BAM Stock: Fees, Perpetual Capital, Dividend and Debt, Q2 2026

What BAM is, and which filings to read

BAM is the listed asset manager of the Brookfield group. It collects fees for managing other people's money across five strategies: infrastructure, energy, private equity, real estate and credit. It is not Brookfield Corporation (BN), which owns about 73% of BAM's Class A shares and keeps the carried interest on older funds. It is also not the funds themselves: Brookfield Real Estate Income Trust and Brookfield Infrastructure Income Fund are separate vehicles with their own NAV and holders, and BAM earns fees from them.

One correction to a common assumption. BAM's annual report for 2025 is a Form 10-K (accession 0001628280-26-013098, filed March 2, 2026) and its quarterly reports are Form 10-Q, with earnings on Form 8-K; it is not a 40-F and 6-K filer. The "supplemental information" that Brookfield publishes with each quarter is on its website, not on EDGAR. This page uses the 10-Q and the 8-K earnings release instead; where the release and the 10-Q differ, we say so.

BAM reports fee-bearing capital, not assets under management, as its main size measure, because that is the capital that pays fees. The 10-Q gives platform assets under management of $262 billion in infrastructure, $144 billion in energy, $166 billion in private equity, “over $280 billion” in real estate and $416 billion in credit, which add to $1,268 billion (our arithmetic); the company's own wording is “over $1 trillion”.

Earnings: fee-related earnings, distributable earnings and what is left out

Fee-related earnings, or FRE, are fee revenues less the costs of earning them. Distributable earnings, or DE, add investment income, subtract cash taxes and interest, and are the base for the dividend. Both are non-GAAP; net income under U.S. GAAP is shown for comparison.

Net income more than doubled in the quarter, but mostly because of carried interest that has not been paid: GAAP revenue included $553 million of unrealized carried interest allocations against a negative $63 million a year earlier. FRE excludes it. That is why we start from FRE.

For the full year 2025, FRE was $2,995 million (2024: $2,456 million; 2023: $2,241 million) and DE $2,695 million (2024: $2,363 million; 2023: $2,244 million), on fee revenues of $5,487 million (Form 10-K). First-quarter 2026 FRE was $772 million, up from $698 million (Form 8-K, accession 0001171843-26-003183).

Fee revenues by strategy for the second quarter show where the growth came from:

Real estate fee revenues, the strategy behind Brookfield REIT, fell 1% in the quarter, and the 10-Q attributes that to lower fees from earlier vintages of flagship funds as assets were sold. Credit rose 28%.

Fee-bearing capital: $672 billion, and how much of it is perpetual

BAM sorts its fee-bearing capital into three kinds. Long-term private funds are closed-end, typically ten years with two one-year extensions. Permanent capital and perpetual strategies have no end date: the listed affiliates (the 10-Q defines “perpetual affiliates” as BEP, BIP, BBUC and BPG), perpetual private funds, and in credit, insurance capital. Liquid strategies are open-end and listed credit and similar mandates. This is the table BAM does not put in its press release:

The perpetual share has moved a long way in three years:

Two readings matter. First, in six months the perpetual bucket grew $53.0 billion (our arithmetic) while long-term private funds grew $12.9 billion; credit's perpetual line alone grew from $115.1 billion to $156.0 billion. Second, perpetual does not mean permanent in the sense a holder of one of Brookfield's non-traded funds might hope: the line includes the insurance mandate, which has outflows (see below), and the evergreen funds that pay out repurchase requests. Excluding credit, perpetual capital was $137.5 billion, 39.7% of the $346.3 billion of non-credit fee-bearing capital (our arithmetic).

For the quarter, the roll-forward was: $613.8 billion at March 31, 2026, plus $68.1 billion of inflows, less $6.9 billion of outflows and $6.3 billion of distributions, plus $5.2 billion of market valuation changes, less $1.7 billion of other movements, equals $672.2 billion. The company says $2.9 billion of the valuation gain was higher market prices of its listed affiliates BEP and BIP, which pay fees on market capitalization: part of fee-bearing capital moves with two stock prices, not with fundraising.

The insurance effect: who is paying for the growth

The 10-Q is direct about the source of the quarter's credit inflows: $44.8 billion of insurance capital from Brookfield Wealth Solutions (BWS), part of $48.6 billion for six months, “inclusive of the Just Group Plc. mandate”. BAM's earnings release calls the Just Group mandate $40 billion. In the quarter, insurance money was 65.8% of total fee-bearing capital inflows ($44.8 billion of $68.1 billion) and 76.8% of the net increase of $58.4 billion (our arithmetic). Take it out and the quarter looks like an ordinary one.

