[multicast]

Big PE firms are now setting up new investment vehicles that specialize in funding big investments of other PE firms. PE firms are starting to invest more and more into equity with their own investors money, thus amount of investments shrink - get more expensive - and the capital needed rises. But I am not sure that this causes more PE firms to close shop on a large scale, but more likely resulting in less transactions being done overall.

[disgruntledphd2]

Yeah, that looks like an extend and pretend maneuver to me, at least.