Apollo Global Management NYSE: APO reported first-quarter 2026 results that management characterized as a strong start to the year, driven by record fee-related earnings and continued momentum in origination and capital formation. On the company’s earnings call, executives also emphasized a “defensive” investment posture amid what CEO Marc Rowan described as an increased risk of “out-of-the-box” macro outcomes, while highlighting initiatives to expand transparency in private credit through daily pricing.
Record FRE and SRE, dividend increase
Noah Gunn, Global Head of Investor Relations, said Apollo generated record fee-related earnings (FRE) of $728 million, or $1.17 per share, spread-related earnings (SRE) of $719 million, or $1.15 per share, and total earnings (adjusted net income) of $1.2 billion, or $1.94 per share. Gunn also noted Apollo declared a common dividend “at our new higher rate,” annualizing to $2.25 per share and reflecting 10% year-over-year growth.
Rowan said FRE of $728 million rose 30% year-over-year and 6% quarter-over-quarter. He highlighted capital solutions fees (ACS fees) of $246 million, marking the fourth consecutive quarter above $200 million. Rowan framed ACS fees as a sign of “high quality” origination, emphasizing syndication activity as a key driver.
On the retirement services side, CFO Martin Kelly said Athene’s net investment assets increased 14% year-over-year to $300 billion, while SRE totaled $719 million in the quarter. Kelly said the alternative investment portfolio returned 6% during the quarter, which he called strong “in the context of an exceptionally weak market backdrop.”
Origination and capital formation: $71 billion and $115 billion
Rowan said Apollo originated $71 billion during the quarter and expected second-quarter origination to be “even stronger,” citing pipeline visibility and noting a record origination quarter of $97 billion as a reference point. He added that the quarter’s origination came at “350 basis points over Treasuries” with an average rating of BBB.
President Jim Zelter provided additional detail, saying the quarter’s $71 billion of origination represented 25% growth year-over-year and brought latest-12-month origination volume to nearly $325 billion. Zelter said the firm originated $61 billion of debt during the quarter, with approximately 75% investment grade (average single-A rating) and 25% sub-investment grade (average single-B rating).
Zelter also detailed spreads generated during the quarter:
- Investment grade origination: 290 basis points over Treasuries, or about 210 basis points over comparably rated corporates.
- Sub-investment grade origination: 470 basis points over Treasuries, or about 170 basis points over comparable high-yield corporate indexes.
Capital formation totaled $115 billion in the quarter, Rowan said, including $50 billion of organic inflows and $65 billion tied to the closing of the Pension Insurance Corporation (PIC) transaction for Athora. Zelter broke down the $50 billion of organic inflows as $30 billion into asset management and $20 billion into Athene. Within asset management inflows, Zelter said about 75% went to credit-oriented strategies and 25% to equity-oriented strategies.
Strategy focus: investment-grade private credit and “industrial renaissance” financing
Rowan and Zelter both emphasized Apollo’s focus on the investment-grade private credit opportunity. Rowan argued that the market’s focus on the roughly $2 trillion levered lending segment misses the broader “$38 trillion” investment-grade private credit market. He also said Apollo has been moving “upmarket,” noting that “better than 80%” of what the firm originated last year was investment grade.
In response to questions on origination durability, Zelter and Rowan described demand tied to what they called a “global industrial renaissance,” including AI infrastructure, energy, defense, and broader infrastructure. Zelter cited two examples from the quarter: a $19 billion bridge commitment “in support of Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros.” and two AI-related financings totaling more than $8 billion to support data center infrastructure leased to an investment-grade counterparty.
Zelter said Apollo has helped open a funding market for “the picks and shovels going into data centers” with “IG counterparty risk and amortizing structures.” He added that high-grade capital solutions have grown to more than 150 transactions and $80 billion in volume since 2020, and said Intel and AB InBev transactions have gone “full cycle from origination to repayment,” including a “$3 billion gain” on Intel for Apollo and its clients.
Transparency push: daily pricing and market making in private credit
A major theme of the call was Apollo’s push to expand transparency in private credit. Rowan said Apollo is implementing daily pricing across its credit business, stating that “by 6:30” investors will have daily pricing for corporate investment-grade fixed income assets and “by 9:30” daily pricing will extend to direct lending and asset-backed finance, resulting in “100% daily pricing” across credit by 9:30.
Rowan described the firm’s approach to marks in its direct lending vehicle ADS, including using the “lowest mark” when positions are held with other parties and mapping the portfolio to the broadly syndicated loan index by industry. He added that if a sector is down more than 2.5%, Apollo will “at a minimum” reflect 50% of the move and reanalyze exposures, stressing that Apollo marks to “current information, not to hope.”
Rowan also addressed secondaries valuation practices, saying that across Apollo’s roughly $1 trillion platform, secondaries “that have been marked up round to zero,” and that 2025 revenue attributable to such markup was “sub $3 million.”
On liquidity, Rowan said Apollo began market making tied to a State Street product that mixed public and private investment grade and has built a data warehouse to share information with other dealers. He said traded assets have grown to more than $13 billion from a “cold start,” and highlighted a venture with ICE to standardize data, stating that “every private asset in the Apollo portfolio going forward will have an ICE ID.”
Athene and Athora: spread dynamics, cash levels, and PIC contribution
Kelly said Athene’s blended net spread was 97 basis points in the quarter versus 120 basis points in the prior quarter. He added that if Athene’s alternative portfolio return had been at the firm’s 11% expectation, net spread would have been 25 basis points higher, bringing it “in line with the 120 to 125 basis point outlook” for the year. Kelly said spread progression was tracking the framework the company outlined in November, with prepayment headwinds believed to have peaked in the fourth quarter and easing in the first quarter.
Rowan noted that Athene held about $40 billion of cash, treasuries, and agency portfolio assets, describing it as “dry powder” alongside a strong origination pipeline. In Q&A, he said Apollo had not seen enough market spread widening to “go all in,” and reiterated a focus on self-help through origination rather than relying on market dislocations.
Kelly said Athora’s PIC acquisition is expected to begin contributing in the second quarter at an annualized rate of about 20 basis points initially. In response to an analyst question, he said he would not expect “much, if any” incremental cost against that revenue due to an established and scalable European ecosystem, adding that the balance sheet will require “pretty extensive repositioning” over time, which could support incremental management fee growth as repositioning progresses.
Rowan also discussed portfolio changes at Athene, including reducing CLO exposure below 8% from prior levels and introducing AMAPS (Apollo Multi-Asset Prime Securities) as an alternative structured product. He said Athene had $11 billion of investment-grade exposure to AMAPS, or about 3% of the portfolio, and expected that figure to “double over the coming months” as CLO exposure declines.
About Apollo Global Management NYSE: APO
Apollo Global Management, Inc NYSE: APO is a global alternative investment manager that specializes in private equity, credit and real assets. The firm originates, invests in and manages a broad set of strategies across distressed and opportunistic credit, direct lending, structured credit, buyouts and real estate. Apollo provides investment management and advisory services to institutional clients and individual investors through pooled funds, separate accounts and publicly listed investment vehicles.
Its private equity business pursues control and non-control investments across industries, often focusing on complex or distressed situations where operational improvement and capital solutions can create value.
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