Private funds’ gross assets recently surpassed those of the commercial banking sector at more than $25 trillion. That is up from $9 trillion in 2012.

The Federal Reserve resumed lifting interest rates with a quarter-percentage-point increase that will bring them to a 22-year high.

The Conference Board said last week that its leading economic index fell for a 15th consecutive month, signaling slowing economic activity ahead. That is the index’s longest streak of declines since a span from the spring of 2007 through early 2009. The U.S. economy fell into a recession in December 2007 and didn’t exit until June 2009.

Companies going public in the U.S. through traditional IPOs raised just $9.1 billion in the first half of the year, far below the $27 billion average for the same period over the past decade.

Blackstone said its assets climbed to $1 trillion in the second quarter from $991.3 billion at the end of the first quarter and $940.8 billion a year earlier. Inflows were $30.1 billion in the quarter, with insurance and credit, including real-estate credit, pushing it over the threshold.

Existing home sales decreased 3.3% in June from the prior month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.16 million. That was the slowest sales pace since January. June sales fell 18.9% from a year earlier.

U.S. inflation eased last month to its slowest pace in more than two years as underlying price pressures cooled.

U.S. crude output this year through April is up 9% from a year ago, on pace for a record-breaking year and helping to keep energy prices stable.

Americans voluntarily left 3.8 million jobs in April. That marked a drop of 700,000 from 4.5 million in November 2021, the highest level on Labor Department records back to 2000.

The overall value of private-equity-backed deals is down over 50% in 2023 versus the prior period, at a three-year low of about $256.7 billion. But the number of transactions has fallen only 4% to 6,458. That is the third-highest year-to-date tally in data going back more than 30 years, showing a resurgence of smaller deals.