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Ares acquires $0.8B solar & battery portfolio in California. Ares Management has deepened its commitment to renewable energy infrastructure in California, acquiring an 80% stake in a 384 MW solar and battery storage portfolio from EDP Renewables in a deal valuing the assets at approximately $0.8 billion at the start of operations. The transaction, executed through an Ares Infrastructure Equity fund, underscores the firm's growing appetite for high-quality, long-term contracted renewable assets amid the broader energy transition. The portfolio includes 200 MW of utility-scale solar generation and 184 MW of battery energy storage, both backed by 20-year agreements - a 20-year Power Purchase Agreement for the solar component and a 20-year Capacity Tolling Agreement for the storage. Josh Bellet, Managing Director in Ares Infrastructure Equity, highlighted the strategic rationale behind the investment, stating that it reinforces the firm's focus on providing flexible capital to essential infrastructure assets with durable cash flows. "The transaction reflects our focus on providing flexible capital to high-quality, essential infrastructure assets with durable cash flows, while contributing to the buildout of a more reliable and resilient U.S. power system," Bellet said. This deal follows Ares' acquisition last year of a 49% stake in a much larger 1,632 MW portfolio of solar, wind, and storage assets across four U.S. power markets from EDPR, further solidifying a partnership that spans critical renewable energy infrastructure. The California portfolio's contracted revenue structure provides visibility over two decades, a key attraction for institutional investors seeking stable, inflation-resistant returns in the energy transition. For EDPR, the transaction represents a partial monetization of its U.S. assets, allowing the developer to recycle capital into new growth opportunities while maintaining operational control. The long-term agreements embedded in the deal mitigate merchant price risk, aligning with Ares' preference for de-risked, cash-flow-generating infrastructure investments. The acquisition arrives at a time when California's energy market is rapidly evolving, with battery storage playing an increasingly vital role in grid stability amid rising renewable penetration and peak demand challenges. Ares' involvement signals confidence in the state's long-term energy transition trajectory, even as regulatory and grid interconnection complexities persist. As institutional investors continue to allocate capital toward decarbonization and energy security, transactions like this one illustrate how alternative asset managers are bridging the gap between developer-led growth and investor demand for scaled, contracted renewable infrastructure. Read all about it

Two pension funds, two continents, two completely different ways to buy into logistics Real Estate. PSP Investments is putting up to $2.4 billion into U.S. warehouses through a joint venture with Ares. West Midlands Pension Fund just bought one UK distribution center outright. Both are pension capital chasing the same durable income, using almost opposite structures to get there. By Sabastian Niles / Published: Sep 21 2026, 9:43 AM EDT Ares Management and Canada's Public Sector Pension Investment Board have formed a joint venture to invest up to $2.4 billion in U.S. logistics real estate, one of the largest pension-backed logistics commitments announced this year. The venture pairs Ares Real Estate's vertically integrated logistics platform, Marq Logistics, which will source and manage assets on the venture's behalf, with PSP Investments' capital. PSP is one of Canada's largest pension investors, managing C$320.6 billion in net assets as of the end of March on behalf of federal public service, Canadian Forces, RCMP and Reserve Force pension plans. Ares itself is a $671 billion global alternative asset manager. What's actually in the deal, and where it's starting. The joint venture launches with a seed portfolio of 14 properties totaling 5.2 million square feet across California, Texas and New Jersey, all three states with established, high-demand logistics corridors. From there, the venture is structured to both acquire and develop additional logistics facilities in what Ares and PSP describe as "high-conviction" and "high-growth" markets, rather than confining itself to buying only existing, already-stabilized buildings. "The acceleration of onshoring, buildout of digital infrastructure and growing influence of e-commerce continue strengthening the investment fundamentals for strategically placed logistics facilities," said Dave Fazekas, Ares Real Estate's head of North America logistics. Laurence Bastien, PSP's managing director of real estate investments for the Americas, framed the appeal in similar terms: "The U.S. logistics sector benefits from durable demand drivers and structurally constrained supply in the submarkets that matter most." Eastdil Secured Savills and Kirkland & Ellis advised Ares; Cushman & Wakefield and Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson advised PSP. This isn't Ares' first move to build out logistics-specific capability. The firm acquired GCP International in 2024, adding development and operating capabilities in logistics real estate and digital infrastructure, and separately picked up the Mexico-based logistics asset management business of Walton Street, representing $2.5 billion in assets under management, the same year. Ares raised nearly $10 billion in real estate