Vista House, a private home in Westlake, Georgia, sponsored by Vista Global during the Masters.

Credit: VistaJet

A version of this article first appeared in CNBC’s Inside Wealth newsletter with Robert Frank, a weekly guide to the high-net-worth investor and consumer. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox.

Private jet companies are rolling out the red carpet for their top clients at the Masters Tournament, as competition shifts from the air to the ground with lavish hospitality events and experiences.

Thousands of private jets are expected to fly in and out of Augusta, Georgia, and nearby airports for the Masters in the coming days, making it one of the most important events of the year. NetJets, the industry leader, expects more than 775 flights into and out of Augusta, marking a 35% to 40% increase from last year, the company said. Flexjet is projecting about 350 to 400 flights, and Vista projects over 20 flights a day.

“Demand is off the charts,” said Mike Silvestro, CEO of Flexjet. “The Masters is like nothing else.”

On the private jet calendar, Davos, the Super Bowl, Cannes, the Kentucky Derby, the Monaco Grand Prix and Art Basel all attract plenty of private jets and wealthy attendees. But the Masters has a unique combination of tens of thousands of well-heeled attendees and a full week of events, creating a constant flow of clients flying in and out.

The swarm of Gulfstreams, Phenoms and Challengers is straining Augusta Regional Airport. Kenneth Hinkle, director of aviation services at the airport, said it had 3,294 flights last year and he expects an increase this year. The airport raised its “special event fee” this year by 25%, to between $150 and $4,000 per plane, depending on size, and expanded its jet parking area to accommodate 200 jets at a time.

The competition among private jet companies for landing slots, parking spaces and access to and from the terminal has grown so fierce that many companies have moved to nearby airports in Thomson, Georgia, or Aiken, South Carolina.

A photo rendering of NetJets’ new Augusta terminal.

Credit: Courtesy of NetJets

The real battle however, begins after the jets land. Jet companies are renting out mansions to create branded pop-up clubs, hiring Michelin-star chefs and well-known mixologists, hosting nightly parties with the biggest names in golf, and vying to attract the top players and announcers as headliners. Many are even staging private concerts with Grammy-winning country stars. 

The spending is all part of a new race in the private jet business. 

Private jet flights hit an all-time record in 2025, with 3.9 million departures, up 34% from pre-Covid levels. Recent U.S. government shutdowns and airport delays have only increased demand, jet companies say.

“We want to stay connected with our customers beyond just when they’re the air with us,” said Pat Gallagher, President of NetJets. “We’re a world lifestyle business. We’re a luxury business. If somebody asks me what business I’m in, I don’t say I’m in the travel or aviation space. I’m in the hospitality business.”

Longtime Masters fans say the hottest ticket of the week outside the Augusta National Golf Club is the NetJets Friday night party. NetJets won’t disclose any details on the location or entertainment for this year’s bash. But past parties have been hosted by sports commentator Jim Nantz and featured musical guests like Noah Kahan, Chris Stapleton and Zac Brown.

For the rest of the week, NetJets clients can use the brand’s hospitality venue to relax, grab a meal or drink, or hold a meeting. Some of NetJets’ more than 30 golf ambassadors who are playing at the Masters are also expected to pass through. Gallagher said the Masters is one of nearly 100 events a year now hosted by NetJets.

The company also just announced a new private jet terminal at Augusta Regional. The project, still under construction, includes 432,000 square feet of ramp space for jet parking.

“The number of jets that are parked on the [Augusta] runways, it’s like nothing you’ve ever seen from a from an aviation perspective,” Gallagher said.

Vista Global will be hosting clients at Vista House, a private home in Westlake, Georgia, that will be transformed into a branded hospitality venue in its signature silver and red. It will have nightly dinners, entertainment and special appearances by Vista brand ambassadors Gary Player, Jon Rahm, Phil Mickelson and Patrick Reed.

Vista hosted its big welcoming party Wednesday night with a private concert. The company said the goal is to give Vista House the same brand feel of its planes, from flight attendants serving in their Moncler-designed uniforms, to Vista’s signature scent designed by Le Labo to its ever-popular Vista beach towels. Clients of VistaJet and XO — both owned by Vista Global — will get access to Vista House as well hospitality space at the Double Eagle Club, close to the Augusta National Golf Club.

