PCP 2025 Impact Report

Every year we gather our thinking around impact and ESG in our annual impact report. We do this to ground our work in a data driven analysis of portfolio priorities and to share our progress and challenges with others. This report is for anyone wanting to understand more where ESG related risks, impact driven opportunities and return actually intersect in private credit, at a moment when AI, energy security, and a harder geopolitical environment are all rewriting what "sustainability" means in practice.

None of this happens without the companies in our portfolio who gave us their time, their data, and their honesty this year. Thank you all.

Key findings

• Most of private credit isn't financing anything new. 85 to 90% of European private credit is sponsor-backed capital tied to buyouts and ownership transfers. Only 10 to 15% is primary capital, funding entrepreneurs directly. If credit is to play a key role in the impact landscape, the share of primary capital going directly to company builders who want to grow without losing control must increase. This is our main mission.
• We talk a good game on impact. We don't measure it. Most of our portfolio (as well as ourselves) is clear on their impact intent. However only 36% of our portfolio companies actively measure the impact they claim. 54% don't measure it at all. Intent without measurement is a story, not a result. Closing that gap is our top priority for 2026.
• Financed emissions are our whole climate story. More than 90% of our total emissions are financed. Office energy use and business travel round to nothing next to what our capital enables once it leaves the building. This is where we need to focus our efforts.
• Dual-use and defense stopped being someone else's problem. "Weapons" used to be an easy exclusion category for us in our Responsible investment policy. It isn't anymore and as investors we need to adapt.
• AI is reshaping everything. In house, we are already augmenting our own ESG and impact analysis with the help of AI driven tools. In our pipeline, we see opportunities shifting swiftly, both within AI driven solutions and from energy demands sharpening.