BlackRock raises $3 billion to tap into private eequity secondary market

(Corrects day in paragraph 1)

(Reuters) -BlackRock Inc has raised more than $3 billion to invest in the private equity secondary market, it said on Wednesday, as the world's largest asset manager looks to boost its presence in the illiquid alternative investments space.

The capital raised by BlackRock Private Equity Partners includes $2.4 billion raised by the Secondaries and Liquidity Solutions Fund, more than an initial target of $1.5 billion, BlackRock said.

The asset manager has in recent years looked to grow its illiquid alternative assets business, a type of investment that is characterized by infrequent trading often in low volume, making it harder to track returns.

Alternative strategies, including private equity, private credit, hedge funds and real estate, provide diversification from traditional stocks and bonds and are seeing greater adoption.

These investments typically offer higher returns to compensate for the additional risk. BlackRock, which manages about $8.7 trillion in assets on behalf of institutional and individual clients worldwide, see it as a lucrative growth area for investment.

"We believe that the secondary market is poised for strong future growth as limited partners and general partners alike seek more creative ways to access liquidity and realize value," said Veena Isaac, managing director, BlackRock Secondaries & Liquidity Solutions team. The capital raise represents the largest fundraise for an inaugural private equity secondaries strategy globally to date, it said. Contributors to the fund included more than 70 institutional investors, including public and private pension funds, insurance companies, sovereign wealth funds, endowments and high-net-worth individuals. BlackRock, whose shares are up about 4% so far this year, is expected to report first-quarter results in mid-April.

(Reporting by Sohini Podder in Bengaluru and Saqib Iqbal Ahmed in New York; Editing by Arun Koyyur)