Private credit’s liquidity façade is beginning to fracture

The recent string of withdrawal limits in private credit shouldn’t be waved away as a US-only sideshow. Over just a few weeks, BlackRock restricted withdrawals from one private credit fund; Blackstone flagged unusually elevated redemption requests at BCRED; Blue Owl paused redemptions in a vehicle; and this week both Apollo and Ares limited quarterly withdrawals to 5% after investors sought to redeem more than 11% of assets.

This isn’t a full-blown systemic event – yet. Still, it’s a pointed reminder that segments of private credit are running into an old constraint: assets that don’t trade easily don’t become liquid simply because a fund wrapper offers periodic exits.

Apostolos Thomadakis is Head of Research at ECMI, and Senior Research Fellow and Head of the Financial Markets and Institutions Unit at CEPS. An earlier version of this commentary was published by IPE on April 2, 2026.