How Record-High Secondaries Fundraising is Reshaping Private Market Access

Private markets have a liquidity problem: Macro pressure and valuation gaps are stifling exits, and as a result, assets are being held longer and distributions are lagging. With a growing pool of capital locked in place, general partners (GPs) and limited partners (LPs) are having to rethink how to access much-needed liquidity. 

That pressure is reshaping the alternative investments market in two ways: Secondary fundraising has surged to record highs as investors look to unlock capital tied up in longer-dated investments. At the same time, fund managers are turning to retail and wealth investors to supplement uneven institutional allocations.

These forces are converging, placing secondaries at the center of today’s private markets. How is this increasingly popular investment strategy impacting LP access and transparency as retail demand grows? Drawing on PitchBook data, Intralinks’ recently published The Retailization of Alternative Investments report examines what’s driving the expansion of retail participation — and how secondaries are reshaping private market liquidity and pricing. 

Liquidity is becoming a structural requirement 

Retail and wealth investors bring different expectations around access, pricing clarity and timing — expectations that traditional private market structures were never designed to meet at scale. This puts pressure on fund managers to deliver flexibility without undermining long-term investment strategies. 

Secondaries play an indirect but critical role in meeting that challenge. By providing liquidity and transaction-based pricing outside traditional exit paths, they allow long-duration private investments to accommodate investors with different time horizons and capital constraints. In doing so, secondaries support the democratization of alternatives by giving more investors the confidence to enter and remain invested in private markets. 

Fewer funds, larger bets 

The report highlights a notable shift in secondaries fundraising that illustrates how the market is evolving. Through the first three quarters of 2025, just 38 secondary funds had closed, yet they raised nearly USD 100 billion in aggregate. That’s just USD 10 billion fewer than 2024’s total, which was raised across nearly four times as many funds. This concentration indicates liquidity is increasingly flowing toward GPs capable of executing large, complex transactions.

As these funds deploy capital over the next year, those with exposure to mature assets may experience a meaningful liquidity windfall — not only through exits, but through secondary transactions that return capital to LPs while keeping companies private. By injecting liquidity without forcing sales or initial public offerings (IPOs), secondaries allow high-quality assets to continue generating value.

Enabling broader access to alternatives 

For retail and wealth investors, access to private markets depends as much on structure as it does on returns. Smaller minimum investments and fewer fund allocations shape how these investors build portfolios and manage exposure over time. Secondaries address these realities by adding flexibility at the portfolio level, without requiring changes to underlying fund strategies. 

In practice, this means private markets can broaden participation without becoming shorter-term or more liquid by design. Secondaries absorb some of the pressure created by a wider investor base, allowing capital to move between participants while assets remain invested. This dynamic makes private markets easier to enter and stay invested in, without diluting the long-term value creation that defines the asset class. 

Meeting operational demands 

As private market access continues to expand, so will the volume of transactions, investor relationships and communications. Whether raising capital for secondary funds, executing LP- or GP-led transactions, or managing ongoing investor communications, the ability to scale operations will be ever more critical. 

With more than one out of every two dollars raised globally on FundCentre^TM, SS&C Intralinks supports the alternatives ecosystem by bringing fundraising, onboarding, reporting and portfolio insights into one unified platform. Fund managers use the platform’s Fundraising and Onboarding tools to coordinate capital raising and subscription workflows. In addition, FundCentre Reporting enables the seamless delivery of fund documentation and updates across GPs’ investor bases. 

Secondaries are unlocking liquidity, but technology will play an important role in determining who can grow their investor relationships. To explore how fund managers are preparing for the next private market evolution, read The Retailization of Alternative Investments.