The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

What’s New at Setpoint

• Upcoming event: Capital Conversations at Franklin BBQ

  Setpoint and Texas Capital are bringing together leading capital providers and borrowers for an exclusive evening of legendary BBQ and conversation at Franklin Backyard. Apply to attend.

• We’re on the road — let’s connect:

  • 2026 Western Secondary Market Conference, Aug 10-12 — Rancho Palos Verdes, CA | Meet with us.

Debt Financings & Acquisitions

AI, Infrastructure & Energy

• Aypa Power, a battery energy storage developer, was acquired by Brookfield from Blackstone Energy Transition Partners for $7B.

• Ezee Fiber, a fiber network operator, closed an $880M ABS issuance secured by customer connection contracts.

• General Compute, an AI inference cloud platform, closed a $400M debt facility with Upper90 secured by inference-chips and contractual cash flows.

• Nebius, an AI cloud platform, closed a $755M senior secured debt facility secured by GPU infrastructure and contracted cash flows.

• PaleBlueDot AI, an AI infrastructure platform, closed a $255M credit facility with Brookfield Asset Management and Tor Investment Management.

• Redaptive Sustainability, an energy-as-a-service provider for renewable energy, closed its second ABS issuance of $105.8M secured by a pool of energy equipment loans and leases.

• Strata Clean Energy, a renewable energy infrastructure company, closed a $450M revolving loan and letter of credit facility with Nomura and First Citizens.

• Zeta Global, an AI infrastructure platform, closed a $1B credit facility from a bank syndicate led by Bank of America.

Aviation, Rail & Transportation

• AIP Capital, Bridgepoint expanded their JV and signed a purchase agreement to acquire 11 LEAP-1B engines from CFM international.

Real Estate & Mortgage

• Fidelis, a real estate asset manager, closed a $191.5M ABS issuance secured by a pool of 381 RTL loans.

• New Silver, a real estate lender, acquired Mayflower Venture Partners, a fix and flip and construction lender based in New England.

• Point, a home equity investment platform, closed a $508.6M ABS issuance secured by a pool of home equity investment contracts.

• Spreo Capital, a nonbank real estate investor, launched Spreo Capital Investment Fund, an alternative asset management vehicle focused on RTL assets, and closed a forward flow agreement with Fortress to acquire up to $750M of loans originated by Spreo.

• Temple View Capital, a private mortgage lender, closed a strategic partnership with Oaktree to support the origination of RTL loans.

Auto & Consumer Finance

• Arivo Acceptance, an auto finance platform, closed a $221.8M ABS issuance backed by a pool of subprime auto loan contracts.

• Avant, a consumer finance platform, closed a $300M asset-based financing facility with Aperture Investors.

• Cashea, a Venezuelan financial technology platform, raised $100M in equity across two financing rounds alongside a $20M debt facility from Architect Capital.

• CPS, a consumer auto finance platform, closed a $716.88M ABS issuance secured by a pool of retail installment contracts.

• Klarna, a consumer BNPL platform, partnered with Apple to power Apple Upgrade, a leasing program for iPhone, Mac, iPad, and Apple Watch models.

• OppFi, a consumer finance platform, shared an FAQ related to its bank charter application.

• Pagaya, a consumer finance and residential real estate platform, closed a $750M auto ABS deal in its fourth pre-funded issuance of 2016 and largest to date.

• Pier Asset Management, an asset-based credit fund, closed a $10M credit facility to a specialty finance company that provides patient financing for elective healthcare procedures.

• Plend, a UK-based consumer finance platform, closed a £20M senior credit facility with Triple Point, with an additional £30M uncommitted accordion.

• Upstart, an AI lending marketplace and consumer finance platform, received conditional OCC approval to establish Upstart Bank.

Commercial Finance

• Amur Equipment Finance, an equipment finance platform, closed its 16th term securitization of $406.02M secured by a pool of equipment loans and leases.

• BasicBlock, a freight factoring platform for owner-operators and small fleets, announced its acquisition of TrueNorth, a free loadboard and AI dispatch platform for carriers.

• Empire Asset Finance, an equipment financing platform, closed its first institutional warehouse facility with Bank OZK to scale origination capacity.

• Forward Financing, a small business finance platform, closed a $350M VFN and a $175M ABS issuance.

• Island CEF, a subsidiary of Gordon Brothers, is preparing for its inaugural ABS issuance of $265.5M secured by a pool of equipment loans and leases.

• iwoca, a UK-based SME financing platform, closed a £250 million credit facility with a leading UK bank and Waterfall Asset Management to scale originations.

• Kapitus, a small business financing platform, was acquired by InterVest capital partners.

• Northbase Finance, an equipment finance platform, closed a $300M revolving credit facility with Oaktree to scale financing capacity.

• Parafin, an embedded B2B lending platform, closed a $300M forward flow with a NY-bassed alternative asset manager.

• The FundWorks, a small business financing platform, extended and upsized a $40M IG corporate note, where proceeds will be used to refinance debt, extend maturity, and scale origination.

Payments

• Pex, a corporate card and spend management platform, raised $160M in debt and equity, led by Bluff Point Associates.

Platform Growth

Fundraises

• Balbec Capital, an alternative asset manager, raised $930M in commitments for its latest asset-based finance flagship fund.

• Barings, an alternative asset manager, raised $2.1B from the North Carolina Investment Authority to invest across multiple asset classes spanning property-backed debt, financing deals, and CMBS.

• GCM Grosvenor, an alternative asset manager, announced the final close of its inaugural Credit Secondaries Fund with $1.2B in commitments.

• GoldenTree Asset Management, an alternative asset manager, announced the closing of its Private Credit Fund II with $2.75B to originate loans to larger companies with average EBITDA exceeding $400M.

• NXT Capital, a direct lending platform owned by Orix, closed its Senior Loan Fund VIII with $1.8B in its initial close to originate loans to middle market companies with pretax earnings of $5-50M.

• Partners Group, a global alternative investment manager, announced the final close of its infrastructure secondaries program at $5.5B.

• Sagard announced the first close of Sagard Credit Partners III with over $1B in commitments to provide directly originated, senior secured financing to mid-market companies in Canada and the US.

• T. Rowe Price, GSAM launched T. Rowe Price Goldman Sachs Private Markets Fund, a new interval fund offering individual investors access to institutional private market opportunities.

• Tailwater Capital, an energy and infrastructure private equity firm, launched Tailwater Royalties Fund II with commitments of $170M to focus on acquisition of mineral and royalty interests across Tier 1 shale basins.

• Tikehau Capital, a Paris-based alternative asset manager, announced the final close of the sixth vintage of its European Direct Lending strategy at €5.2B.

M&A

• PGIM acquired its remaining 25% interest in Deerpath Capital, bringing the firm’s ownership to 100% to deepen PGIM’s direct lending platform.

New Vehicles, Hiring & Structured Products

• Encina Private Credit rebrands as Encina Commercial Finance. Encina Commercial Finance (ECF) is focused on first-out enterprise value loans from $15M - 150M.