Insurance capital pays low fees. The 10-Q footnote says BWS had $150 billion of fee-bearing capital at June 30, 2026 (June 30, 2025: $97 billion), which generated $158 million of fee revenues in six months (H1 2025: $112 million). As a share of the total:

The same pattern shows by strategy, using the second-quarter fee revenue times four over period-end capital (our arithmetic, a rough yield because fee revenues include incentive and catch-up fees):

Why it matters for the stock: capital growth driven by credit and insurance raises the headline faster than it raises earnings. The 10-Q says $35 million of the quarter's increase in base management and advisory fees came from net insurance inflows from BWS, and the 10-Q attributes the $39 million rise in credit's permanent and perpetual fee revenues (to $150 million from $111 million) to those flows and to capital deployed in private credit. It also matters for the headline of "perpetual capital": the more of it is insurance, the more it depends on one client relationship inside the Brookfield group.

Carried interest: accrued, split with Brookfield Corporation, mostly unrealized

Carried interest is the manager's share of profits above a hurdle. The 10-Q describes the standard terms as 20% of net profits after a preferred return of typically 8% a year. Two features set BAM apart from other listed managers, and both are in the filings. First, “BN is entitled to receive 33.3% of the carried interest on new sponsored funds of BAM and will retain all of the carried interest earned on our existing mature funds.” So BAM owns 66.7% of the carry of new funds and none of the older ones. Second, the carry in credit partner managers such as Oaktree is held inside the investment balance, not as accrued carry, so the table below leaves credit out.

Realized carried interest, the part that reaches distributable earnings, was $16 million in the first half of 2026 and nil in the second quarter. Net of compensation, new-fund carry in Q2 was $525 million against $134 million (100% basis). The unrealized carried interest attributable to BAM was $387 million against $94 million. Energy contributed $330 million of the new-fund accrual, and the 10-Q attributes $261 million of the year-on-year increase in GAAP carried interest to the first and second vintages of its global transition flagship fund. In short: the accrual is large and growing, and it matters for the dividend only when funds sell assets and pay it out.

A caution on uncalled commitments, the pipeline of future fees. The earnings release says BAM had “$149 billion of uncalled fund commitments, $68 billion of which will generate approximately $680 million of annual fees once deployed.” The 10-Q's deployable-capital table shows uncalled private fund commitments of $114,153 million. The two are different by $34.8 billion (our arithmetic) and neither document reconciles them; we use the 10-Q figure when we need a number for the balance, and the release for the $680 million.

The retail channel: what Brookfield REIT and BII mean for BAM

BAM names three vehicles for individual investors in its 10-K and 10-Q: Brookfield Real Estate Income Trust (“a semi-liquid strategy catering specifically to the private wealth channel”), Brookfield Infrastructure Income Fund and, since October 2025, Brookfield Private Equity Fund, which the 10-K calls “an evergreen semi-liquid fund offering individual investors streamlined, diversified access”. BAM says it has a dedicated team of about 150 people for the private wealth channel and about 69,000 private wealth clients, up from about 60,000 in the 10-K, where they were “over 8% of capital raised”. It also says its infrastructure private wealth strategy took in $900 million in Q4 2025, $800 million in Q1 2026 and $900 million in Q2 2026, and had “over $8.0 billion” of capital after the first quarter. In the second quarter it was selected by AllianceBernstein to distribute real asset strategies through target-date funds.

What the vehicles pay the manager can be read from their own filings, for the same six months:

Together the two paid $53.0 million of adviser fees in six months, 1.8% of BAM's $2,920 million of fee revenues (our arithmetic). That is a ceiling for the money BAM actually keeps, because both vehicles engage sub-advisers and the filings do not say how the fees are shared. The point is one of proportion: these are the vehicles in the news for repurchase limits and distribution cuts, yet to the listed company they are a rounding error, and the growth case for BAM stock rests on institutional flagships and insurance. It also means the vehicles and the stock do not move together: a tender request at BII does not appear in BAM's results.

For the vehicles themselves, see our Brookfield REIT review, the Brookfield REIT distribution and share-class fee analysis and the Brookfield Infrastructure Income Fund tender offers. Two points from the BAM filings that a holder should know: BAM's risk factors say “There is no assurance that our efforts to grow our retail assets under management will be successful,” and that retail products expose it to “heightened litigation and regulatory enforcement risks.” And the Brookfield REIT's adviser has elected to take its management fee in Class I and Class E shares, not cash.

The dividend: policy, coverage and who receives it

The policy words are “at least approximately 90%”, so a payout over 100% does not breach them; but the dividend was raised 15% in February 2026 to a level above what distributable earnings per share have covered over the last twelve months. The dividend is still small against fee-related earnings of $3,201 million over twelve months, and the shortfall in distributable earnings is mostly a function of cash taxes ($97 million in Q2), interest and the investment line, which was a negative $27 million in Q2. Whether distributable earnings per share catch up with the dividend depends on fee growth, which is the core of the company's guidance; none of that is in the filings.

