Private credit has become an essential source of financing globally, with fund sponsors enjoying strong demand from borrowers, market participants, and investors. However, as the industry’s “golden age” continues, regulatory scrutiny is growing. Media coverage and legislative inquiries have pressured agencies — particularly the SEC — to take action.
Confession: writing this in May 2025, we cannot predict with confidence what the rest of 2025 will bring. The year has already seen four months of change and upheaval – political, regulatory, and economic. The new US administration has touted a business-friendly regulatory environment, with actual and promised tax cuts and deregulation. However, geopolitical tensions, tariff trade wars and political instability have introduced new risks and created a climate of extreme unpredictability. We should expect 2025 to hold several surprises still, whether that is a breakout of peace or new political themes obtaining prominence in one or more jurisdictions.
To understand the litigation and regulatory risks that are coming in 2024 for private capital, it is helpful to look back briefly on recent events. Arguably, the single most important event over the last 18 months was the rapid increase in interest rates by the central banks in the United States, England, and Europe. From March 2022 to August 2023, the Federal Reserve increased interest rates at the fastest clip in more than 40 years, to break inflation that had reached the highest levels since the 1970s.
Last year, we wrote, “The regulatory and litigation risks for private funds are greater than at any time since the financial crisis in 2008.” That statement is even more true today. The Wall Street Journal recently published separate front-page stories on an SEC initiative to oversee large private companies and the explosive growth of the private credit industry (suggesting a more active phase of regulatory oversight). Growth itself is not necessarily a risk, but disputes – and regulators – tend to follow capital.
Private funds are now an integral part of the global economy and, as a consequence, are affected by it. Currently, there are massive structural changes occurring simultaneously across industries and the economy as a whole. For example: cryptocurrencies could threaten legacy payment systems and currencies; the electrification of the auto industry may lead to obsolescence of the internal combustion engine; and climate change will increase the ESG groundswell. These changes are not merely disruptive; they are transformative.
President Biden has signaled a shift to a more assertive SEC Enforcement program with the nomination, and expected confirmation, of Gary Gensler as the next Chair of the SEC. Mr. Gensler previously served as the Chairman of the CFTC from 2009 to 2014, where he established a reputation as a forceful regulator. This reputation suggests that we should expect a significant increase in enforcement actions against private fund managers.
Under former Chairman Clayton, private fund advisers benefited indirectly from the SEC’s focus on ”Main Street” investors. More of the SEC’s limited resources were devoted to addressing retail fraud, leaving fewer resources available to focus on private funds. As former Enforcement Director Stephanie Avakian explained recently, the SEC relied more heavily on exams by OCIE (recently renamed the “Division of Examinations”) – through deficiency notices and remediation, rather than enforcement actions – to address perceived private fund compliance violations. Whether the SEC returns to the more assertive “broken windows” approach to regulation under prior administrations remains to be seen.
The regulatory and litigation risks for private funds are greater than at any time since the financial crisis in 2008. Just a few examples prove the point: the pandemic (which caused extraordinary volatility in revenues and valuations for most asset categories); a new administration in Washington D.C. (with a more
T
he private fund industry is more in the public eye than ever before. Private capital and private markets have experienced massive growth over the last two decades, substantially outpacing the growth of public equity. We have witnessed that trend continue during the past year, and have worked with
With the public equity markets at an all-time high and private equity fund raising setting new records, it might seem counterintuitive to forecast litigation and regulatory risks. The opposite is true. Disputes typically follow capital, and the steeper the growth curve, the greater the risk of litigation and regulatory scrutiny. With that backdrop, we are pleased to present our Top Ten Regulatory and Litigation Risks for Private Funds in 2018.
1. Regulatory Scrutiny Involving Cryptocurrencies and ICOs
Cryptocurrencies and other instruments based on blockchain technology – such as Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) – are in the regulators’ sights. The SEC has asserted jurisdiction over products structured as ICOs and is pursuing violations of the anti-fraud provisions and registration violations involving ICOs and cryptocurrencies. A number of enforcement attorneys in the SEC’s new Cyber Unit are focused on ICO and cryptocurrency investigations, with more cases in the pipeline. In addition, the CFTC has declared virtual currencies to be “commodities” subject to its oversight under the Commodity Exchange Act and has brought a number of actions under the anti-fraud provisions of the CEA against industry participants. Fund managers with investments in or exposure to these areas should prepare for questions about disclosures and increasing regulatory scrutiny and spillover relating to those investments.