Charts

Source: X

Source: X

Source: Bryant Park Capital

Source: Blue Owl

Source: Blue Owl

Source: KKR

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “Market is overreacting to hyperscale credit spreads widening from my perspective. TL;DR Spot pricing for renting GPU compute materially above contracted rates implies hyperscalers are underearning while operating cash flow acceleration is an underestimated source of funds for AI capex. The fact that spot prices for GPU rentals are at least 2x higher than contracted rates is the missing piece from the discussion about hyperscaler credit, which is the only fundamental factor behind this selloff. Multiple private companies are planning on spending at least 2x more per GPU for compute as contracts roll-off and some have spoken about this publicly. As contracts roll-off, hyperscale growth rates are going to continue to accelerate as their installed bases of compute reprice higher. Hyperscale operating cash flow growth using a mix of estimates and actuals is modeled to accelerate from 31% in the first quarter of 2026 to 50% in the second quarter. This acceleration should continue for the rest of the year and this is not in estimates which incorrectly model a deceleration in the third quarter from my perspective.” - Gavin Baker, Founder & CIO of Atreides Management on Market Misperceptions of Hyperscaler Credit Spreads

• “When you think about illiquidity premiums, it needs to be on the order of hundreds of basis points, we believe, to sufficiently compensate you for that illiquidity risk. It’s also about the structures that you hold those investments in. What we’re very focused on at Carlyle is being able to very clearly explain to our investors the type of liquidity they can expect and not expect when they come into these investments, because there is a tradeoff when they come into these illiquid investments. When you cut through some of the chip financings and data center financings, what they’re ultimately supported by is cash flows and leases to IG counterparts, many of those being the hyperscalers. And so, there’s an element that you may be secured by an asset but ultimately what supports that asset is an obligation or a cash flow from an IG corporate. We don’t look at AI monolithically. We think about diversification. One of the areas we’ve been focused on is energy and natural gas. We think natural gas is going to become the next currency of AI. When you think about all of the CGT power plants that are being built to power these data centers, they’re going to need natural gas. We have a venture with Diversified Energy where we’ve been acquiring mature cash flowing, mostly natural gas wells, hedging them, and securitizing them as a way to get that exposure and benefit from those tailwinds.” - Akhil Bansal, Head of Asset-Backed Finance at Carlyle on Illiquidity Premium in ABF and Energy and Natural Gas Opportunities

• “The managers who will endure are those who resisted the temptation to equate growing assets with creating value. In a fund that owns only loans, success is measured by return on each dollar invested — not by how many dollars you’re managing. These are not the same thing, and confusing them has cost investors dearly.” - Joshua Easterly, former CIO of Sixth Street on Three Lies in Private Credit

What We’re Reading & Listening To

Earnings & Investor Presentations

• Asset Managers: Blackstone, Blue Owl, KKR

Reading

• 2026 Mid-Year In Focus (Blue Owl)

• Music ABS and Institutional Readiness (Standard Innovation)

• Signal vs. Noise: Q3 2026 Global Private Markets Quarterly (Carlyle)

• The Broken Anchor (Carlyle)

• The Cost of Compute: a $7 trillion race to scale data centers (McKinsey)

• What the Neoclouds Actually Own (Gus Wisanggeni)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Beyond the Private Credit Headlines: Finding Opportunity in a Noisy Market (Guggenheim)

• Golub co-CEO sees a Darwinian moment for private capital (Credit Exchange)

• Jon Winkleried on Lessons from Goldman Sachs and TPG’s Next Chapter (Talks at GS)

• Roadmap for Private Credit in Australia - Frank Danieli of MA Financial Group (Capital Allocators)

• Sagard’s Paul Desmarais III - building the next generation alternative asset manager (AGM)

• Thoughts from the Road: Europe (KKR)

• Wall Street Alchemists Tap Insurers to Unfreeze Private Markets (Bloomberg)

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 🆕 What we built in Q2: Firms leading in asset-backed finance are replacing manual systems with purpose-built technology to make decisions faster and scale more efficiently. See what we built in Q2 to support them.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

AI, Infrastructure & Energy

• Brightspeed, a telecom and ISP platform owned by Apollo, plans to raise an asset-backed financing facility secured by subscription cash flows from its fiber network.

• Linea Energy, a US-based renewable energy developer and IPP sponsored by EnCap Investments, closed a tax equity financing with Crux for its Watertown solar project, a 172 MWdc utility scale solar energy facility.

• nScale, a London-based AI hyperscaler, closed a £672.3M revolving credit facility from a bank syndicate including JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley.

• Williams, an energy infrastructure company, signed a JV with Blackstone and KKR to support the development of its five behind-the-meter power innovation projects, where Blackstone and partners will commit $5.34B in exchange for a 49% noncontrolling equity interest in the five projects.

Aviation, Rail & Transportation

• AIP Capital, an alternative asset manager, is preparing to service its inaugural ABS issuance, a $643M deal secured by lease revenue on 18 aircraft.

• Dubai Aerospace Enterprise, a global aviation services company, and Neuberger Specialty Finance launched Mustang Aerospace, an aircraft leasing co-investment vehicle that will invest ~$6B in aircraft assets over the medium term across multiple vehicles.

• EasyJet, a British low-cost airline, received a competing acquisition offer from Apollo of £5.7 billion, competing with Castlelake’s prior £5.5 billion offer.

Real Estate & Mortgage

• 400 Capital, an alternative asset manager, closed capital relief transactions referencing a $1.5B residential mortgage loan portfolio on a US bank’s balance sheet.

• Alterra IOS, an industrial outdoor storage (IOS) acquisition platform, closed a $400M refinancing led by Truist and KeyBank, secured by a portfolio of 99 IOS properties.

• Brocc Finance, a Swedish credit platform, completed the acquisition of the remaining 35% minority interest in unsecured NPL portfolios previously held through a JV between Brocc and Intrum AB.

• Fidelis, a real estate asset manager, is preparing to raise $191.5M in a new ABS issuance backed by revenues from RTL loans acquired from other RTL originators in its 4th rated deal.

• Figure, a blockchain-native capital markets platform and HELOC originator, priced a private offering of $600M of senior notes used to finance the Kiavi acquisition.

• Hope Capital Property Finance, a UK-based real estate lender, closed a £75M senior credit facility with TriplePoint.

• MS Lending Group, a UK-based real estate investment firm, closed a £230M funding line with Pollen Street.

Auto & Consumer Finance

• Addi, a Colombia-based BNPL platform, raised an $86M Series D financing led by Citius, with participation from BTG Pactual, GIC, and Monashees.

• Consumer Portfolio Services, a consumer auto finance platform, renewed its credit agreement with Citi and its subordinate lender, increasing capacity to $508M. CPS also closed a $716.8M ABS issuance backed by a pool of auto loans for used vehicles.

• Elevate, a digital consumer finance platform, closed a $655M credit facility led by Raven Capital, with participation from Hudson Cove and Bow River, to scale origination volume.

