Introduction
The legal shell of a continuation vehicle (CV) travels across asset classes almost unchanged: a new vehicle managed by the same general partner (GP) buys assets from an older fund, and each limited partner (LP) sells or rolls. What travels badly is everything priced inside it. Houlihan Lokey's 2025 continuation fund study found credit CVs frequently priced at or around par to reference-date net asset value (NAV), against a 97.0% median for all CVs; infrastructure CVs wait on regulators, and venture and real estate CVs rest on round prices and appraisals. These strategies remain a minority: Evercore's 2025 secondary market report puts private equity at 77% of GP-led volume, private credit at 11%, real estate and infrastructure at about 4% each, and venture at 3%. The process is one a private capital advisory (PCA) banker already knows; the valuation, the consents, and the buyer list are not.
What Moves, and Why, Strategy by Strategy
Why LP interests in these strategies trade at different discounts is covered in pricing by strategy, and the latest segment volumes in credit, infrastructure, and venture secondaries trends. A GP-led deal asks what the GP is keeping, why a new vehicle suits it, and where the process has its weakest link:
| Strategy | What moves into the CV | Why the GP uses a CV | Main advisor challenge |
|---|---|---|---|
| Private credit | A seasoned book of performing loans | Loans outlast the fund; reset leverage | Loan-level pricing near par; transfer consents |
| Infrastructure | Operating assets on long concessions or regulated returns | Asset lives run decades past a fund term | Change-of-control approvals |
| Venture and growth | Stakes in a few late-stage companies | Companies stay private longer than funds last | Marks set by preferred-share rounds |
| Real estate | Properties or a property platform | Fund term ends mid-cycle | Appraisal-based NAV and mortgage debt |
Private Credit CVs: Rotating a Loan Book
What Moves and Why a Credit GP Runs One
A credit CV transfers a loan portfolio, usually first-lien, floating-rate loans to middle-market companies, out of an aging direct lending fund. The problem is a timing mismatch: loans repay on their own schedules, and a fund near its term would otherwise sell performing loans one by one or wait for them to run off. Houlihan Lokey lists the motives as extending duration, offering LPs structured liquidity, reoptimizing fund leverage, and bringing in new LPs; the lending model is explained in the private credit and direct lending overview.
- Credit Continuation Vehicle
A continuation vehicle that buys a portfolio of loans, typically performing senior secured direct loans, from an existing credit fund of the same GP. Existing LPs take cash or roll, and new investors, often with bank financing, fund the purchase while the GP manages the loans to repayment.
Benefit Street Partners' $2.3 billion credit continuation vehicle, closed in September 2025 and led by Coller Capital, bought senior secured loans from BSP's 2016-vintage flagship direct lending fund and was described as the largest single-fund credit CV; Jefferies advised BSP. Coller also led a $1.3 billion CV for a 2018-vintage Ares fund in February 2026.
Pricing Near Par, Leverage, and Loan Consents
Pricing follows the loan tape, not an exit forecast: performing loans cannot repay more than par, so buyers price yield, credit quality, and expected losses loan by loan, and the price clusters near NAV. Acquisition financing then turns a loan yield into an equity return; J.P. Morgan and Wells Fargo financed the BSP vehicle.
Documents add a workstream: loan agreements can restrict assignment or require borrower or agent consent, and the old fund's credit facility may bar disposals without lender approval. Because loans pay cash every quarter, parties keep the reference date current or roll it forward to avoid large closing adjustments.
Infrastructure CVs: Assets That Outlive the Fund
Concessions, regulated networks, and contracted power have economic lives measured in decades, while a closed-end fund runs roughly ten years. A CV lets a GP keep a core asset for its cash yield or give a value-add platform fresh capital. Houlihan Lokey found infrastructure CVs weighted more toward single assets than the wider CV market, with a yield that suits retail-sourced secondaries funds.
- Core Infrastructure
Operating infrastructure with contracted, concession-based, or regulated revenues and limited construction or volume risk, such as a toll road concession or a regulated utility. Investors accept lower target returns for its predictable cash yield.
The long-hold version is Meridiam's €2.2 billion Meridiam Infrastructure Europe Core Fund, closed in March 2026 to hold 22 concession assets; Campbell Lutyens and J.P. Morgan co-advised, and close to 70% of commitments came from new LPs. The platform version is New Mountain's Azuria and Inframark vehicle, among the landmark continuation vehicles.
The distinctive workstream is change-of-control approval from a regulator or concession grantor, sometimes with foreign-investment clearance, each on its own timetable. Houlihan Lokey adds that recent litigation has lengthened limited partner advisory committee (LPAC) review of energy and infrastructure CVs.
Buyer pools differ as well: dedicated credit secondaries capital has supported high credit pricing, while infrastructure and real estate rely on smaller specialist groups, compared in specialist buyers for credit, infrastructure, venture, and real estate.
Venture and Growth GP-Leds: Late to the Structure
Venture adopted GP-leds late for reasons in the asset. Marks rest on the last preferred-share round, so a CV price below it crystallizes a write-down; value sits in a few companies; and liquidity came instead from company-run tender offers and single-stake sales. What changed is duration: companies now stay private longer than a venture fund lasts.
Growth managers moved first. Insight Partners' Continuation Fund III, about $1.5 billion led by HarbourVest Partners in October 2024, bought stakes in software companies across several Insight funds, with Evercore advising. Houlihan Lokey found deferred payments more common in venture and growth CVs, one way to bridge a valuation gap diligence cannot close.
Real Estate GP-Leds: From Opportunistic Funds to Longer Holds
Value-add and opportunistic real estate funds usually run eight to ten years, so a term ending mid-cycle forces a sale into whatever market exists; GP-leds instead move stabilized assets into a longer-life vehicle, the logic of open-end core funds. Blackstone's 2020 recapitalization of BioMed Realty set the pattern: Blackstone Real Estate Partners VIII sold the life science portfolio for $14.6 billion to a group led by existing investors in a perpetual core-plus strategy, and those investors could exit for cash or reinvest. Stream Realty Partners' December 2025 CV for seven Texas industrial properties shows the smaller version. Two inputs change the advisor's work:
- Appraisals. NAV rests on them, so the price is reconciled to an independent appraisal and comparable sales.
- Mortgage debt. Lenders may need to consent or be refinanced, and leverage turns a small gap between appraisal and price into a larger one in the equity.
Side by side, the four strategies move the pressure in one process to different stages: in credit to closing, where quarterly cash flows make the reference date matter; in infrastructure to the consents that set the calendar; in venture to the price, where round, NAV, and bid rarely agree; and in real estate to the lender, whose consent decides whether the vehicle can own the asset at all. An advisor who knows where a strategy's deal will stall plans the timetable, election window, and buyer list around it before the first bid.