capital across its strategies in 2024, up from $5.3 billion in 2023, a real acceleration in fundraising that this joint venture extends rather than initiates. A useful contrast: how a much smaller pension fund did essentially the same thing differently. It's worth setting this deal against a very different, recent example of pension capital moving into logistics real estate: West Midlands Pension Fund's direct purchase of a single, fully let 462,700-square-foot Sainsbury's distribution center in Bedford, England, acquired through portfolio manager CBRE Investment Management. Both deals reflect the same underlying institutional logic, pension funds with long-duration liabilities seeking durable, often inflation-linked income from logistics real estate specifically. But the structures could hardly be more different, and the difference says something real about how pension funds actually access this asset class depending on their scale and internal capabilities. West Midlands Pension Fund bought one already-stabilized, income-producing building outright, using an external portfolio manager to execute a direct acquisition. That's a common approach for pension funds that have the capital and long investment horizon for direct real estate ownership but not the in-house scale or specialized expertise to run an active sourcing, development and asset management operation themselves. PSP Investments, by contrast, entered a full joint venture with a $671 billion alternative asset manager that brings its own dedicated logistics platform, sourcing network and development capability to the table. That structure lets PSP pursue a genuinely programmatic strategy, acquiring a seed portfolio of 14 properties immediately while retaining the capacity to fund new development and additional acquisitions as opportunities arise, rather than a single, discrete transaction. The scale gap between the two investors helps explain the structural gap: PSP's C$320.6 billion asset base supports a large, standalone joint venture with a specialized manager in a way a single UK local government pension fund's more modest direct property allocation generally doesn't. Two ends of the same spectrum. Neither approach is more "correct" than the other; they represent different points on a real spectrum of how institutional pension capital accesses logistics real estate. Direct, single-asset ownership through an external portfolio manager, West Midlands Pension Fund's approach, offers a more controlled, individually underwritten exposure to a specific, already-proven income stream, well suited to funds allocating a smaller, more conservative slice of their portfolio to direct property. A large-scale joint venture with a specialized operator, the Ares-PSP structure, offers exposure to a broader, actively managed pipeline that includes development risk alongside stabilized income, suited to a fund with the scale and risk appetite to back a full programmatic strategy rather than a single building. Both, notably, are betting on the same underlying thesis, that logistics real estate's combination of e-commerce-driven demand and constrained new supply in the best submarkets offers the kind of durable, long-duration income pension liabilities are specifically built to match. What's confirmed and what's structural interpretation. The deal terms, seed portfolio size and location, advisor list, and all direct quotes here come from Ares and PSP's own joint press release, corroborated by independent reporting from Commercial Observer, The Real Deal and multiple financial news outlets. Ares' prior logistics-related acquisitions and 2024 fundraising figures come from the company's own annual report filings. The comparison to West Midlands Pension Fund's Sainsbury's acquisition draws on separately reported, independently confirmed deal terms for that transaction; the framing that these two deals represent different points on a shared structural spectrum is this piece's own analysis, not something either set of parties has stated as a direct comparison. What to watch next. The most concrete near-term marker is how quickly the Ares-PSP venture deploys beyond its 14-property seed portfolio, and whether its activity concentrates further in California, Texas and New Jersey or expands into additional logistics corridors. It's also worth watching whether more large-scale pension investors follow PSP's joint-venture-with-a-specialist-manager model for U.S. logistics exposure specifically, versus continuing to pursue direct, single-asset acquisitions more in line with West Midlands Pension Fund's approach, since the answer will say a good deal about which structure institutional investors increasingly see as the more efficient path into a property type both clearly view as a durable, long-term bet. Join the Discussion EDITOR'S PICKS

Momentum Financial Services Group has renewed and expanded its secured loan facility with Ares Alternative Credit funds. The facility has been increased from C$657.9 million to C$810 million, with an accordion feature providing up to an additional C$130 million. The agreement extends through January 2029. The expanded facility will support Momentum's growing loan receivables portfolio in Canada and fund new products expected to launch in both Canada and the United States. Momentum operates over 360 stores in Canada and 60 in the US under the Money Mart brand, providing financial solutions including personal loans, cheque cashing, and money transfers. The renewal reflects the company's significant growth in its Canadian business over the past year.