The largest private equity deal of the year won’t be so much a Goliath as a Mini-me. An expected $2.5bn-$3bn Blackstone acquisition of 10 US theme parks owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev is a shadow of former mega-deals, but signals that the private equity industry is continuing its slow rebound. The big question remaining regards the debt involved. In spite of a market rally, costs will be high. A conservative equity injection will also be required; probably far more than the 20-30 per cent levels before the credit crunch.

Financing aside, private equity buyers love non-core assets in need of a new home. August Busch III, the former Anheuser-Busch chairman, built his theme park empire to explore consumer habits. Such expensive hobbies can be indulged when you share your name with that of the company. Now that arch cost-cutter Carlos Brito runs the group – bursting with $45bn of debt from last year’s AB acquisition – this luxury must go. AB’s entertainment division swallowed over twice as much capital expenditure, as a proportion of assets, as did the rest of the group in 2007, the last time such numbers were split out. Yet its return on assets, at 11 per cent, was about 1.5 percentage points less than the group’s.