Vista said some of its clients fly in from as far away as Japan, South Korea, Singapore, India and Brazil.

“I think the Masters, especially in the past five years, has become more pronounced for us,” said Leona Qi, president of VistaJet U.S. “It’s a place where our clients — the ultra-high-net-worth individuals and corporate executives — go to not just to watch the game, but to really connect with each other and get deals done. And to share the passion and the experience with each other.”

Wheels Up will open the “Wheels Down Club” in Augusta, just a 10-minute walk from the entrance to Augusta National. The club, a temporary structure built around an existing home, will offer 11,000 square feet of hospitality space. Guests can valet their cars, get snacks and drinks in between rounds and check in their phones (a prized service since no cellphones are allowed on the course).

Wheels Up is running a “Wheels Down Club,” just a 10-minute walk from the entrance to Augusta National at the Masters.

Credit: Wheels Up

Wheels Up, now controlled by Delta Air Lines, expects to host 600 guests a day at the club. Big names on the program include Delta CEO Ed Bastian; Eric Kutcher, the North America chair of McKinsey & Co.; and Apple executive Eddy Cue, along with pro golfers. Chef José Andrés will host a “Jamon and Caviar” tasting and mixologist Tyler Zielinski will be making his signature “tiny cocktails.”

“The Masters has really become our tentpole event,” said Kristen Lauria, chief marketing officer for Wheels Up. “Whether it’s for members, whether it’s for prospects, or whether it’s for our partners who entertain their clients on the ground, it’s becoming bigger and bigger and bigger.”

Lauria said Wheels Down events will continue to expand into other sports, like tennis, equestrian and motorsports, as well as culinary and luxury lifestyle events. She said the clubs also help attract new clients who come in as guests of existing members.

“As I look at different ways to create demand, it’s really about going to where our customers are and where our members are,” she said. “Time is of the essence for our members. So showing up where they’re already going or where they’re planning to be, is a return in and of itself.”

Flexjet is taking a different approach. Rather than joining the spending spree of pop-up clubs and parties, the fractional jet company says it’s focused solely on its core business of getting clients to and from the event.

With Augusta Regional Airport highly congested during Masters week, Flexjet decided this year to move its operations to the Thomson-McDuffie Regional Airport in Thomson, Georgia. The airport is a short drive to the course at Augusta, is closer to the areas where attendees usually stay, and will allow Flexjet clients to get in and out quickly.

“The infrastructure in Augusta is taxed,” Silvestro said. “We’re trying to stay ahead of the curve and have the experience that we deliver to our customers be as seamless and stress-free as possible.”

Silvestro said clients will have an exclusive executive area at Thomson and can be picked up and dropped off right in front of their planes. He said the Masters has become so oversaturated with parties and events that Flexjet’s clients already have too many events to choose from.

“I shake my head at some of the hospitality extravagances from some of the people that are operating our space,” he said. “We see people doing certain things in and around our space that don’t make a lot of sense to us.”

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A Gulfstream G-IV private jet on approach to Washington’s Reagan National Airport in Arlington, Virginia, June 12, 2024.

J. David Ake | Getty Images

As the Iran war pushes jet fuel prices higher, well-heeled travelers are facing hefty surcharges to fly private, sometimes on flights booked months prior, charter brokers and aviation insiders told CNBC.

Vimana Private Jets CEO Ameerh Naran said the firm recently booked a $520,000 flight from Dubai to London on a Boeing business jet for a client. That same trip cost the client $400,000 in 2023. The difference was entirely due to jet fuel prices — which now average about $4.65 a gallon globally — Naran said.

It’s yet another ripple in the recent disruptions to air travel.

More customers turned to private air travel during the pandemic to avoid crowds. The option remains popular and has become more important to the aviation sector as wealthier households prop up spending in travel and other sectors.

These deep-pocketed travelers are less likely to get priced out as airfares rise, but they have to navigate unexpected fees as brokers and charters differ on how they pass along fuel costs. Jet fuel prices in major U.S. cities were up more than 80% last month, according to Airlines for America, an industry group, citing Argus data.

