Why Just 1 of 8 Recently Rated Semiliquid Funds Earned a Bronze Rating

Only one of eight newly rated semiliquid funds in 2026’s second quarter—Carlye AlpInvest Private Markets XCPIX—earned a Bronze Morningstar Medalist Rating. Most of the rest received Neutral ratings, while one—Partners Group Growth—received a Negative. The latest batch of strategies that Morningstar Manager Research Analysts reviewed spanned private debt, private equity, and venture capital.

Each of the eight funds has a credible strength. For example, six strategies earned Above Average People Pillar ratings. Others stood out for their sound processes, strong parents, or lower-than-peer-group fees. Yet only Carlyle earned a Bronze rating, a distinction as much for its well-regarded team and investment process as for the absence of any big weakness.

Why Carlyle AlpInvest Private Markets Stands Out

Carlyle AlpInvest Private Markets combined Above Average People and Process ratings with fees that were competitive with those of peers; other recently rated funds fell short on at least one of those counts.

The strategy’s structure helps. Rather than letting a manager select specific private equity deals for this fund, it holds a slice of nearly every deal from the broader AlpInvest platform. This limits the potential for conflicts over which vehicle gets access to which opportunities and keeps underwriting standards consistent. It also creates a diversified portfolio of underlying companies sourced through many different private equity sponsors rather than a single sponsor.

The team’s experience reinforces that advantage. Founded in 1999, AlpInvest has operated largely autonomously since Carlyle acquired it in 2011. This independence has helped the firm preserve relationships with the outside private equity managers it relies on.

High Fees Hobble Blackstone Private Equity Strategies

Neutral-rated Blackstone Private Equity Strategies shares many similarities with Carlyle AlpInvest but also has a meaningful fee hurdle that makes outperforming public market equivalents less certain.

The strategy earns Above Average marks for both People and Process, drawing on Blackstone’s decades of private equity experience. The fund participates in virtually every deal approved by the firm’s various private equity investment committees that meet its portfolio guidelines. Blackstone, unlike many semiliquid peers that gain exposure mainly through co-investments with third parties or secondary funds, leads its own investments, like the March 2026 purchase of Indian cricket franchise Royal Challengers Bengaluru. The portfolio also includes other Blackstone majority-owned positions like sandwich chain Jersey Mike’s, where it sets the overall business strategy and has a large team of operations analysts to help execute it.

That fund’s strengths aren’t enough to offset its price tag, which is among the costliest of its peers.

Fees Constrain HPS Corporate Lending

HPS Corporate Lending earns Above Average ratings on both People and Process. It focuses on larger, more resilient private borrowers than many peers. The portfolio is also more diversified than many, with close to 400 positions and no single holding exceeding 2% of assets. HPS has followed this same cautious private credit philosophy since its 2007 founding, and the firm’s 2025 combination with BlackRock has expanded its team of underwriters to more than 250 investment professionals.

Costs undercut the fund’s People and Process advantages. Its incentive-fee structure, while typical for a nontraded business development company, means investors learn the fund’s full costs only in retrospect, and the fund is priced higher than most of its peers.

T. Rowe Price OHA Select Private Credit and Partners Group Private Equity Lack an Edge

T. Rowe Price OHA Select Private Credit and Partners Group Private Equity both earn Above Average People ratings but only Average Process ratings, which limited both funds’ Medalist Ratings to Neutral.

T. Rowe Price OHA Select Private Credit comanagers Alan Schrager and Eric Muller bring decades of combined private credit experience from Oak Hill Advisors. But the fund’s relatively aggressive positioning, including picking up more software loans even as that sector sold off, has produced early signs of strain. The fund has seen a rising share of payment-in-kind (or noncash) income and several loans amended from cash-paying to partial payment-in-kind in the first quarter of 2026. Its fees also sit in the costliest third.

Partners Group Private Equity draws from an impressive 250-plus-person investment team and stands out for its focus on direct control investments, where investors acquire majority or even outright ownership and often actively shape corporate strategy and operations While the fund provides exposure to a huge number of individual companies across geographic regions, sectors, vintages, transaction types, and financing stages, the challenges of managing across this sprawling portfolio contributes to its Average Process rating.

Partners Group Growth Lands in Negative Territory

Partners Group Growth is the only fund among the eight to receive a Negative rating, reflecting an Average Process rating paired with relatively high fees. The fund draws on the same well-regarded 250-plus-member investment team that supports Partners Group Private Equity. But Partners is newly applying the firm’s investment model to growth equity, a segment of later-stage investments that falls between less-proven venture capital companies and more established buyout investments. That makes this process unproven over a full cycle and warrants some caution as the portfolio develops.

As of March 2026, the portfolio was weighted toward secondaries, at 53%. Co-investments followed at 33%, direct control investments at 13%, and 1% in primary fund commitments. The allocations are likely to shift over time, considering the target is 25% for secondaries and 40% for direct transactions. Performance since its September 2023 launch has lagged public market indexes and has been boosted by the immediate net asset value markups typical of secondaries-heavy portfolios rather than by any deft deal or investment selection.

Why BlackRock Credit Strategies and Calamos Aksia Alternative Credit and Income Get Average People and Process Pillars

BlackRock Credit Strategies CREDX and Calamos Aksia Alternative Credit and Income CAPIX both earn Average ratings for People and Process, leading to Neutral Medalist Ratings despite fees that land at the cheaper end of their fee group.

BlackRock Credit Strategies underwent a near-total overhaul of its investment team in December 2025 when HPS co-founders Purnima Puri and Michael Patterson took over as portfolio managers alongside a single holdover from the fund’s prior manager lineup. The new team has already reshaped the portfolio, cutting the number of holdings to fewer than 400 from more than 1,000, but it’s too soon to evaluate the new approach.

Calamos Aksia Alternative Credit and Income pairs investment consultant Aksia, which sources deals through a 26-person direct lending team, with Calamos, which manages the fund’s liquidity sleeve. That reliance on external sourcing partners provides diversified private credit exposure but leaves deal flow and structure outside the team’s direct control. The fund’s short track record since its June 2023 inception means it has not been tested in difficult markets, limiting conviction until it builds a longer record.

Takeaways

This quarter’s ratings demonstrate how one or more strong attributes are not enough to earn Bronze, Silver, or Gold, especially for high-fee funds. There are more well-regarded teams and disciplined processes than funds with one or both of those attributes that charge a reasonable price. Costs can still offset a strategy’s most attractive quality.