• Fig Financial, a Canadian consumer fintech lender, announced it surpassed $500M in life to date originations since launching in 2023.

• Klarna, a digital bank and payments platform, closed its first forward flow and warehouse facility in Germany, amounting to a €900M facility to scale originations in Germany.

• Lendable, a UK-based digital lender, is raising £500M by selling securities backed by a portfolio of personal loans. Lendable has originated over £10B in consumer credit since launching over a decade ago.

• Nexu, a Mexico-based auto finance platform, closed a $143M credit facility with HSBC.

• Octane, a financial platform for recreational purchases, closed a $750M forward flow agreement with AB CarVal, with the option to upsize to $1.125B.

• Oportun, a consumer finance platform, announced a lending partnership with Column to support Oportun’s unsecured personal lending program, where Column will originate loans on Oportun’s behalf.

• Robinhood, a digital brokerage and banking platform, is looking to sell at least $400M in its inaugural ABS issuance secured by receivables from its Robinhood Gold credit card.

• PayPal, a digital payments and lending business, received a joint bid from Stripe and Advent International to be acquired in a deal that would value PayPal at $53B. KKR is also marketing an ABS deal in Europe tied to PayPal’s BNPL business in Germany.

• Upstart, an AI lending marketplace and consumer finance platform, closed a $569.4M ABS deal secured by auto-secured personal loans, third ABS deal of the year.

Commercial Finance

• Elect Capital, a UK-based SME finance platform, closed a senior secured credit facility with Pollen Street.

• Flex, a fintech platform for small businesses, closed a $70M Series B1 equity financing led by Halo Fund, the venture firm founded by Ryan Smith and Ryan Sweeney, at a $1.2B post-money valuation.

• InKind, a software and financing platform for restaurants, closed a $320M financing with Liberty Mutual Investments who is serving as Senior and Mezz lender, to scale origination volume. InKind has provided over $600M in funding to restaurants since its 2014 launch.

• Lendistry, a tech-enabled small business lender, closed a $100M credit facility from East West Bank to support Lendistry’s Airport Concessions Program which funds small businesses operating in airports across the US.

• Mountain Ridge Capital, an asset-based commercial finance platform, upsized its asset-based lending facility with Wells Fargo Capital Finance to $400M.

Esoteric

• Acacia Asset Management, a real estate investment firm, sponsored a securitization secured by a portfolio of 41,752 property tax lien assets, raising $235.7M.

• Adams Outdoor Advertising, an out-of-home media company, closed a $765.1M ABS issuance backed by revenues from billboard advertising and related contracts.

• Bending Spoons, an Italian acquisition and operating platform for digital platforms and mobile apps, went public with a $1.68B IPO under the ticker BSP.

• CAA, a talent agency, partnered with TPG’s Integrated Media Company to form Compound Creative Holdings, a $250M holding company designed to acquire, operate, and grow a portfolio of Creator Economy businesses.

Insurance

• Accelerant, a risk exchange platform for specialty insurance, announced a partnership with newly formed WoodStar Reciprocal Exchange, a reciprocal insurance company funded with $220M in surplus notes and capital from Kilter Finance, a KKR-backed specialty finance company.

💰️Platform Growth

Fundraises

• Allianz closed $744M in commitments for the first close of Alliance Asian Pacific Secured Lending Fund III.

• Artcos, a business of KKR, announced final close of $6.2B for Arctos Keystone Partners Fund I, a fund focused on bespoke growth capital and financing for alternative asset managers.

• Cloud Capital, a data center investment firm, launched Cloud Capital’s Core Joint Venture Strategy, with Realty Income and Global Investor, seeded with three initial investments valued at over $6B.

• Hayfin Capital raised more than €15B for its flagship direct lending strategy.

• Incus Capital, a Spanish asset manager, had its second close on Europe Credit Fund V with €560 million in closed and committed capital.

• Starwood Capital, a private investment firm, closed Starwood Distressed Opportunity Fund XIII with $10.2B in capital commitments to focus on real assets globally.

M&A

• Russell Investments is being acquired by an investor group led by B Capital and CalPERS for $2.8B.

New Vehicles, Hiring & Structured Products

• Churchill Asset Management, the US asset management company of Nuveen, and Seviora Holdings, Temasek’s asset management platform, closed a $400M collateralized fund obligation investing across Churchill’s US junior capital and private equity secondaries strategies, and Seviora’s Asian private credit and global fund of funds business.

• GoldenTree closed a $726M CLO backed by a $710M portfolio of senior secured loans.

• Seer Capital, a US-based hedge fund, is closing a $300M insurance-backed financing facility in partnership with Cantor Fitzgerald and Lockton to support SRT investments.

📈 Visuals

Source: Nuveen

Source: SemiAnalysis

Source: SemiAnalysis

Source: SemiAnalysis

Source: KKR

Source: Bloomberg

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “AI Debt Financing will become a multi-trillion-dollar credit market, with over $7T of debt outstanding by 2029 driven both by AI IT Capex and AI Datacenter Capex needs for Neoclouds, datacenter builders, and even hyperscalers. This will make it the second largest asset backed debt market after the US mortgage-backed financing market at just over $13T. Annual AI Capex – including GPUs, networking, storage and attached CPU compute as well as for the Datacenters to house AI compute – will be well north of $2T in 2028. Cumulative AI Capex from 2024 to 2029 will reach ~$11.1T, and credit markets will be the main funding source for this buildout.” - SemiAnalysis on Market Size Estimates for AI Debt Financing

• “The notion that somehow you can forever increase your operating leverage is a crazy notion. We don’t have that. I think it’s part of the reason why banks failed, if you go back 20 years ago. We’re never going to have that point of view. AI will have its gives and takes. We can’t project. I do think you might actually see a slowdown in growth, maybe a slowdown in 2027 or 2028. The teams are looking at all of our opportunities, and we pointed out over and over again when we have an opportunity to spend more money in marketing, with deposit ROI, we’re going to do it. We’re not going to have false gods. We have to pray that we can’t do something really smart.” - Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan CEO & Chairman on Limits to Operating Leverage in the Banking Sector

• “It’s not a sensitive topic at all. We are going to use AI to do a better job for our clients. That’s our job. We fully expect it’ll have huge efficiency in certain parts of the company. We analyze it all the time. I think we’ve mentioned in the past, we spend quite a bit of money on it. We have a lot of MVPs that we know we have. The whole company’s working this at this point. I think there’s almost 1,000 use cases today, though we’d say that the really important ones are 50 across risk, fraud, marketing, hedging, prospecting, note-taking, idea generation, document reading. It’s kind of just starting. We do expect that. You can’t just say, “Well, your ROE is going to go to 50% and stay there.” If we had a 50% ROE and growing at 10% a year, we’d probably have, in 50 or 60 years, you’d probably be 100% of the GDP of the United States of America.” - Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan CEO & Chairman on AI Initiatives across the JPM

