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Citi lights

Citigroup and Apollo have paired up to launch a new $25bn private credit program, adding another name to the growing list of bank-PC partnerships.

Some players are finding that cooperation can lead to better outcomes than competition when it comes to banks and direct lenders, reframing the narrative around their relationship. It’s less traditional banks versus PC firms narrative, but rather battles between PC and bank tag-teams.

In this hybridized arrangement, where banks and direct lenders operate as a sort of joint platform designed to capture the widest possible range of borrowers between the two, there could still be niches for those who aren’t quite at 25 big ones.