In the past decade, private equity firms smashed records with the amount of financial firepower they mustered from investors around the world. Close-knit relationships with the largest pension schemes, endowments and other institutional investors in the US helped bring in huge cheques – often for more than $1bn – for the buyout industry’s best-known names.

But that picture is changing, with private equity firms no longer able to bank on the momentum offered by their big, cornerstone investors to attract other investors and help them raise the megafunds of the past.