MARC ROWAN

Marc Rowan co-founded Apollo Global Management in 1990 alongside Leon Black and Josh Harris, starting with $600 million. While Apollo was always known for leveraged buyouts and distressed debt, Rowan was the architect of its credit and insurance strategy — the engine that now drives the majority of Apollo's revenue.

In 2022, Apollo merged with Athene Holding, a retirement services company Rowan helped create, in a $29 billion deal that transformed Apollo from a private equity firm into a hybrid asset management and insurance giant. When Leon Black stepped down in 2021 amid controversy, Rowan became CEO.

Under his leadership, Apollo's assets under management exploded past $670 billion. The firm now manages more money in credit and insurance than in traditional private equity.

Rowan is widely credited with seeing that the future of alternative investments was not just buyouts but the massive pool of insurance and retirement capital that traditional Wall Street was ignoring.

Apollo Global Management (co-founder and CEO, $670B+ AUM), Athene Holding (co-founder, $29B merger with Apollo)

Rowan is a credit investor at heart. His genius was recognizing that lending — not buying companies — would be the bigger opportunity in alternatives.

Apollo's strategy under Rowan is to originate and manage massive pools of credit: corporate loans, asset-backed securities, real estate debt, and insurance liabilities. He thinks in terms of yield, duration, and risk-adjusted returns, not multiples and exits.

When Apollo does private equity, it tends to be in industries with stable cash flows — insurance, retirement, leisure, media. Rowan avoids hype sectors entirely.

Building Apollo's credit and insurance platform into the largest in the world. The Athene strategy alone — creating an insurance company that feeds its assets to Apollo to manage — was Rowan's brainchild and is now responsible for the majority of Apollo's $670B in AUM.

It transformed Apollo from a PE shop into the dominant force in alternative credit.

The Leon Black situation damaged Apollo's reputation significantly. Rowan had to navigate a leadership transition during a period of intense public scrutiny.

While not Rowan's personal mistake, he was a co-founder and partner for decades, and the controversy raised questions about the firm's culture that Rowan had to address as the new CEO.

The biggest opportunity is always in the things that look boring. Rowan believes the most money in finance is made not in headline-grabbing deals but in the plumbing of the financial system — credit, insurance, pensions.

He thinks most investors chase excitement and leave enormous returns on the table in areas they consider beneath them.

Married to Carolyn Rowan. Multiple children.

Major philanthropists — particularly in Philadelphia and to the University of Pennsylvania. Private family life.

University of Pennsylvania Wharton School (BS in Economics, MBA). Was in the same Wharton class as several other major PE figures.