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Private Equity Without the Lag

Creating an index of listed private equity funds with daily returns

Nicolas Rabener
10 min read
11 Aug 2025

SUMMARY

  • Listed private equity funds can be used to create a PE index with daily returns
  • Highly correlated to private market indices
  • PE funds have not outperformed the S&P 500 over the last decade

INTRODUCTION

Since publishing our initial research articles on private equity in 2018 and 2020 (read Private Equity: The Emperor has No Clothes and Private Equity Is Still Equity, Nothing Special Here), one question has come up repeatedly: Can public equities be used to replicate private equity returns?

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