Jet charter brokers like Vimana arrange flights with jet operators, which own the planes and buy fuel, on behalf of passengers. Naran said Vimana does not renegotiate contracts and does not reprice flights, but that charter prices have surged quickly.

He advised travelers to book sooner than later, saying any price hikes are likely to be sticky even if the Iran war ends soon.

Larger jet operators are slower to pass along fuel costs to passengers as they buy fuel in bulk and want to avoid alienating customers, according to Naran. However, operators will likely have to pay more at the pump when they replenish their supplies, and some are taking losses by not repricing flights, he said.

“There’s a long-term effect, because a lot of companies now will be making losses,” he said. “They’re not going to renegotiate the contract because they don’t want to spoil the relationship with the client, but if they’re making a loss today, they’ve got to recoup it.”

Jet charter prices have increased by 5% to 15% on average, with some rising by as much as 20%, since the Iran conflict began, according to charter broker Amalfi Jets’ database.

Passing costs to passengers

While some operators have raised prices on flights booked months ago and scheduled to fly in the coming weeks, Amalfi Jets CEO Kolin Jones said his company is eating the surcharges for jet card customers.

Some operators are also passing along increased war risk premiums for flights in the Gulf, though Amalfi Jets has only encountered this with three flights so far, he said. The charges added about $8,000 to $10,000 per trip, Jones said.

Gregg Brunson-Pitts of charter broker Advanced Aviation Team said that while he believes operators should honor prices for previously booked flights, repricing is a risk.

In some cases, the fees are relatively insignificant, he said, like a $1,500 surcharge for a flight from Palm Beach, Florida, to Phoenix, Arizona, on a Bombardier Challenger 300, for example. On the other hand, a round trip on a Gulfstream from the East Coast to Asia could incur $20,000 in surcharges for every dollar increase in fuel prices per gallon, he said.

Some long-haul trips have all-inclusive fuel pricing, Brunson-Pitts added.

Nearly all charter contracts include a fuel variable expense, allowing providers to charge more even if the flight was booked six months ago, according to Amanda Applegate, a partner at Soar Aviation Law.

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Fractional jet owners, who share overhead costs in exchange for a set number of flight hours, typically pay an hourly rate on fuel that’s adjusted on a monthly or weekly basis. Even they may be on the hook for surcharges when fuel prices spike, Applegate said.

Private jet travelers are less price-sensitive than most flyers, and brokers told CNBC that they haven’t seen surcharges deter demand. Customers who only fly private once or twice a year for special occasions are most likely to get sticker shock, they said.

“Realistically, the individuals that are flying private, the need and want and reason of flying private does outweigh cost,” Jones said. “If you’re going to spend $25,000 on a private jet, and let’s say the cost is now $30,000, that doesn’t necessarily price people out.”

Brokers are also working to mitigate costs by refueling in countries where fuel is cheaper, even if it means additional flight time, Jones said.

Demand for private flying

So far, the business jet market is holding steady, with flights up 5% year over year in the week through March 22, according to aviation data and consultancy firm WingX.

Flexjet global CEO Andrew Collins said jet utilization by the company’s fractional aircraft owners is up 15% over last year. Clients are generally invoiced after they fly, and the company resets fuel prices toward the end of the month, taking an average of the month, he said.

Even as oil prices surge, travelers looking to avoid long lines at airports may be propping up demand for private charters.

Recent government shutdowns — a major disruption last fall and now a partial, ongoing shutdown — have left key aviation workers without pay and slowed air travel.

Most recently, that has led to hourslong lines at major U.S. airports like those serving Houston and New York as Transportation Security Administration officers called out of work while they weren’t receiving regular pay.

In the five weeks after the partial government shutdown began on Feb. 14, business jet departures increased year over year at most metropolitan airports, WingX reported.

Flexjet’s Collins said the company saw an increase in what he called “pop-up flights,” or reservations that guaranteed an aircraft within 10 hours of departure, during the recent airport chaos.

That said, Amalfi’s Jones said he has noticed some clients opting to fly on smaller aircraft to spend less.

“Some of them are very upset about that, like, ‘Hey, I used to fly on Citation Xs. Pricing is so expensive, and now I’m flying on a Hawker 800,'” Jones said. “It’s like, well, you’re still flying private. You’re going to get there maybe three minutes slower than the bigger airplane. But all in all, it’s the same kind of level of experience.”