• “In the case of prime, also in the case of FICC financing, as has been the case, there continues to be far more demand across the client segment than we’re willing to engage when we sort of balance our objectives of serving our clients, driving market share, but also being balanced, diversified and focusing on risk management. So we’re at a moment in time where the demands for the provision of financing are outstripping what we think is the appropriate quantum. That should come as no surprise. We are in the middle of an AI CapEx super cycle where there are demands on financing into every single financing instrument in every region of the world and across every single industry. So it’s a function of deploying our resources as efficiently as we can to serve our clients as best we can. But we’re at a moment in time where there’s more demand right now.” - Dennis Coleman, Goldman Sachs CFO on Supply vs. Demand for Prime & FICC Financing Businesses

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Earnings & Investor Presentations

• Asset Managers: BLK

• Banks: BAC, C, GS, JPM, WFC

Reading

• Capital Markets Assumptions (KKR)

• Continuation Funds in 2026: Beyond Liquidity (Preqin)

• Monitoring the AI Trade: Cross-Asset Risk Signals from Equity, Credit, and CDS (Apollo)

• Nvidia GPU Debt Backstop Unleashes the AI Project Trinity: Capital, Offtake and Datacenters (SemiAnalysis)

• Q2 2026 Alts Quarterly: Midyear Outlook (Brookfield)

• State of the AI Economy (Exponential View)

• The State of Private Credit in 2026 (9fin)

• UK Challenger Banks Explore SRT Issuance to Manage Maturing Loan Portfolios (Octus)

Podcasts & Interviews

• AI Dominates Economy and Markets with Torsten Slok (Steve Eisman)

• The Future of Chips and Infrastructure with Dylan Patel (a16z)

• Choosing Wisely: Where IC Invests and Where It Doesn’t (Flow of Funds with Glenn Schorr)

• Julian Salisbury on Sixth Street’s Culture and Investing Across the Capital Stack (Money Maze)

• The Blueprint Episode 7: Gregg Lemkau (Rockefeller Capital Management)

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 🔍 Rethinking Risk in Private Credit: Stu Wall, Setpoint’s Co-Founder & CEO, joined FINTECH.TV’s Market Movers to discuss how operational discipline is reshaping private credit, and where AI will create the most value in finance. Watch the full conversation.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

AI, Infrastructure & Energy

• FirstLight Fiber, a telecom infrastructure provider, closed a $1.1B ABS issuance backed by contracts for communications, fiber infrastructure, and connectivity.

• Spearmint Energy, a developer and operator of utility scale battery storage systems, raised a $325M debt facility with Nuveen EIC, Elda River, Harrison Street Asset Management, and Aiga Capital Partners to advance its operating portfolio.

• Terrawatt Infrastructure, a charging infrastructure platform for EVs, raised up to $300M in debt from a bank syndicate led by RBC to support acquisition and development of charging facilities in the US and abroad.

Aviation, Rail & Transportation

• Aquila Air Capital, an aircraft lessor backed by Wafra, closed a $400M refinancing and upsizing of its warehouse facility with ATLAS SP.

Real Estate & Mortgage

• Axonic Capital, a real estate focused asset manager, announced a partnership with Deutsche Bank to originate and securitize multifamily loans in the alt-agency space, targeting $500-600M in volume. Axonic also closed a $400M multi-family securitization.

• Balbec Capital, a global asset manager focused on asset-based credit and real estate strategies, acquired Funding 365, a UK-based specialist property lender.

• Figure, a blockchain-native capital markets platform and HELOC originator, closed a $300M prefunded securitization for loans trading on Figure Connect.

• Trovy, a consumer fintech offering a HELOC-based card product, raised $15M Series A equity financing led by Left Lane Capital, bringing total funding to $25M.

Auto & Consumer Finance

• Arra Finance, a nonprime auto finance company, closed its inaugural ABS issuance co-sponsored by Obra Capital.

• Digitt, a Mexico-based credit card debt refinancing platform, closed a $50M credit facility from Victory Park Capital to finance originations for its fixed-rate installment loan product.

• Financeit, a Canada-based consumer finance platform, closed its inaugural C$201M Term ABS transaction backed by a portfolio of home improvement loans.

• Foundation Finance, a home improvement financing platform, closed a $399.3M ABS issuance backed by consumer loans financing home improvement projects.

• Karta, a US-issued credit card for global travelers, closed a $125M senior credit facility from CIM alongside a $15M Series A equity financing led by Galaxy Ventures.

• Republic Finance, a consumer finance platform, entered an agreement to be acquired by an investor ground led by J.C. Flowers & Co.

• Upstart, an AI lending marketplace and consumer finance platform, closed a forward flow agreement with Neuberger Specialty Finance to sell up to $600M of consumer loans originated through the Upstart platform.

Commercial Finance

• Commercial Credit Group, a commercial equipment finance platform, closed its latest term ABS deal of $517.93M, backed by a pool of receivables from CCGs equipment finance platform.

• Float Financial, a Canadian neobank and spend management platform, closed a CAD $85M Series C equity financing led by Inovia Capital alongside GS Alternatives, Northleaf, and others.

• Funding Circle, a UK-based SME finance platform, completed its 10th public securitization with SBOLT 2026-1, surpassing £2.5b in securitized issuance since 2016.

• InSoil, an Lithuania-based SME finance platform focused on equipment and working capital financing in agriculture verticals, closed a €120M credit facility with Pollen Street.

• Liberis, UK-based embedded SME finance platform, was acquired by Nordic Capital, a private equity firm, and will merge with Qred to form a unified SMB lending platform.

• OakNorth, a UK-based digital bank for entrepreneurs, partnered with Fintex Capital to grow OakNorth’s specialty finance business.

• Parafin, an embedded lending platform for SMEs, closed a new credit facility with Goldman Sachs and One William Street.

• Zintra Capital, a Spanish private credit platform providing short-term financing to SMEs, closed a credit facility from Pollen Street to finance Vera, a Spanish securitization vehicle that acquires Promissory Notes Programs.

Esoteric

• Hamilton Re, a pan-European insurance consolidator, announced an investment from Sixth Street.

• TeamShares, a tech-enabled acquirer of small businesses, began trading publicly on Nasdaq under the ticker TMS.

💰️Platform Growth

Fundraises

• Blacktree Management, an asset manager, launched a new SBA and esoteric asset-backed finance platform that invests across guaranteed and unguaranteed portions of SBA loans, whole loans, and other esoteric ABS, with backing from Fortress.

• Colbeck Capital, a middle market private credit firm, launched Colbeck Strategic Income, which does first-lien senior secured loans to middle market companies, with $400M in initial commitments.

• Lloyds, Legal & General surpassed £1.5bn of participations since launching their fund finance partnership in December 2022.

• Magellan Capital, a Dubai-based alternative asset manager, launched a new asset-based finance focused evergreen fund, Magellan Asset Backed Opportunities Fund, targeting $250M near term.

