vehicles, as the Fed note explains.

Comparing the main types of private lender

Type	What it does	Where to find the rankings
Private credit fund managers	Raise capital from investors and make loans to companies	PEI Private Credit 200
BDCs	Lend to mid-sized companies through investment vehicles, public or private	PEI BDC manager ranking
Bridge and term lenders	Make property-backed loans by volume and number of loans	Scotsman Guide Top Private Lenders
Middle-market lending groups	Fund company loans, often senior debt, ABL, mezzanine or acquisition financing	Not ranked in the lists above

Middle-market borrowers: how the lender search works

Most of the names above are large funds that work with big deals. A middle-market company usually has a different question: which lending groups fit its deal size, sector and state?

Thrive Funding is not a lender. It arranges private credit for middle-market companies, and the lender makes every credit decision. The business works like this:

1. A borrower submits one application.
2. Thrive compares the deal against each lending group's criteria, including deal size, revenue and EBITDA minimums, industries, states, loan types and pricing.
3. Groups that match receive an anonymous deal summary and reply yes or no.
4. Once the borrower agrees, up to three groups that said yes get introductions, best fit first. Each introduction is a separate email thread.
5. Lenders issue term sheets on their own letterhead. Thrive sends the borrower a side-by-side summary, and the borrower chooses one.

Thrive is paid by its lending partners. Its success fee is owed when a loan closes, and lending groups pay an access fee to see deal flow. Paying that fee gets a group into the network, but it does not give the group priority. Deals go to the groups that fit them.

Thrive focuses on loans from $1 million up to $100 million and more. The site leads with $5 million and above, but the form accepts $1 million and up. Requests under $1 million receive an automatic decline.

If you want an indicative view of terms, Thrive calls these estimates indicative terms. They are not a term sheet and not an offer. Only the lender can issue a term sheet.

What to do if you need a private lender

• Decide your measure first. A fund manager ranking tells you about scale. It does not tell you who will lend to your company.
• Check the loan type you need: senior debt, ABL, mezzanine or acquisition financing. Lenders specialise.
• Prepare the basics a lender will ask about, including deal size, revenue, EBITDA, industry and state.
• Compare term sheets side by side and check who issued each one.

Sources

• PEI Private Credit 200
• FEDS Notes: Bank Lending to Private Credit: Size, Characteristics, and Financial Stability Implications
• 2025 Top Overall Private Lenders