North Carolina commits $300m to Blackstone fund

The $99.5 billion North Carolina Retirement System has committed $300 million to Blackstone Real Estate Partners IX, according to Stephanie Hawco, spokeswomen for the pension fund.

Blackstone Real Estate Partners IX, managed by Blackstone, recently completed raising $17.3 billion of a targeted $20 billion for the opportunistic real estate fund. BREP IX’s strategy will be similar to the firm’s prior real estate fund, which gathered $15.8 billion in 2015 and focused on distressed properties globally. Along with nearly $10 billion for each of its opportunistic European real estate and its private equity secondaries funds, Blackstone expects to exceed $60 billion from these four flagship funds collectively, largely by the end of the year. This compares to $50 billion raised in its prior vintage. In real estate, Blackstone continues to see particular strength in tax-driven office, global logistics, U.S. rental housing and investments in India.

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