By Robb M. Stewart
Brookfield plans to combine with its insurance business as it streamlines its corporate structure to improve flexibility and its ability to deploy capital.
The Canadian investment manager's tie-up with Brookfield Wealth Solutions would further simplify the company's web of various listed businesses after the recent conversion of its Brookfield Business Partners and Brookfield Business Corp. units into a single listed entity. Brookfield said it is also evaluating a similar simplification plan for its two infrastructure and two energy entities.
Uniting Brookfield and Brookfield Wealth Solutions is expected to be done on a tax-efficient basis for most shareholders of both entities, and the combined business is set to be listed on both the Toronto and New York exchanges. Toronto-based Brookfield said that it will adopt generally accepted U.S. accounting principles from the first quarter of next year, which would allow for greater comparability with its peers.
The wealth solutions business was structured in a way that would allow it to leverage its parent's capital base and investing abilities. Over the last five years, the insurance business has grown to about $30 billion in value and its asset base has reached nearly $200 billion. Brookfield said that to keep growing and maximize returns, a full combination is the best route.
"As our insurance platform continues to scale, the combination will enhance capital efficiency and flexibility, supporting our ability to deploy capital globally into high-quality investment opportunities," Brookfield President Nick Goodman said.
The combination is expected to allow Brookfield to fully utilize its permanent capital base, adding about $145 billion of cash, equities, real estate, and other investments, to support the growth of the insurance operations. Few other insurance businesses in the world have access to this scale of excess capital to add to its equity base, Brookfield said.
Brookfield ended March with about $188 billion of deployable capital for new investments, including $114 billion of uncalled private fund commitments.
It returned roughly $598 million of capital to shareholders in the first quarter through dividends and buybacks, with year-to-date repurchases of its class A shares totaling $470 million. At the same time, majority-owned Brookfield Asset Management bought back $575 million of its shares in the open market.
Brookfield's distributable earnings--a measure of cash that can be returned to shareholders--were up slightly at $1.55 billion, or 66 cents a share, in the first three months of 2026 versus the prior-year period. That topped the about $1.44 billion analysts polled by FactSet were expecting.
Net income jumped to $1.04 billion, or 3 cents a share, from $215 million, or 1 cent, a year earlier.
Revenue increased 3.5% to $18.58 billion for the latest quarter.
Brookfield's asset management business generated an 11% rise in fee-related earnings over a year prior, which it said were supported by strong institutional fundraising. Asset management fundraising totaled $67 billion in the quarter, and Brookfield Asset Management's first-quarter distributable earnings increased 7% to $702 million.
Brookfield executed about $17 billion of asset sales across its business in the first quarter, which included $6 billion in infrastructure exits, $5 billion in energy and $2 billion in real estate. Transaction activity remained resilient across most asset classes, it said.
Write to Robb M. Stewart at robb.stewart@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
By Robb M. Stewart
Brookfield has picked up $2 billion in shares of Elon Musk's SpaceX ahead of its initial public offering as the investment firm taps into businesses that stand to benefit from the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence.
Brookfield said it has amassed SpaceX shares at the current pre-IPO mark, with about $1 billion of the shares owned directly and the remainder by its affiliates.
The satellite builder and rocket operator has confidentially filed IPO paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission, putting it on track to potentially list shares by July. SpaceX is aiming for an IPO that could raise between $40 billion and $80 billion, The Wall Street Journal has reported.
Toronto-based Brookfield in supplemental information released alongside its first-quarter results said it has made select investments in businesses linked closely with the boom in AI, including an about $500 million commitment to humanoid robotics developer Figure. It also has invested in next-generation AI platform Hark Labs, which was funded in the second quarter of this year, and in the Deployment Co. AI deployment joint venture with OpenAI.
Brookfield said majority-owned Brookfield Asset Management also owns half of Pinegrove Capital, a platform focused on secondary and structured capital in the technology and venture capital space. It said it has committed more than $450 million to Pinegrove's strategies, increasing its exposure to private technology investments across venture secondaries, venture funds and venture credit opportunities.
As of the end of March, the total amount of capital in these new business strategies was $6.3 billion, with the value of Brookfield's balance sheet capital sitting at about $2.3 billion.
Brookfield ended the first quarter with about $188 billion of deployable capital for new investments, including $114 billion of uncalled private fund commitments.
Distributable earnings--a measure of cash that can be returned to shareholders--were up slightly at $1.55 billion, or 66 cents a share, in the first three months of 2026 versus the prior-year period. That topped the about $1.44 billion analysts polled by FactSet were expecting.
Net income attributable to shareholders jumped to $102 million, or 3 cents a share, from $73 million, or 1 cent, a year earlier. And revenue increased 3.5% to $18.58 billion for the latest quarter.
Brookfield plans to combine with its insurance business as it streamlines its corporate structure to improve flexibility and its ability to deploy capital.
The proposed tie-up with Brookfield Wealth Solutions comes after the recent conversion of the investment company's Brookfield Business Partners and Brookfield Business Corp. units into a single listed entity. Brookfield said it is also evaluating a similar simplification plan for its two infrastructure and two energy entities.
Uniting Brookfield and Brookfield Wealth Solutions is expected to be done on a tax-efficient basis for most shareholders of both entities, and the combined business is set to be listed on both the Toronto and New York exchanges. Brookfield said that it will adopt generally accepted U.S. accounting principles from the first quarter of next year, which would allow for greater comparability with its peers.
Over the last five years, the insurance business has grown to about $30 billion in value and its asset base has reached nearly $200 billion. Brookfield said that to keep growing and maximize returns, a full combination is the best route.
"As our insurance platform continues to scale, the combination will enhance capital efficiency and flexibility, supporting our ability to deploy capital globally into high-quality investment opportunities," Brookfield President Nick Goodman said.
The combination is expected to allow Brookfield to fully utilize its permanent capital base, adding about $145 billion of cash, equities, real estate, and other investments, to support the growth of the insurance operations. Few other insurance businesses in the world have access to this scale of excess capital to add to its equity base, Brookfield said.
Write to Robb M. Stewart at robb.stewart@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 14, 2026 12:49 ET (16:49 GMT)
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