The turbulence that has been battering the once-highflying private-funds business is easing up.

KKR on Thursday reported record earnings for the second quarter driven by a bumper crop of company sales from its private-equity funds. Private-credit specialist Blue Owl recommitted to beating Wall Street forecasts, touting the strength of its data-center investment products, despite a slump in new sales of its core funds marketed to individual investors.

Still, the industry's recovery from a surge in redemption requests from rattled investors remains uneven. Share prices of large fund managers have lost about 15% to 35% of their value this year.

"Our industry is increasingly K-shaped," said KKR Chief Executive Officer Scott Nuttall on a conference call with analysts. "Most of the external focus will be on the unhappy part of the K -- we find ourselves on the happy part."

KKR started out as a private-equity specialist about 50 years ago, then expanded into real estate, credit investing and other markets, giving it ballast to weather volatility in any one segment. Blue Owl is a relative newcomer that is trying to diversify but remains dependent on fees from private-credit funds sold t o wealthy individuals , the epicenter of recent market volatility.

KKR's fee-related earnings, an important metric for investment firms, jumped 37% in the second quarter from a year ago while the firm raised more than $34 billion, a 24% increase from the prior quarter.

Much of the bump came from the firm's share in companies that were sold by the private-equity funds it manages. Kokusai Electric, a microchip equipment maker benefiting from the artificial-intelligence boom, sold for 20 times what KKR paid. Global Medical Response, an ambulance operator that had to cut its valuation in an initial public offering, went for about three times what KKR paid.

KKR is benefiting in part because it was slower than competitors to sell private-credit funds to individuals through brokers and financial advisers, a strategy Blue Owl pioneered. Blue Owl is launching new products to balance the mix but "direct lending" funds still account for about 35% of the money it manages, down from 50% two years ago.

Blue Owl's fee-related earnings climbed 7% from a year ago. Fundraising declined about 16% from the prior quarter and 37% from the year-ago quarter. The slump coincided with $4.7 billion in withdrawal requests from the firm's private-credit funds sold primarily to wealthy individuals, many who have grown worried about potential losses from investments in software companies.

Limits that firms place on client redemptions prevented forced liquidations of the funds but fueled anxiety among some investors.

Marc Lipschultz, Blue Owl's co-chief executive, said redemption requests have started to ease and that new fund sales improved in July and June, although only slightly.

"It takes time after a hurricane blows through to clean up," he said.

The firm doubled down on its commitment to beat fee-related earnings of $1.02 per share for the year and reported 10% growth in fundraising from the previous quarter for its real-asset business, which invests in infrastructure and has become one of the biggest backers of large data centers feeding AI.

Big fund-management firms are pointing to the "digital infrastructure" build-out as a key growth driver. Blackstone reported last week a 26% jump in distributable earnings, due in large part to AI investments.