Railcars are an unglamorous corner of the infrastructure market, but they have drawn steady interest from private capital. KKR said on Monday it had agreed to sell Infinity Transportation to Ares Management for about $2.9 billion, according to the release. Its lessees range from carmakers and railroad operators to shippers in agriculture, mining and chemicals, and the company is also an active buyer of used railcars.
KKR said Infinity has more than doubled its book value since 2021 and grown into one of the largest railcar lessors in the country, the Wall Street Journal reported. Ares framed the purchase as a bet on the reshoring of manufacturing and the need for more resilient supply chains, and said it intends to back further fleet growth after the deal closes, a partner at Ares Infrastructure Equity said.
For KKR, exits of this kind feed directly into earnings. The New York firm, founded in 1976, earns management fees as well as carried interest and realized gains when it sells investments, and its infrastructure strategy targets existing assets it describes as critical to the functioning of the economy, its annual report shows. Management told analysts in May that any monetizations slipping out of 2026 would not be lost but would likely shift into 2027 and beyond, according to the company record. With a closing penciled in for early next year, the Infinity proceeds would land in that later window.