UniCredit Expands Partnership with Blackstone

MILAN (Reuters) – Italian bank UniCredit announced on Wednesday that it is expanding its partnership with Blackstone (NYSE:BX) to offer a private equity fund to its wealthier clients, a financial product usually reserved for professional investors.

UniCredit first collaborated with the world's largest alternative asset manager in July last year by providing clients of its wealth management business access to Blackstone's European private credit fund.

In response to increasing competition from lower-cost, passive investments, wealth managers are progressively shifting towards niche products that come with higher fees and diversifying their range of illiquid investments beyond public markets.

Now, UniCredit will also offer its clients the Blackstone Private Equity Strategies Fund (BXPE), which is an actively managed, semi-liquid, open-ended alternative investment fund.