Private equity deal news and insights from the New York newsroom

Rising uncertainty. PE Hub is monitoring how private equity is viewing how tariffs and the current economic environment are affecting dealmaking.

“We have not seen an immediate impact between tariffs and private market dealmaking volume yet,” Zach Ullman, principal at Lead Edge Capital said. “However, everyone we speak with – GPs, LPs, companies – are more cautious than a week ago. We know private markets tend to lag public markets. When deal volume starts to slow, we tend to see the best secondary opportunities.”

Lead Edge is a growth investment firm based in New York. The firm invests in software, internet, and tech-enabled businesses globally. Some past investments from Lead Edge include Alibaba Group, Asana and Toast.

“Any uncertainty is bad for business,” Ullman said. “In uncertain environments, you hold off on major decisions, such as growth investments, capital investments, and capital markets transactions. That last bucket includes going public or running a sale process. We have seen companies such as StubHub, Klarna, and MNTN put their IPOs on hold. That kicks the can on the backlog of public IPOs further into 2026.”