The US take-private market is on a tear. In 2025, PE dealmakers closed 41 take-private transactions in the US, valued at a combined US$242.9 billion. While deal volume climbed only marginally from 39 deals in 2024, public-to-private buyout value came in at more than double the US$104.3 billion recorded in 2024. So far in 2026 (up to February 24), there have been four take-private deals totaling US$15.5 billion.
Bumper take-private deal value has been buoyed by a wider uplift in US buyout M&A. After a patchy first half to 2025, where tariff uncertainty put transactions on hold, capital markets stabilized in the second half and buyout transaction activity rallied strongly. US buyout and secondary buyout deal value reached US$722.4 billion in 2025, more than two-thirds higher than 2024 figures and the second highest annual buyout value total on record. In 2026 so far (up to February 24), there have been 251 buyouts in the US valued at a total of US$107.4 billion.
After a period of falling US buyout activity through a cycle of rising interest rates, the uptick in deals has been a welcome relief for US GPs and their investors.
Public to private: A key deployment channel in 2026
The momentum is expected to continue this year, and take-private transactions will remain a key channel for deployment as financial sponsors move to accelerate investment after a fallow period.
PE managers in the US have US$1 trillion of uninvested capital to put to work, according to Pitchbook figures, and will be exploring all options for transaction flow to help boost the pace of investment, with take-privates front and center.
Indeed, 2025 deal trends show how public-to-private transactions provided opportunities for sponsors to invest large sums of capital into established businesses and bring disrupted deployment timelines back into sync.
Three US interest rate cuts in 2025 and readily available deal financing in leveraged loan and private credit markets have put large, listed companies within the reach of cash-rich PE acquirers once again.
In September, a consortium comprised of Affinity Partners, Silver Lake and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund announced the US$55 billion take-private of listed video game business Electronic Arts in what could be one of the largest leveraged buyouts in history.
Other jumbo public-to-privates in 2025 included Blackstone and TPG’s US$18.3 billion acquisition of medical diagnostics company Hologic, Sycamore Partners’ U$23.7 billion acquisition of drug store chain Walgreens and Thoma Bravo’s US$12.3 billion delisting deal for HR software business Dayforce.
Cherry-picking assets in specialist areas
Big-ticket take-privates are enabling buyout managers to put dry powder to work at scale, but GPs are not simply deploying capital into listed companies for deployment’s sake.
Even though stock markets have been volatile during the last 12 months, PE deal rationales have been less focused on attempts to arbitrage dislocation in public market valuations, and more about bidding for high-quality listed businesses operating in industries where managers have sector-specific expertise, or see opportunities to lead business transformation away from the constant scrutiny that comes with a stock market listing.
Retail investment specialist Sycamore Partners, for example, tracked Walgreens for more than a year before moving to take the drug store chain private, according to Pitchbook reports, while consumer-focused firm 3G Capital stepped away from M&A for a long period until the right deal emerged and it progressed with a US$9.4 billion deal for shoe company Skechers.
In the case of the Hologic transaction, the backers plan to ramp up investment in research and product development, and to pursue M&A at a pace that would be challenging in a public setting, where the focus is on hitting quarterly profitability targets.
PE sponsors have also turned to take-privates to gain exposure to the AI boom that has driven huge gains in the “Magnificent 7” large cap technology stocks but has also benefited other listed companies.
Thoma Bravo’s take-private of Dayforce—the firm’s largest-ever deal—was rooted in Dayforce’s AI-powered human resources software and a conviction that AI will transform the wider enterprise software market. Blackstone Infrastructure’s US$11.8 billion delisting of New Mexico power generator TXNM Energy also had an AI angle, with the deal predicated on rising demand for electricity to power the data centers that AI runs on.
Companies and activists in on the action
PE firms are the main players behind rising US take-private deal flow, but companies and shareholder activists are also taking opportunities to acquire listed companies.
Ohio bank Huntington Bancshares, for example, agreed a US$7.4 billion transaction to acquire Cadence Bank, in a deal that will extend its presence in the US’s southern states.
Another notable corporate take-private in 2025, meanwhile, was led by Japanese conglomerate Sumitomo Corp and aircraft lessor SMBC Aviation Capital, which headed a consortium that acquired aircraft leasing rival Air Lease in a US$7.5 billion deal.
Shareholder activists are also spurring delisting activity. Barclays research shows activism campaigns climbing to record highs in 2025, with around 50 percent of campaigns in the second half of the year including some kind of M&A component. This does not always lead to a take-private, but activist campaigns can catalyze corporate sales and spin-offs.
Outlook: Staying selective
Moving into 2026, all signs point to sustained levels of take-private deal flow, but dealmakers will have to move with caution when picking prospective targets.
Markets have had a choppy start to the year, with a sell-off of software stocks, which shed almost US$1 trillion in value in the first week of February, highlighting the complexity and unpredictably associated with take-private dealmaking. The sell-off followed the release of a new AI tool by startup Anthropic, which was seen as posing a significant threat to software business models.
This volatility brings risk to take-privates, but also opportunity. Even though stock markets have taken a bearish view on software valuations, many of these companies are still hitting earnings forecasts and maintaining stable customer retention rates. This could provide buying opportunities for take-private dealmakers, but only if they have conviction on a deal target’s asset valuation and long-term growth outlook.
Take-private deal opportunities look set abound in 2026. The trick will be to pick the right ones at the right time.
