• Preserving AES’s investment grade credit rating is a key goal for the deal.
• Regulatory approvals may delay closing; divestment of non-core assets is also planned.
• AES Clean Energy has 137 US projects, with 26 reaching advanced stages recently.

Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) and EQT Infrastructure remain in active talks to acquire AES Corp., said sources familiar with the situation.

The plan at present is to use AES’s balance sheet financing going forward as it is portable, but it has also lined up backstop financing, if needed, from the likes of JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs and others.

The end goal is to preserve AES’s investment grade credit rating, said those same sources.

AES is rated at BBB- by S&P and Fitch, putting it one notch above a non-investment grade or junk bond rating.

While the deal is expected to take well over a year to close, given the myriad of regulatory approvals needed, there is also a plan in place to divest non-core assets.

AES reports its annual earnings on February 27 at 10am EST.

EQT, GIP, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan declined to comment on the situation. AES did not return calls seeking comment.

According to its 3Q25 investor relations presentation as of September 30, AES has no balance under USD 1.8bn on revolver debt, of which a USD 300m tranche came due on December 6, 2026 and a USD 1.5bn tranche comes due on August 23, 2027.

The rest of the corporate debt structure is comprised of USD 6.293bn in unsecured bank debt, notes and hybrid notes.

Next steps.

There has been considerable industry speculation on what path this deal might look like down the road considering the collective ownership of power generation held amongst various investments made by GIP, its parent Blackrock and EQT in recent years.

However, the regulatory pathway to any deal is going to take considerable time as it needs to get cleared by the Ohio Public Utilities Commission (PUCO), as it owns Dayton Power & Light, the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission (IURC), as it owns Indianapolis Power & Light, and FERC, amongst other regulatory approvals.

The sheer concentration of power assets under one umbrella might draw scrutiny as well.

AES owns regulated utilities out of the US, clean energy development in both the US, AES Clean Energy, and globally. AES also owns energy infrastructure businesses in the US, including Southland Energy, and businesses in Latin America and South America.

NPM Interconnection queue data, at present, shows AES Clean Energy has 137 pre-operational projects under development across 19 GW in the US, of which 26 projects, across 5.29 GW have reached an advanced stage in the past 24 months.

AES also remains a major investor in battery storage technology and services provider Fluence, that it started with Siemens in 2018.

GIP, amongst its various holdings, still has a 50% stake in energy IPP Clearway Energy, and owns Skyborn Renewables, which it also holds a 50% stake in and is in advanced stages of building the 704 MW Revolution Wind offshore wind project off the coast of New England. Separately, Blackrock owns storage developer Jupiter Power, amongst other clean energy investments

EQT owns a roster of power developers which include Cypress Creek Renewables, Scale Microgrids, Madison Energy Infrastructure, and Zelestra, a global IPP with a US bucket.

Both asset managers have dry powder to deploy after closing their latest flagship infrastructure funds last year.

GIP completed the fundraising for its fifth flagship fund in July 2025, having raised USD 25.2bn in commitments, while EQT Infrastructure closed its sixth fund in March 2025, having raised EUR 21.5bn (USD 25.38bn) in commitments.

*This story was originally published exclusively for NPM subscribers.