Ares Management

Ares Management Corporation is a global alternative investment manager headquartered in Los Angeles, California, operating across credit, private equity, real estate, infrastructure, and secondaries markets. Founded in 1997, the firm has grown from a founder-led private credit boutique into one of the world’s largest alternative asset managers, with approximately $596 billion in assets under management as of November 2025. It listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2014 and joined the S&P 500 in December 2025.

Website: aresmgmt.com

Head office address: 1800 Avenue of the Stars, Suite 1400, Los Angeles, California 90067

Founded: 1997

Founders: Antony Ressler, Michael Arougheti, David Kaplan, John H. Kissick, and Bennett Rosenthal

Company type: publicly traded; NYSE: ARES; S&P 500 component

CEO: Michael Arougheti

AUM: approximately $596 billion (as of November 2025)

Employees: approximately 4,200 (as of November 2025)

Regions served: North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, the Middle East, and South America

History of Ares Management

Ares Management was established in 1997 by a group of senior credit and leveraged-finance professionals, including Antony Ressler, Michael Arougheti, David Kaplan, John H. Kissick, and Bennett Rosenthal. The founders brought deep experience in complex and stressed financing, and built the early firm around disciplined credit underwriting rather than broad market speculation. That foundation shaped the firm’s identity through its first decade of growth.

From that credit base, Ares expanded into private equity, real estate, infrastructure, and secondaries through a mix of organic growth and targeted acquisitions. Key milestones include:

• 2004: Ares Capital Corporation launches as a business development company, providing financing to middle-market companies across the United States
• 2014: Ares completes its initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange, giving the firm access to public capital markets and increasing its institutional profile
• 2021: Ares acquires Landmark Partners, a leading secondaries manager with approximately $18.7 billion in AUM, and Black Creek Group, a real estate investment platform, launching its Secondaries and Wealth Management channels in the same year
• 2023: Ares takes an initial minority stake in BlueCove, a London-based systematic fixed income manager, as BlueCove’s AUM grows from $1.8 billion to approximately $5.5 billion over two years
• 2025: Ares completes the acquisition of GCP International, the international business of GLP Capital Partners, in a deal with an upfront purchase price of $3.7 billion plus an earn-out of up to $1.5 billion tied to performance targets; Ares describes the transaction as cementing its position as a top-three global owner and operator of logistics assets
• 2025: Ares enters into a definitive agreement to acquire Walton Street Capital Mexico, a real estate asset management platform focused on the industrial sector in Mexico with $2.1 billion in AUM, expanding its Latin American footprint; the close date has not been independently confirmed
• December 2025: Ares is added to the S&P 500, joining alternative asset peers Blackstone, KKR, and Apollo in the benchmark index
• February 2026: Ares completes the acquisition of BlueCove, integrating it into a newly created Ares Systematic Credit strategy led by BlueCove co-founder Alex Khein and a team of approximately 60 professionals
• March 2026: Ares and Euroclear announce a partnership to expand private market access for investors

These moves reflect a sustained shift from a single-strategy credit firm toward a diversified, multi-asset-class platform with global reach and a growing presence in the wealth management channel.

What does Ares Management offer advisors and investors?

The firm organizes its investment activity across five major groups, each with its own distinct strategy and market focus. Advisors and investors can access these strategies through both institutional funds and a growing range of vehicles designed for the wealth channel:

• Credit Group: the firm’s largest and founding business, covering direct lending, private high yield, mezzanine, structured credit, and — following the BlueCove acquisition — systematic credit strategies; managed approximately $397 billion in AUM as of September 2025
• Private Equity Group: pursues control or shared-control investments in middle-market and growth-stage companies across North America and Europe, with a focus on healthcare, services, energy, and industrials
• Real Assets Group: invests in real estate equity and debt, as well as infrastructure equity and debt, including logistics, data centers, and energy transition assets globally
• Secondaries Group: built through the 2021 acquisition of Landmark Partners, providing investors access to private equity, real estate, and infrastructure secondaries
• Ares Wealth Management Solutions (WMS): a dedicated team of approximately 120 professionals overseeing product development, distribution, and client management for financial advisors and individual investors, offering institutional-quality private credit, real estate, and equity strategies through retail-accessible vehicles

Through Ares WMS, the firm works with registered investment advisors, broker-dealers, and private wealth managers to provide education and access to private market strategies. Its model portfolio work includes frameworks for building portfolios with meaningful private market allocations alongside traditional public market exposure.

Ares Management in the market

Private credit has become one of the fastest-growing corners of institutional investment. According to JPMorgan’s Alternative Investments Outlook for 2026, private markets have grown to an estimated $20 trillion in size, with companies staying private longer and a large pool of dry powder supporting ongoing deal activity.

Ares sits at the center of that trend. Its Credit Group is among the largest direct lenders to middle-market companies globally, and the firm’s scale — roughly $596 billion in total AUM as of November 2025 — gives it a competitive advantage in origination, pricing, and investor relationships.

The wealth channel is an increasingly important growth driver. According to iCapital’s Alternatives Decoded report for Q4 2025, the average RIA financial advisor allocates approximately 6 percent of client portfolios to alternative investments — a figure that Ares and others in the industry believe has significant room to grow as defined contribution plans begin expanding access to private markets.

Ares has been vocal about its ambitions in the private equity segment as well. CEO Michael Arougheti said in an interview with the Financial Times that the firm has the financial capacity to pursue both organic growth and acquisitions to build a broader private equity franchise, as U.S. retirement plans open up to alternative investments.

The firm’s S&P 500 inclusion in December 2025 placed it alongside Blackstone, KKR, and Apollo in the benchmark, increasing its visibility among generalist portfolio managers and wealth management platforms. That profile, combined with its multi-asset-class platform and dedicated wealth distribution team, positions Ares as one of the central players in the ongoing movement to bring institutional alternative investment strategies to individual investors.

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