How to stand out in a growing secondaries market

It’s no secret that infrastructure secondaries investments have been surging. According to Campbell Lutyens, deal volumes in 2024 may exceed $15bn. This would represent a record year, with volumes up more than 36% compared with 2023 and more than 22% above 2021 levels, the previous peak, where deal volumes were elevated to address pent-up supply that had carried over from a pandemic-affected 2020.

Infrastructure secondary deal volume

^{Source: Campbell Lutyens, StepStone Group analysis}

This increased activity is a function of the continued growth in infrastructure assets under management (AUM), the natural maturation of the infrastructure asset class, as well as the increasing appetite for LPs to access liquidity given exit constraints across private markets in recent years. Annual secondary volumes have averaged 0.8% of total infrastructure AUM over the last three years, with LP-interest secondary volumes averaging just 0.3% of AUM over the same period. StepStone believes both figures may grow in the years to come, as the market matures.

A successful secondaries strategy requires a relative information advantage on both manager and asset quality, which in turn supports the quality of underwriting and speed of execution.

This information advantage can be sourced from three key areas: the scale of your primary program, the quality of your manager and asset-level database, and your ability to leverage asset-level insights from your co-investment platform.

StepStone is one of the largest allocators of primary infrastructure capital in the world. Over the last decade, our global team has deployed more than $60bn of primary capital across more than 220 infrastructure funds. However, investing alone is not enough.

StepStone is committed to regular and active engagement with managers around the world, holding more than 1,300 meetings with infrastructure sponsors each year, providing critical intelligence on manager and fund-level investment performance. StepStone also reviews hundreds of co-investments each year, providing detailed asset-level knowledge across the market.

Through significant primary and co-investment deployment, and continual engagement with global sponsors, StepStone has been able to create a comprehensive data intelligence tool, SPI by StepStone, that garners detailed operating data on more than 1,600 infrastructure investments.

This data set is vital to being able to underwrite secondary investments in an efficient and low-risk manner. At StepStone, we have more than 50 live secondary models that are continuously updated for current market information to support a highly informed secondaries investment strategy.

Investing from the ‘outside in’ is no longer viable in infrastructure secondaries. An information advantage based on reliable data is paramount.

About
StepStone Infrastructure and Real Assets seeks to provide tailored solutions to meet the needs of institutional investors at any stage of their investment programs. With total capital responsibility of $98bn across global infrastructure investments, we are ideally positioned to support our clients with deep GP engagement across the sector. Our platform enables access to a large pool of opportunities across primary fund investments, secondaries, and co-investments through fully customized solutions and tailored products. We provide deep experience across all major infrastructure and real assets sub-sectors, strategies, and geographies, introducing our clients to attractive secular themes across markets. Learn more at www.stepstonegroup.com/what-we-do/asset-classes/infrastructure.

_{This article originally appeared in Preqin 2025 Global Report: Infrastructure. The opinions and facts included in the above do not constitute investment advice. Professional advice should be sought before making any investment or other decisions. Preqin and StepStone Group accept no liability for any decisions taken in relation to the above.}