• Man Group, an alternative investment firm, announced the first close of Man Opportunistic Credit Fund III, targeting $1.25B in total commitments.

• RGREEN INVEST announced the final close of its INFRABRIDGE IV fund at nearly £500m.

M&A

• Bridgepoint, a UK-based asset manager, agreed to acquire Kayne Anderson Real Estate, a real estate investment platform, for an upfront enterprise value of $1.393B.

• Janus Henderson, which owns Victory Park Capital, completed its take private with Trian, General Catalyst, and QIA.

New Vehicles, Hiring & Structured Products

• Aegon Asset Management expanded its partnership with Lakemore Partners to grow its CLO issuance.

• Bridgepoint announced the pricing of Bridgepoint CLO XI, a £405m CLO.

• Phoenix Merchant Partners, an alternative asset manager, and Texas Capital Alternative Asset Management, a subsidiary of Texas Capital Bank, announced a partnership to provide capital solutions and direct lending to middle market borrowers.

• PIMCO launched a strategic partnership with SIMCo, an infrastructure debt manager and origination platform, to originate senior IG infrastructure debt opportunities.

📈 Visuals

Source: Carlyle

Source: AB CarVal

Source: Bloomberg

Source: SVB

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “It takes a nuanced understanding of where each music asset is in its decay curve. We are assessing the downside and ensuring full recovery of principal and interest…Music royalties have become a very investable segment. These securitization transactions took advantage of a moment when spreads were tight and rates were low to raise debt against music assets through ABS (asset-backed securitization).” - Carlos Mendez, co-founder of Crayhill Capital Management on Private Credit’s Opportunity in Music Royalties

• “We estimate that credit secondaries represented a $20+ billion market in 2025, and believe that it can grow to $80+ billion by 2030 (~$55B in GP-centered transactions vs. ~$25B in LP centered transactions).¹ This is largely driven by the continued expansion of the nearly $2 trillion private credit market and broader industry adoption of secondary solutions. What was once episodic and fragmented has quickly evolved into a scalable, repeatable market. Despite rapid growth, the market remains materially underpenetrated relative to the more mature private equity secondary market, suggesting substantial runway ahead.” - Michael Hacker, Justin Karp, Joy Xu, and Raaed Qureshi from Carlyle AlpInvest on projections and catalysts for the Credit Secondaries market

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Reading

• $2.8 Trillion Asset Management Star Is a Deal Away From Losing Its Crown (Bloomberg)

• A $100 Million Bet on Old Books (WSJ)

• Credit Secondaries: Stepping into the Spotlight (Carlyle)

• He Dared to Buy Senior Housing at Its Lows. Now He Runs a $160 Billion Empire (WSJ)

• Private Credit is Making Bets on Consumer Debt at a Precarious Time (Bloomberg)

• Semiquincententacles - latest Eye On the Market report from Michael Cembalest (JPM)

• The Bitcoin lending renaissance (SVB)

Podcasts & Interviews

• How Asset-Based Finance is Powering the AI Infrastructure Boom (Neuberger)

• Oak Hill Advisors’ Eric Muller - operating at the intersection of public and private credit (Alt Goes Mainstream)

• Vlad Barbalat - Investing $120 Billion in Permanent Capital (Invest Like the Best)

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 🆕 Optimize borrowing capacity with Asset Allocator: Most capital users allocate across facilities and manage securitizations manually. This approach doesn’t scale. Setpoint’s Asset Allocator enables you to model multiple scenarios in minutes, giving you back the time required to make better allocation decisions. Watch the video.

• 📈 Private credit needs a new standard: Stu Wall, Setpoint’s Co-Founder & CEO, joined NYSE’s Taking Stock to discuss the technology gap facing the industry, and how to close it with infrastructure that gets borrowers and capital providers operating from the same verified data. Watch the interview.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

AI, Infrastructure & Energy

• Nvidia, the AI chipmaker, priced a $25B investment-grade bond—its largest-ever debt deal and first since 2021—drawing roughly $85B in orders and including a 30-year tranche maturing in 2056 to help fund the AI infrastructure buildout

• Pathway Power, a renewable energy power producer focused on developing solar, hybrid, and battery energy storage systems, closed a $150M senior secured finance facility with AB CarVal to fund development and construction of US battery storage assets.

• Super Micro Computer, an AI server maker, announced $7.0B of equity and equity-linked financing to fund components for roughly $39B of recently received AI server orders.

• USD.AI, an asset-backed financing platform for AI infrastructure operators, closed a $98.1M debt financing to support AI infrastructure buildout with 2,304 GPUs operated by Duos Edge AI and managed by Hydra Host.

Aviation, Rail & Transportation

• Altavair, a commercial aviation leasing and financing platform, closed a $1.4B equity commitment from KKR to expand its partnership beyond two prior aircraft leasing portfolios created in partnership with Altavair.

• Global Jet Capital, a commercial aircraft finance business, closed a $659M ABS issuance backed by a portfolio of 28 leases and loans across 16 aircraft models.

Real Estate & Mortgage

• Cross River, a technology-focused bank, agreed to purchase up to $250M of crypto-backed loans from Figure through a forward flow agreement, supporting Figure’s crypto-backed lending business that lets borrowers access liquidity against their digital assets without selling them.

• Guaranteed Rate, a mortgage lender, closed a $360.3M RMBS issuance backed by a pool of prime, jumbo, fixed-rate mortgages.

• PennyMac, a mortgage REIT, closed a $423M RMBS issuance backed by a pool of mortgages.

• Unlock, a HEI originator, closed a $358.5M ABS issuance sponsored by D2 Asset Management secured by a pool of 3,546 HEAs.

Auto & Consumer Finance

• Achieve, a consumer finance platform, closed a $151.4M ABS issuance backed by a pool of debt settlement fees.

• CarMax, a used car retailer, closed a $600M ABS issuance backed by a pool of non-prime auto loans.

• Current, a consumer fintech platform, closed an $80M Series E at a $1.5B valuation led by Springcoast Partners.

• Edge Focus, a tech-enabled private credit firm focused on consumer assets, formed a $500M joint venture with a private credit manager to fund auto loan originations

• Elevate, a consumer finance platform, closed a $655M refinancing deal alongside Hudson Cove, extending a longstanding relationship between Elevate and Raven.

• Octane, a financial platform for recreational purchases, closed a $340M forward flow agreement with Bayview to purchase fixed-rate installment powersports and outdoor power equipment loans.

Commercial Finance

• Fora Financial, a small business finance platform, closed a $130M ABS issuance backed by a pool of small business loan receivables.

• Funding Circle, an SME lending platform, renewed its lending partnership with Deutsche Bank, extending a £200M arrangement to support small-business loan originations.

• Oxford Finance, a specialty finance platform for small businesses, closed a $400M rated securitization backed by a pool of small business loans.

Esoteric

• Coventry, a financing and acquisition platform of life insurance-linked assets, closed a $250M placement of asset-backed notes to acquire life settlements and related assets.

