The Carlyle Group swung to a loss in its second quarter, the firm said on Wednesday, as it struggled to show growth in its core private equity investments.
The firm's loss of $57 million was reported as economic net income, a metric preferred by other publicly traded private equity firms like the Blackstone Group and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts. The figure includes unrealized gains for investments.
That amounts to a loss of about 19 cents a share, surpassing the 14 cents a share average estimate of analysts surveyed by Standard & Poor's Capital IQ.
A year ago, the firm reported $237 million in economic net income.
Carlyle itself emphasizes distributable earnings, which track how much the firm doles out to its investors. It paid out $115 million during the quarter, up 29 percent from the same time a year ago.
Using generally accepted accounting principles, Carlyle lost $10 million for the quarter.
Like many of its counterparts, the firm said that the continuing shakiness of the global markets hampered its ability to do deals as well as slightly eroded the value of its private equity investments.
But Carlyle also pointed to the $3 billion in realized gains that it generated during the quarter as a sign that it was continuing to create value for its limited partners. And it said that it raised nearly $4 billion in new capital for the quarter.
“Our firm, portfolio and funds are in very good shape, despite a quarter marked by significant volatility in global equity markets and continued uncertainty in Europe,†David M. Rubenstein, a co-chief executive of the firm, said in a statement.
The earnings report is the second since the firm went public in May.