Brunson-Pitts encouraged flyers to confirm with their broker whether they can expect a fuel surcharge or an invoice after their trip. Still, he said he expects the situation to be temporary, comparing it to oil’s rapid surge and subsequent crash from 2007 through 2008.

“This too shall pass,” he said. “That doesn’t mean it’s not painful, but the price of jet fuel rises and then it falls again.”

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Jamie Dimon, chief executive officer of JPMorgan Chase & Co., during the America Business Forum in Miami, Florida, US, on Thursday, Nov. 6, 2025.

Eva Marie Uzcategui | Bloomberg | Getty Images

JPMorgan Chase is reducing its exposure to the private credit industry by marking down the value of loans held by the bank as collateral, according to a person with knowledge of the moves.

The bank’s giant Wall Street trading division has reduced the value of loans — most of which were made to software firms — sitting within the financing portfolios of private credit clients, said the person, who declined to be identified speaking about the client interactions.

JPMorgan’s move indicates the biggest U.S. bank by assets wants to get ahead of potential turbulence involving private credit loans to software companies. CEO Jamie Dimon, who has guided his bank through multiple crises in his two decades atop JPMorgan, is known to constantly remind his executives about the risk that borrowers won’t be able to repay their loans.

Software firms have come under scrutiny in recent months as model updates from OpenAI and Anthropic drive concerns that some providers will be disrupted by AI. The worries have ignited a downcycle for private credit players as retail investors yanked funds in recent weeks, driving abnormally high redemptions at firms including Blue Owl and Blackstone.

The adjustments were made in JPMorgan’s financing business, where private credit firms borrow money to amplify fund returns in what’s known as “back-leverage.” The business is considered relatively risky because it layers leverage upon leverage — amplifying losses when the underlying loans sour.

By marking down the collateral for that leverage, JPMorgan is reducing the ability of private credit firms to borrow against their loans, and in some cases could even force firms to post more collateral.

The size of the loans impacted and the extent of the markdowns at JPMorgan couldn’t be determined.

JPMorgan is potentially the first major bank to take such steps, according to the FT, which was first to report the bank’s markdowns.

The moves are a preemptive step driven by changes in market valuations rather than actual loan losses, said the person with knowledge of the bank, who characterized the move as financial discipline, “rather than waiting until a crisis comes.”

JPMorgan previously pulled back leverage to the industry during the early days of the Covid pandemic, according to the person.

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Blue Owl BDC’s CEO Craig Packer speaks during an interview with CNBC on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York City, U.S., Nov. 19, 2025.

Brendan McDermid | Reuters

The latest tremor in the private credit world involved a deal that should’ve been reassuring to markets.

Blue Owl, a direct lender specializing in loans to the software industry, said Wednesday it had sold $1.4 billion of its loans to institutional investors at 99.7% of par value.

That means sophisticated players scrutinized the loans and the companies involved and felt comfortable paying nearly full price for the debt, a message that Blue Owl co-President Craig Packer sought to convey in interviews several times this week.

But instead of calming markets, it sent shares of Blue Owl and other alternative asset managers diving on fears of what could follow. That’s because as part of the asset sale, Blue Owl announced it was replacing voluntary quarterly redemptions with mandated “capital distributions” funded by future asset sales, earnings or other transactions.

“The optics are bad, even if the loan book is fine,” Brian Finneran of Truist Securities wrote in commentary circulated Thursday. “Most investors are interpreting the sales to mean that redemptions accelerated and led to forced sales of higher quality assets to meet requests.”

Blue Owl’s move was widely interpreted as the firm halting redemptions from a fund under pressure, even as Packer pointed out investors would get about 30% of their money back by March 31, far more than the 5% allowed under its previous quarterly schedule.

“We’re not halting redemptions, we’re just changing the form,” Packer told CNBC on Friday. “If anything, we’re accelerating redemptions.”

Coming amid a broad tech and software selloff fueled by fears of AI disruption, the episode shows that even apparently strong loan books aren’t immune to market jitters. This in turn forces alternative lenders to scramble to satisfy shareholders’ sudden demands for the return of their money.