• Fortitude Re, a global reinsurance company, closed a $500M funding agreement-backed notes (FABN) offering to investors to purchase a previous funding agreement issued by Fortitude Life Insurance & Annuity Company.

• Jack in the Box, a quick-service restaurant franchise, closed a whole business securitization refinancing.

• Jimmy John’s, a quick-service restaurant franchise, closed a $585M whole business securitization, its third master trust securitization.

• Perk, an AI-native travel and spend-management platform, closed a $300M private credit facility led by Neuberger Specialty Finance alongside Blue Owl Capital, Hercules Capital, and Liquidity Group, upsizing and replacing a 2024 $135M facility.

💰️Platform Growth

Fundraises

• Ares raises $12.7B for Pathfinder Fund III at $8.5B in commitments, along with $4B in Pathfinder II commitments that elected to extend the investment period for an additional two years. This marks one of the largest dedicated asset-based finance funds globally.

• Canyon Partners, a $30B AUM global alternative asset manager, established Canyon ABF Partners, a JV that will provide permanent balance sheet capital with Daiichi Life Insurance Co Ltd. and Korea Investment Holdings Co. to facilitate $5B+ of annual origination capacity, led by Jay Kim, former CEO of ATLAS SP.

• Gravis Capital Management, a UK-based asset manager that invests in physical infrastructure, renewable energy, and real estate, is looking to launch a €1bn closed-ended ABF fund targeting mid-market infrastructure debt transactions.

• HSBC Asset Management closed a $1B for its first vintage NAV Financing Partnership strategy.

• Hunter Point raised $4.3B for its GP Financing Solutions platform to provide NAV loans and preferred solutions to private equity, private credit, and alternative investment firms.

• Kinnerton Hill Capital, a UK-based alternative asset manager focused on capital solutions for European middle market borrowers, received a $150M investment from Stable Asset Management.

• Trimontium, an alternative asset manager focused on flexible capital solutions, launched with $1.5B in AUM to originate tailored financing solutions across the capital structure.

M&A

• Wafra, a $30B AUM asset manager, acquired Navitas Credit Corp from United Community Bank for $1.9B to expand its presence in specialty finance and equipment finance.

New Vehicles & Structured Products

• Blackstone launched SablePoint Credit Strategies, a new asset-based lending platform led by James Garlick, former co-founder of Wingspire, to source, structure, and manage senior secured asset-based and first-out credit facilities for corporate borrowers.

• Blackstone announced a partnership with Nippon Life Insurance Company where they will provide investment management services in private credit and real estate.

• Carlyle Global Credit closed a single-asset CV with Content Partners LLC, a leading owner of studio-distributed films, TV programming, and related participations.

• Comvest Credit Partners closed a $428M private credit CLO backed by a diversified pool of senior secured loans originated and managed by Comvest.

• Schroders Capital hired Bob Paterson as head of European asset-based finance and SRT investments on its private debt and credit alternatives team.

• Veld Capital, a European asset manager, closed a €355 million private credit CV with Blue Owl to acquire a portfolio of asset-backed finance assets in Europe.

📈 Visuals

Source: McKinsey

Source: McKinsey

Source: McKinsey

Source: McKinsey

Source: X

Source: Bloomberg

Source: Figure

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “These numbers imply that the remaining pool that could plausibly migrate from traditional intermediaries to the asset management industry is roughly $9 trillion – $10 trillion. In practice, however, the addressable market is likely smaller. We expect banks will continue to retain high quality loans, particularly given recent regulatory relief. In addition, some assets remain operationally difficult to transfer. Therefore, based on our research and calculations, a more realistic long-run private credit opportunity or TAM is probably closer to $6 trillion – $8 trillion.” - Lofti Karoui, MD at PIMCO on the Market Opportunity for Asset-Based Finance

• “Five or ten years ago, there was virtually no new issuance in the digital infrastructure space, but today, we’re seeing it grow quite rapidly, especially as we hear about data centers or fiber financing. Much of this was done privately, and at a much smaller scale, where today, the ABF market has been a leader in terms of the financing for these asset classes. They’re very predictable cash flows that the ABF market can underwrite, and we have seen quite a bit of issuance come into the liquid side of the market in the CUSIP business where we have been participating.” - Xavier Dailly, MD at TPG Angelo Gordon on Asset-Based Opportunities in Digital Infrastructure

• “The aviation market is struggling with a deeper structural issue: there simply aren’t enough aircraft to keep up with rising demand for travel. Aircraft production began to decline in 2019, creating an estimated gap of 5,000 to 8,000 aircraft. And because aircraft are highly engineered assets, manufacturers have been unable to quickly add capacity to replace that lost production. We expect the gap to persist for years. This matters because aviation demand has grown more swiftly than global gross domestic product—roughly 1.5 to 1.7 times faster over long periods, according to the International Air Transport Association. When hostilities in the region end, we expect that demand to rebound swiftly.” - James McManus, Vice President & MD at AB CarVal and Brian Resnick, Senior Investment Strategist at Alliance Bernstein on Global Aviation Leasing Catalysts

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Reading

• Asset-Based Finance: A Growing Frontier for Private Credit (TPG Angelo Gordon)

• Banks seek to offload risk to avoid ‘choking’ on data centre debt (FT)

• Figure Kiavi Transaction Investor Presentation (Figure)

• Financing the AI Infrastructure Boom: Emerging Litigation Risks in AI Data Centers (Quinn Emanuel)

• Global ABS Special Report - June 2026 (GlobalCapital)

• How Large Is Private Credit’s Total Addressable Market, Really? (PIMCO)

• KKR Mid-Year Outlook 2026 (KKR)

• McKinsey Global Private Markets Report 2026 (McKinsey)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Alex Sacerdote - How to Invest Through Technology Cycles (Invest Like the Best)

• Carmen Li’s Plan to Build a Futures Market for Compute (Odd Lots)

• Catching Up with Power Investors Howard Marks and Bruce Flatt (Barron’s)

• The SpaceX IPO, Fable 5, AI Capex Update, & Market Check w/ Gavin Baker, Andrew Fox & Clark Tang (BG2)

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 🆕 Optimize borrowing capacity with Asset Allocator: Most capital users allocate across facilities and manage securitizations manually. This approach doesn’t scale. Setpoint’s Asset Allocator enables you to model multiple scenarios in minutes, giving you back the time required to make better allocation decisions. Watch the video.

• 🤝 We’re on the road — let’s connect:

  • Global ABS, June 9-11 — Barcelona, Spain | Meet with us.

  • IMN Non-QM Forum, June 15-16, Dana Point, CA | Meet with us.

  • Digital Infrastructure Finance 2.0, June 17, New York, NY | Meet with us.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

AI, Infrastructure & Energy

• Apollo, a global asset manager, is working with Blackstone to bring additional investors into a rumored $36B debt financing deal to finance Anthropic’s build out of its AI infrastructure and purchase of TPUs, with Broadcom backstopping payments on the largest portions of the transaction.

