Politicians Red and Blue love PEU (private equity underwriters) and increasingly, more are one. Yesterday, the PEU/TechGod class gathered at the Milken Institute Global Conference for a series of invitation only, off the record sessions. They included:
Treasury Chief Scott Bessent kicked off Milken this morning. Bessent was quite complimentary of his boss Donald Trump and Junk Bond King Michael Milken, the recipient of a Trump pardon for his past criminal behavior.
Bessent's cheerleading included describing our economy as "anti-fragile" and "up and to the right" or number only go up. Milken launched a number of softball questions to Bessent, reminiscent of a David Rubenstein interview, Rubenstein co-founded The Carlyle Group, a politically connected private equity underwriter. He and a number of Carlyle speakers are on the program.
Following Scott Bessent, CNBC's David Faber hosted a panel with Carlyle Group CEO Harvey Schwartz. Schwartz talked about protecting capital and maintaining financial flexibility in order to get to the other side of Trump II's tariff restructuring. He noted Carlyle has $80 billion of dry powder. Speakers agreed the path to a new normal involves negotiating trade deals and enacting tax cuts in a timely manner.
The Milken Global Conference has seven sessions focused on private equity, three of which are invitation only. (click on image to make it larger)
Also, new at Milken 2025 is the new Women's Health Network, chaired by former First Lady Jill Biden.
Another session is dedicated to legendary PEU founders Henry Kravis & George Roberts of KKR, while Blackstone's Jon Gray and Apollo's Marc Rowan are on a "Leaders in Asset Management" panel.
Milken is all about making big money from "doing good," generally a smokescreen for the greed and leverage boys and a complete afterthought for TechGods fresh on the political scene.
Politicians Red and Blue love PEU and their new TechGod imitators (only brasher). May "The Farce Be With You."
Update 5-14-25: That big beautiful House bill does not eliminate PEU preferred "carried interest" taxation. It even adds another tax break for pass through corporations and BDCs.
Politicians Red and Blue love PEU and increasingly, more are one.
Update 5-19-25: University endowments are having to sweeten their PEU/private credit secondary sales due to low interest from potential buyers. Can we get a stablecoin on that? Congress?
