Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • July 2022
  • Article
  • Journal of Financial Intermediation

Private Equity and COVID-19

By: Paul A. Gompers, Steven N. Kaplan and Vladimir Mukharlyamov
  • Format:Electronic
ShareBar

Abstract

We survey more than 200 private equity (PE) managers from firms with $1.9 trillion of assets under management (AUM) about their portfolio performance, decisionmaking and activities during the Covid-19 pandemic. Given that PE managers have significant incentives to maximize value, their actions during the current pandemic should indicate what they perceive as being important for both the preservation and creation of value. PE managers believe that 40% of their portfolio companies are moderately negatively affected and 10% are very negatively affected by the pandemic. The private equity managers—both investment and operating partners— are actively engaged in the operations, governance, and financing in all of their current portfolio companies. These activities are more intensively pursued in those companies that have been more severely affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. As a result of the pandemic, they expect the performance of their existing funds to decline. They are more pessimistic about that decline than the VCs surveyed in Gompers et al. (2020b). Despite the pandemic, private equity managers are seeking new investments. Relative to the 2012 survey results reported in Gompers, Kaplan, and Mukharlyamov (2016): the PE investors place a greater weight on revenue growth for value creation; they give a larger equity stake to management teams; and, they also appear to target somewhat lower returns.

Keywords

COVID-19 Pandemic; Health Pandemics; Private Equity; Management; Investment Portfolio; Performance; Decision Making; Value Creation

Citation

Gompers, Paul A., Steven N. Kaplan, and Vladimir Mukharlyamov. "Private Equity and COVID-19." Journal of Financial Intermediation 51 (July 2022).
  • Find it at Harvard

About The Author

Paul A. Gompers

Finance
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • 2023
    • Faculty Research

    The Market for CEOs: Evidence from Private Equity

    By: Paul A. Gompers, Steven N. Kaplan and Vladimir Mukharlyamov
    • 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Private Equity

    By: Paul A. Gompers and Steven N. Kaplan
    • 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Failing Just Fine: Assessing Careers of Venture Capital-backed Entrepreneurs via a Non-wage Measure

    By: Natee Amornsiripanitch, Paul Gompers, George Hu, Will Levinson and Vladimir Mukharlyamov
More from the Authors
  • The Market for CEOs: Evidence from Private Equity By: Paul A. Gompers, Steven N. Kaplan and Vladimir Mukharlyamov
  • Private Equity By: Paul A. Gompers and Steven N. Kaplan
  • Failing Just Fine: Assessing Careers of Venture Capital-backed Entrepreneurs via a Non-wage Measure By: Natee Amornsiripanitch, Paul Gompers, George Hu, Will Levinson and Vladimir Mukharlyamov
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College