TechFlow News, February 22: According to CoinDesk, U.S. private credit giant Blue Owl Capital announced the sale of approximately $1.4 billion in loan assets to meet redemption requests from investors in its retail-oriented private credit fund. The fund—Blue Owl Capital Corp II—will return roughly 30% of its net asset value (NAV) to qualified investors, with the assets sold at 99.7% of par value. As a result, Blue Owl’s stock (OWL) fell nearly 15% this week and has declined over 50% year-on-year; shares of other private equity firms—including Blackstone, Apollo Global, and Ares Management—also dropped significantly.
Experts liken this development to the “canary in the coal mine” signal preceding the 2007 financial crisis—such as the collapse of Bear Stearns’ hedge funds—warning that excessive expansion in the private credit market (especially AI-related investments) could trigger systemic risk, credit tightening, and contagion across banks. If mounting pressure forces central banks to cut interest rates and inject liquidity, it could replicate the post-pandemic scenario of 2020, fueling Bitcoin and the broader crypto market and propelling the next bull run.
