Blue Owl Capital Q2 Earnings Call Highlights

Blue Owl Capital Q2 Earnings Call Highlights

Blue Owl reported solid Q2 2026 results: fee-related earnings and distributable earnings both rose 9% year over year, while the company declared a quarterly dividend of $0.23 per share. Management reaffirmed expectations to exceed 2026 consensus estimates, driven mainly by top-line management-fee growth. Significant embedded growth supports the outlook: Blue Owl ended the quarter with $31 billion of non-fee-paying AUM that could generate approximately $380 million in annual management fees once deployed. The firm also raised $7.8 billion in quarterly capital and expects management-fee growth to accelerate over the next two quarters. Real assets and alternative credit are gaining scale: real-assets AUM increased 25% year over year, led by net lease and digital infrastructure, while alternative credit AUM grew 35%. Credit performance remained strong, with limited watch-list changes, a 12-basis-point average realized loss rate, and nearly $7 billion in credit deployment over the past year.

Blue Owl Capital NYSE: OWL reported second-quarter 2026 fee-related earnings of $0.25 per share and distributable earnings of $0.22 per share, with distributable earnings rising 9% from the prior-year quarter. The alternative asset manager declared a quarterly dividend of $0.23 per share, payable Aug. 27 to shareholders of record on Aug. 13. Chief Financial Officer Alan Kirshenbaum said management fees increased 8% year over year, excluding the effect of management-fee offsets, while fee-related earnings and distributable earnings each rose 9%. Blue Owl’s fee-related earnings margin was 58.5%, modestly higher than both the first quarter and the year-ago period and in line with the company’s outlook for the full year.

Kirshenbaum reaffirmed management’s expectation that Blue Owl can exceed the Visible Alpha consensus estimates it cited last quarter of $1.02 in fee-related earnings per share and $0.89 in distributable earnings per share for 2026. He said the expected improvement is primarily a top-line growth story, supported by management-fee growth rather than a substantial expansion in margins.

Blue Owl ended the quarter with $31 billion of assets under management not yet paying fees, representing about $380 million in expected annual management fees once deployed. Kirshenbaum said this amount equates to approximately 15% embedded growth relative to 2025 management fees. Blue Owl’s fee-related earnings margin was 58.5%, modestly higher than both the first quarter and the year-ago period and in line with the company’s outlook for the full year.

“As this capital is drawn down and put to work, it converts into fee-paying AUM and will continue to support management fee growth across our platforms,” Kirshenbaum said. The company expects management-fee growth to build in each of the next two quarters. Its outlook does not assume a sharp recovery in sponsor-led merger-and-acquisition activity, according to Co-Chief Executive Officer Marc Lipschultz, who said growth is being supported by newer credit strategies, real assets, and other areas of the platform. Blue Owl raised $7.8 billion of total capital in the quarter and $50.5 billion over the past 12 months, equal to 18% of its assets under management at the same point last year. The company said all of the capital raised was organic. Institutional and insurance investors accounted for roughly three-quarters of equity capital raised during the second quarter and about two-thirds of equity capital raised over the past 12 months.

Lipschultz highlighted the growing role of real assets, which now represents nearly 30% of Blue Owl’s assets under management. Real-assets AUM r...