On repurchases: BAM spent $576 million on its own shares in the first half of 2026, $200 million of it in Q2. Under a normal course issuer bid that runs to January 12, 2027 it has bought 12,466,459 Class A shares and may buy 24,479,718 more. It had 1,597,230,353 Class A shares outstanding on August 6, 2026. Because Brookfield Corporation owns about 73%, the shares that trade are a minority, and the 10-K lists BN's “substantial influence” as a risk factor.

Debt, liquidity and the Oaktree purchase

BAM's corporate borrowings were $3,466 million at June 30, 2026, up from $2,478 million at December 31, 2025, all senior unsecured notes:

Interest expense was $53 million in the quarter against $31 million (the higher figure follows the new issues). Corporate liquidity was $3.1 billion at June 30, 2026: $1.8 billion of cash and short-term assets and $1.4 billion of undrawn credit facilities (the 10-Q says the facilities were undrawn and a $1.0 billion commercial paper program had nothing outstanding). Cash and cash equivalents on the balance sheet were $1,503 million. The consolidated funds' own borrowings of $589 million are separate from the corporate debt.

Oaktree. On July 31, 2026 Brookfield acquired the remaining 26% of Oaktree's common equity for aggregate consideration of about $3.0 billion, of which about $2.2 billion is attributable to BAM. Until then BAM's FRE included Oaktree's fee-related earnings at an approximate 74% interest; the 10-Q says Oaktree's results are in BAM's statements from July 31. The purchase accounting was not available when the 10-Q was filed, so Q3, the quarter reported on November 6, 2026 (8-K, accession 0001171843-26-006587), will be the first look at how much it adds. We do not estimate it.

How the stock compares with owning the funds

BAM stock is a claim on the manager's fees. A Brookfield REIT or BII share is a claim on property or infrastructure, less the fees. The first trades daily and the second only through the vehicle's own repurchase terms. The manager earns 1.25% a year on both vehicles whether or not the underlying assets perform, plus the performance fee when they do, so a shareholder of BAM benefits from asset growth and from keeping the vehicles' assets under management, while an investor in a vehicle pays for it. For the same pattern at other managers, see our pages on Blackstone, KKR and Apollo, and our list of evergreen infrastructure funds. Oaktree's own non-traded products are in our page on Oaktree Strategic Credit Fund.

What a holder or interested reader can do with this

This page is analysis of public documents, not investment, legal or tax advice. These are checks the filings let you make yourself.

• Be clear which Brookfield you own. BAM stock is the manager. Brookfield Corporation (BN), Brookfield REIT, BII and Brookfield Private Equity Fund are separate. A distribution cut at the REIT is not a change in BAM's dividend.
• Read fee-bearing capital by type, not the total. The $672 billion includes $150 billion of insurance capital at about 0.21% and $81 billion of liquid strategies. The perpetual share is 43.7%, but 53.2% of perpetual is credit.
• Compare the dividend with distributable earnings per share, not with FRE. $2.01 a year against $1.75 over twelve months is the number the policy ties to.
• Remember what Brookfield Corporation keeps. It takes 33.3% of the carry on new funds and all of it on mature funds, so accrued carry of $2.4 billion is not all BAM's.
• If you hold a Brookfield vehicle, look at the vehicle's own filings. Fees, tender results and distributions are in the REIT's 10-Q and 8-Ks and BII's semi-annual report, as in the pages linked above.
• Watch the next date. Q3 2026 results are due before 7:00 a.m. ET on November 6, 2026. They will show the first Oaktree consolidation.

If you hold a Brookfield non-traded vehicle and are asking how it sits with the rest of your money, a conversation with a licensed adviser is the logical next step; filings cannot answer that for you.

FAQ

All figures are from Brookfield Asset Management Ltd. (CIK 1937926) filings read on EDGAR on October 15, 2026: Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2026 (accession 0001628280-26-054933, filed August 10, 2026); Form 10-K for 2025 (0001628280-26-013098, filed March 2, 2026); Forms 8-K with the earnings releases of February 4, May 8 and August 5-6, 2026 (0001104659-26-010078, 0001171843-26-003183, 0001171843-26-005272) and the Q3 call notice of October 13, 2026 (0001171843-26-006587); Brookfield Real Estate Income Trust Inc. (CIK 1713407) Form 10-Q for June 30, 2026 (0001713407-26-000079); and Brookfield Infrastructure Income Fund Inc. (CIK 1955857) Form N-CSRS for June 30, 2026 (0001398344-26-016527). Percentages and sums marked "our arithmetic" are ours. This is analysis of public documents, not investment, legal or tax advice.