The New York-listed firm is one of several such US private market/alternative investment big players to develop links with private wealthy clients around the world.

Global investment firm Carlyle has appointed a managing director and Asia-Pacific head for its wealth arm, part of a trend of US-listed private market titans building wealth offerings.

The firm, which at the end of September 2024 had $447 billion in AuM, said yesterday that Brad McCarthy has joined as MD, head of APAC, for its Carlyle Global Wealth business. McCarthy, who is based in Singapore, will also oversee the institutional wealth channel for Carlyle in Australia and New Zealand. 

McCarthy has more than 25 years’ wealth and asset management industry experience leading sales and client servicing teams, product launches and distribution strategies. He has joined from Citi Private Bank and Global Wealth, where he was MD and APAC head of alternative investment sales. Prior to Citigroup, McCarthy was head of Asia at Permal, where he was responsible for growing the firm’s regional business as an alternative investment provider. He has also held various investment and wealth management positions at ABN AMRO Asset Management and BT Financial Group.

New York-listed Carlyle is not alone, as a provider of funds such as private equity, in pushing more into the wealth management client space, adding to existing clients such as pension funds and other forms of institutional client. Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, aka KKR, and Blackstone, for example, have built out offerings in this area, as reported here and here. 

A separate but parallel trend has been the moves by firms such as Moonfare, iCapital and CAIS to widen access among HNW individuals to private equity, venture capital, hedge funds and private credit. In the past, the access tended to be controlled by investment banks. New technologies, the disruptions caused by the 2008 financial crisis, and changed capital rules, have changed the landscape, however.