As private market assets become available to more investors, a growing number of asset managers are trying to launch indices to track their performance. In the latest example, global index provider FTSE Russell and alternative asset manager StepStone Group signed a proposed partnership agreement to develop private asset indices, data and analytics products.
According to Financial News, the firms plan to launch their first daily indices later this year.
The announcement follows private equity giant BlackRock’s purchase of London-based capital markets research firm Preqin with the goal of launching a private market index. Also, last year, capital markets research firm MSCI launched its MSCI Private Capital Indexes, which track the performance of closed-end funds.
FTSE Russell’s and StepStone’s partnership will aim to deliver reference indices for a complete spectrum of private asset classes. The goal is to allow investors to better benchmark the performance of their private markets portfolios within a total return portfolio view, the firms note. The indices will build on FTSE Russell’s expertise in the design, development and management of indices across multiple asset categories and StepStone’s data-driven insights into multiple private market asset classes.
Both StepStone and FTSE Russell declined to comment on the partnership directly at this time.
In an official statement announcing the deal, Mike McCabe, head of strategy with StepStone, noted, “As private markets have become more meaningful components of investors’ portfolios, the need for integrating views of risk and return across the total portfolio has become critical for investment decision makers. With a growing portion of the global economy remaining private not only for longer, but potentially indefinitely, we need to pave a pathway for further easing the access to differentiated sources of investment returns. Partnering with FTSE Russell will unleash the power and scale of our private markets data—contained within our proprietary technology platform, SPI by StepStone—to drive these goals forward.”
StepStone, which has $189 billion in AUM, launched SPI by StepStone in fall 2023. The private markets intelligence platform allows investors to track the performance of their portfolios and underlying assets in real time, model future cash flows and access analysis of market trends. According to StepStone, the platform was analyzing over 25,000 in investor commitments encompassing over $1.1 trillion as of March 31, 2025. It also gives users access to deal-level and operating metrics benchmarking, including purchase price and leverage multiples, equity contributions and value creation, as well as legal terms benchmarking.
Also in an official statement, Fiona Bassett, CEO of FTSE Russell, said, “With the continued growth in private asset allocation and growing client demand, it is essential for us not only to deliver leading indices in this asset class but to work with partners aligned to our commitment to transparency, rules-based methodologies, robust data provenance and investability. With StepStone’s broad, in-depth private markets dataset, we have chosen a great partner with which to build this offering.”