Blackstone Group Inc (BX.N) said on Thursday its second-quarter distributable earnings nearly doubled year-on-year, driven by a surge in asset sales across its real estate, private equity and credit businesses.
Blackstone’s shares rose 4.5% on Thursday morning, pushing its market capitalization to a record high of $131 billion, overtaking Goldman Sachs Group Inc (GS.N), another Wall Street heavyweight.
Blackstone’s distributable earnings, which represents the cash used to pay dividends to shareholders, rose to $1.1 billion from $548 million a year earlier.
Blackstone said its capital deployment reached a record $23.8 billion during the quarter. It also committed to investing an additional $28.5 billion in deals such as acquiring a majority stake in medical supplier Medline Industries Inc alongside Carlyle Group Inc (CG.O) and Hellman & Friedman.
Buoyant capital markets and rising company valuations allowed Blackstone to cash out a lot of its investments. Total asset sales reached $19.6 billion, including the $2.9 billion divestment of its portfolio of warehouse and logistics assets in Australia.