It also exposed a central tension in private credit: What happens when illiquid assets collide with demands for liquidity?

Against a backdrop that was already fragile for private credit since the collapse of auto firms Tricolor and First Brands, the fear that this could be an early sign of credit markets cracking took off. Shares of Blue Owl fell Thursday and Friday. They are down more than 50% in the past year.

Early Thursday, the economist and former Pimco CEO Mohamed El-Erian wondered in social media posts whether Blue Owl was a “canary in the coal mine” for a future crisis, like the failure of a pair of Bear Stearns credit funds in 2007.

On Friday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that he was “concerned” about the possibility that risks from Blue Owl had migrated to the regulated financial system because one of the institutional buyers was an insurance company.

Mostly software

With skepticism over loans to software firms running high, one question from investors was whether the loans they sold were a representative slice of the total funds, or whether Blue Owl cherry-picked the best loans to sell.

The underlying loans were to 128 companies across 27 industries, the largest being software, the firm said.

Blue Owl indicated it was a broad swath of overall loans in the funds: “Each investment to be sold represents a partial amount of each Blue Owl BDC’s exposure to the respective portfolio company.”

Despite its efforts to calm markets, Blue Owl finds itself at the nexus of concerns around private credit loans made to software firms.

Most of the 200-plus companies Blue Owl lends to are in software; more than 70% of its loans are to that category, executives said Wednesday in a fourth-quarter earnings call.

“We remain enthusiastic proponents of software,” Packer said on that call. “Software is an enabling technology that can serve every sector and market and company in the world. It’s not a monolith.”

The company makes loans to firms “with durable moats” and is protected by the seniority of its loans, meaning that private equity owners would need to be wiped out before Blue Owl saw losses.

But, for now at least, the problem Blue Owl faces is one of perception bleeding into reality.

“The market is reacting, and it becomes this self-fulfilling idea, where they get more redemptions, so they have to sell more loans, and that drives the stock down further,” said Ben Emmons, founder of FedWatch Advisors.

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Anciens Huang | Moment | Getty Images

A version of this article first appeared in CNBC’s Inside Wealth newsletter with Robert Frank, a weekly guide to the high-net-worth investor and consumer. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox.

As the world’s wealthiest pad their fortunes, they are spending more to run their private investment firms, according to a recent report by J. P. Morgan Private Bank.

Family offices with at least $1 billion in assets spent an average of $6.6 million in annual operating costs, the bank’s survey found. The average cost has increased by $500,000 since JPMorgan’s previous family office poll conducted in 2023.

Family office consultant Kirby Rosplock said the rise in expenses is the natural result of the surge in wealth.

“Usually offices try to reduce their expense line items if they feel like their assets are shrinking,” said Rosplock, CEO of Tamarind Partners. “Most people don’t recognize that the volume of wealth created just in the last decade means that you need more heads, more bodies, more people to support more systems.”

William Sinclair, global co-head of J. P. Morgan Private Bank’s family office practice, credited much of the increase in expenses to rising compensation costs on investment talent, which are the largest portion of operating budgets.

“There is a war for talent, and family offices are competing against other financial services and related businesses — private equity and hedge funds — if they’re trying to build out an investment team,” he said.

While family offices have embraced outsourcing, Sinclair attributes this more to talent shortage rather than defraying costs. About 80% of family offices reported outsourcing at least some of their portfolio, but only 28% of them said reducing costs or resource burden was a main factor for doing so.

When picking external advisors, factors such as desirable track records and access to private investments ranked much higher, according to the report.

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Natasha Pearl, a family office advisor, said some family office principals pay little heed to cost creep, prioritizing the confidentiality and control that comes with a single-family office versus using third-party vendors.

Many principals of ultra-wealthy families also lose track of their expenses as they have multiple investment entities and holding companies, she added.

However, their children are more likely to get sticker shock, Pearl said. It’s common for heirs to consider consolidating costs or even unwinding the family office altogether after their parents pass, she said.

“The next generation will take a close look and say, ‘Whoa, our parents were paying that much money? We want that money,'” she said. “The next generation may have children of their own at that point or even grandchildren, given how long people are living, right? So, you know, they’ve got to be a lot more concerned about how to make that money stretch.”

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