• Maxwell Power, formerly known as HDM Renewable Finance, a residential solar and battery storage systems business, closed a $750M investment commitment from Fairtide Partners to finance battery storage and solar power projects.

• Sunraycer Renewables, a developer, owner, and operator of clean energy sites, closed a $901M project financing facility with MUFG, Ally Bank, Nomura, NORD/LB, and SocGen.

Aviation, Rail & Transportation

• FTAI Aviation, a global aviation leasing, management, and MRE company, closed a $612M inaugural ABS issuance backed by a portfolio of 48 A320ceo and 737NG aircraft on-lease to 23 airlines globally.

• RESIDCO, a specialty leasing and asset-based investment platform focused on rail and aviation equipment, renewed and upsized its $450M senior secured revolving credit facility led and arranged by Fifth Third Bank.

• Sculptor Capital Management, an alternative asset manager, closed Eclipse 2026-1, a $414.5M aircraft securitization under a sponsor-servicer partnership between Sculptor and SMBC Aviation Capital.

Real Estate & Mortgage

• Arixa Capital, a private real estate lender, closed its second RTL securitization of $200M backed by a pool of loans originated and serviced by Arixa across major US markets.

• PGIM, the asset management arm of Prudential Financial, has financed roughly $4B in land banking projects through a partnership with Domain Real Estate Partners.

• Rithm, an alternative asset manager, closed its latest residential mortgage securitization via its NewRez portfolio company of $438.8M secured by a pool of 890 mortgages.

Consumer Finance

• Pagaya, a consumer finance and residential real estate platform, closed a $600M upsized auto ABS issuance.

• Wisr, an Australia-based consumer finance platform, closed a $354M ABS issuance collateralized by secured vehicle and personal loan assets.

• Yamaha Motor Finance Corporation, the captive financing arm of Yamaha, closed a $400M term securitization collateralized by a pool of powersports and marine receivables.

Commercial Finance

• Byzfunder, a small business finance platform, closed a $165M ABS issuance secured by a revolving pool of loans and MCAs in its inaugural issuance.

• Capchase, a vendor finance platform for enterprise tech, closed a $174M credit facility alongside a $26M equity financing led by 01 Advisors.

• Channel, an equipment finance platform, closed its eight ABS issuance of $205M backed by a pool of equipment finance loans and leases.

• Fora Financial, a small business finance platform, closed a $130M ABS issuance backed by a pool of business loans and advance receivables extended to small businesses.

• GreatAmerica, an equipment finance platform, closed a $747.9M ABS issuance backed by a pool of equipment leases and loans originated through its commercial finance business.

• Mulligan Funding, a small business finance platform, closed a $100M ABS issuance backed by a pool of small business loans.

Esoteric

• Apogee Therapeutics, a biotech company advancing novel biologics, closed a $1.3B strategic financing with Blackstone Life Sciences, including up to $800M of synthetic royalty and access to $500M in senior corporate debt to advance Phase 3 development and commercialization of Zumilokibart.

• Banco Santander SA, a Spanish bank, plans to issue an SRT tied to a €3.3 Billion portfolio of global corporate loans.

• Evoke Entertainment, a film and television management, production, and financing company, closed a $35M senior production financing facility with a multi-billion dollar private credit firm to support production volume.

💰️Platform Growth

Fundraises

• Bridgepoint is nearing a close of €5 billion for Bridgepoint Direct Lending IV to invest in direct lending opportunities across Europe.

• Kayne Anderson raised $5.12B for Kayne Anderson Real Estate Partners VII LP to invest in student housing and healthcare-related real estate.

• Pemberton announced a final close of €3.4bn for the fourth vintage of Pemberton Strategic Capital to invest in first lien capital solutions across Europe.

M&A

• DigitalBridge announced its acquisition of ArcLight Capital Partners, a specialist investor in power and electric infrastructure, for a total transaction value of $1.05B.

New Vehicles & Structured Products

• BasePoint is in market with a private rated note-feeder to provide investors access to its asset-based lending strategy.

• Benefit Street is set to close a $1.2B CRE CLO backed by 59 loans and an additional $47.2M in cash.

• Loomis, Sales & Company announced the launch of Loomis Sales Credit Income Opportunities Fund, an interval fund investing across diversified multi-sector public and private credit markets.

📈 Visuals

Source: Carlyle

Source: PIMCO

Source: PIMCO

Source: PIMCO

Source: PIMCO

Source: PIMCO

Source: Apollo

Source: FT Partners & BCG

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “The story of private credit today is not about excess giving way to crisis. It is about a structural transition from an era of abundant, undifferentiated capital to one in which liquidity is conditional, underwriting must be granular and outcomes will be increasingly unequal. The adjustment will not spark a broader financial meltdown, but expect it to inflict a good deal of pain—while, as always, giving those best placed to navigate choppier waters a chance to dig for treasure.” - Hamza Lemssouguer, Founder & CIO of Arini Capital on the pain to come in private credit

• “Using Preqin loan data, MFA finds that private credit lent $560 billion to businesses over the past three years. IMPLAN economic modeling estimates that this lending supported approximately $897 billion in U.S. GDP and 6 million jobs — capturing not just the direct effects of lending, but the downstream economic activity generated through supply chains and household spending. The top 10 states — led by California ($184.5 billion), Illinois ($90.4 billion), and Texas ($58.1 billion) — account for the largest shares of GDP impact. The software, aerospace, and consumer products sectors are the biggest recipients of private credit loans in California. In Illinois, the top recipients of private credit loans are the healthcare, chemical, and packaging industries. In Texas, private credit loans are driven by software, healthcare, and business support services.” - Managed Funds Association 2026 report on private credit contributions to the U.S. economy

• “In between is almost always the best asset class because there is poor capital formation and there’s no one that’s assigned every day as their day job for the risk. This is exactly what’s happening between our two firms [a16z and Apollo] because you have an entire ecosystem of which your firm [a16z] is a major player that has never been capital intensive. And for the first time, not only is it capital intensive, but it’s going to be capital intensive on a scale that’s unimaginable. Because the amount of money that is going to be put into data centers, chips, robotics, manufacturing, defense is as I suggested, every dollar since the beginning of fire. That is not going to be financed with equity entirely because that is not efficient and the scale of it is not achievable. It’s going to have to be parceled out into various risks. And that’s what we’re seeing happen right now. So if I look at the drivers of our business for this year, it’s data centers, it’s massive amounts of chip financing, and what we’re doing is parceling out the risks.” - Marc Rowan, CEO of Apollo on financing the industrial renaissance and what’s driving Apollo’s business

• “This is the largest theme at Brookfield and really it’s touching every part of our business. We feel we’re unique in that we can provide end-to-end solution under one roof. We’ve been leaders in the traditional inputs to AI infrastructure - real estate, energy, digital infrastructure. We’ve also developed leading positions in the new parts of AI infrastructure. Things like compute and sovereign AI. What we think really differentiates us is our market leading energy platform as energy is really the bottleneck around the world not only to AI infrastructure, but across growth to companies and economies today.“ - Connor Teskey, CEO of Brookfield Asset Management on AI and private credit

