European Capital Markets Briefing: Key Themes We Are Watching into Q4 – Goldman Sachs Research

Key Takeaways

• 1.Global sponsor-led private market exit activity has rebounded past $1tn LTM, easing software valuation concerns and stabilising US wealth channel flows, though rising long-end interest rates remain a headwind for fundraising.
• 2.Passive equity fund demand in Europe reached record highs in 2026, lifting organic fee growth at Amundi and DWS to a 4-year peak, with AI and fee compression acting as catalysts for further M&A consolidation.
• 3.Retail investment platforms face rising client acquisition costs due to intensified marketing from unlisted neobrokers, but absolute net savings inflows achieved record levels amid massive untapped household cash reserves.

Table of Contents

• DivFins: Performance overview
• Key themes we are watching across Capital Markets
• In focus: Highlighting frequent single-stock debates
• AJ Bell: Up to Neutral (from Sell) following underperformance of the shares
• DivFins: Upside/downside to price targets and key macro datapoints
• Alternative Asset Managers: Latest data points and insights
• Market Structure: Latest data points and insights
• Retail Investment Platforms: Latest data points and insights
• Traditional Asset and Wealth Managers: Latest data points and insights
• Estimate changes, valuations and risks
• Price performance and consensus earnings revisions

Report data

Exhibit 5: Looking at most prior market cycles of carry generation, consensus estimate revisions on performance fee generation have been slow on the upside, but fast to catch the downside when the cycle has turned negative — as of September 29, 2026.