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Reading

• AI Credit Expansion: Assessing the Micro and Macro Risks (PIMCO)

• Architect Set to Launch US-Listed Compute Futures in Challenge to CME, NYSE-owner (Bloomberg)

• Beyond stablecoins: The emerging architecture of on-chain money (McKinsey)

• Global FinTech Report 2026 - From Recovery to Resurgence (FT Partners & BCG)

• Private credit spreads in spotlight on both sides of Atlantic as market dynamics shift (Pitchbook)

• The Emergence of the Multi-Product Non-Bank Lender (Edgar Matthews)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Capital in Motion: Repositioning at Scale for the Next Cycle with Harvey Schwartz (Milken Conference 2026)

• Dan Loeb - Lessons from 30 Years of Investing (Invest Like the Best)

• From One $3M Loan to a $25B Firm - How Madison Realty Capital Was Built with Josh Zegen (POWERS)

• Jane Street on GPUs, Trading, and Hiring: A Conversation with Dwarkesh (Jane Street)

• Marc Rowan on Private Markets, Software Repricing, and Capital Allocation (a16z)

• Nat Friedman and Daniel Gross in conversation with John and Patrick Collison (Stripe)

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• Reflections from Private Credit’s Next Act: Setpoint and Blue Owl recently hosted a private panel discussion at a16z’s San Francisco office. Brad Stroh, Co-CEO and Founder of Achieve captured insights from the conversation. Read his piece here.

• The Most Important Financial Institution Nobody Talks About Anymore: GE Capital was a $600B lending platform that shaped the ABF playbook Apollo, Ares, KKR, and others still run today. It’s been dead for five years, but its influence on the architecture of modern private credit is everywhere. More from Business Development & Partnerships Lead at Setpoint, Conor Witt, here.

• Upcoming Events:

  • Capital Conversations Summer Kickoff — June 2: Join Setpoint and Cross River for Capital Conversations, a happy hour bringing together the asset-backed finance community in NYC. ​Apply to attend.

• We’re on the road — let’s connect:

  • IMN’s Residential Mortgage Securitization, June 3 — New York, NY | Meet with us.

  • Global ABS, June 9-11 — Barcelona, Spain | Meet with us.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• Affirm, a consumer BNPL platform, expanded its long-term partnership with One William Street via a new dedicated OWS fund to purchase roughly $1.5B of loans through 2027, in addition to extending an existing facility to purchase an additional $500M per year in loans through 2027.

• ALLO Communications, a fiber-optic telecom infrastructure platform, closed an $824.4M ABS issuance backed by contract payments from fiber optics networks.

• Altriarch, an alternative asset manager, announced the acquisition of a $30M A/R factoring portfolio from a fintech-enabled specialty finance platform.

• BIG Fiber, a dark fiber infrastructure provider, closed a $250M debt facility with an additional $100M accordion from Stonepeak Credit and La Caisse (fka CDPQ) to accelerate expansion in core markets.

• Carvana, an online used car retailer, closed a $1.1B ABS issuance secured by a pool of fixed-rate, retail installment sale contracts on used vehicles.

• CoreWeave, an AI hyperscaler, closed a $3.1B delayed draw term loan facility to support its AI cloud platform expansion from Morgan Stanley and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group.

• Credibly, a small business finance platform, closed over $260M in new financing including a new securitization and the refinancing of its existing warehouse and mezzanine facilities with Truist Bank and Medalist Partners.

• Crux, a capital platform for clean energy, closed a $500M debt financing facility with Nuveen Energy Infrastructure Credit to finance Crux-led tax driven investments including hybrid tax equity.

• Diversified Energy partnered with Carlyle to acquire oil and natural gas properties in the Anadarko Basin from Camino Natural Resources for ~$1.2B. Carlyle’s Global Credit platform structured a bespoke ABS to finance the deal — a newly formed SPV holds the PDP assets and issues debt backed by the underlying cash flows, with Carlyle holding a majority SPV stake and Diversified operating the assets.

• Exponent, a financial platform for multi-location franchise operators, raised a $30M credit facility from Jovian Capital to scale its lending product alongside a $7.5M Series A financing.

• Honor Capital, an insurance premium finance company, acquired Ascend, a financial operations platform for the insurance industry.

• McGrath RentCorp, a business-to-business rental company, closed a $725M credit facility with a syndicate of banks including Bank of America, US Bank, and Wells Fargo.

• Mercury, a neobank for SMBs, raised a $200M growth equity round from TCV, Sequoia, a16z, and Coatue at a $5.2B valuation.

• Octane, a financial platform for recreational purchases, closed a $350M forward flow agreement with Nuveen in a one-year arrangement to purchase fixed-rate installment powersports and outdoor power equipment loans.

• Pagaya, a consumer finance and residential real estate platform, announced a partnership with Sezzle to embed Pagaya’s AI underwriting platform at point of sale to help more borrowers access installment loans.

• Parafin, an embedded SMB finance platform, upsized its warehouse facility with SVB and brought in EverBank as a new A-note lender.

• Regents Capital, a commercial finance platform, closed its inaugural securitization in a $132.9M issuance secured by a pool of loans and leases spanning a range of industries.

• Relay, a banking and money management platform for SMBs, closed a $50M growth investment from General Catalyst’s Customer Value Fund to finance customer acquisition.

• Ripple Prime, the institutional prime-brokerage unit of Ripple, closed a $200M asset-backed debt facility with Neuberger Specialty Finance to scale Ripple Prime’s margin lending and financing capacity.

• Sankaty Jet Capital, a business aviation lending platform and wholly owned subsidiary of AIP Capital, closed a $68M committed secured mezzanine facility with Wheels Up Experience.

• Scratch Financial, a payment processor and loan platform for veterinary clinics, closed a purchase facility with Victory Park to scale loan origination volume.

• Sezzle, a consumer BNPL and payments platform, closed a new $300M receivables funding facility with Mesirow Alternative Credit, doubling the original commitment from 2024.

• Splitero, a home equity investment platform, closed a $275M ABS issuance secured by a portfolio of 2,246 fixed home equity investment agreements in a deal sponsored by Splitero and BOAC HOWL Splitero Securitization Holdings.

• Westlake, a technology-based auto finance company, closed a $1.4B ABS issuance secured by a pool of subprime auto loans.

💰️Platform Growth

• Abry Private Debt closed its acquisition of a $330M diversified private credit portfolio in partnership with Coller Capital.

• Antares Capital closed its third Senior Loan Fund with $8.5B in total commitments.

• Apollo is in talks to sell MidCap Financial Investment Corp, a publicly listed BDC, which Apollo values at roughly $3B.

• Barings announced the close of over $19B in committed capital for its Global Direct Lending strategy.

• Blackstone announced a JV with Google to create a US-based TPU cloud offering with $5B in equity commitments to bring 500 MW of capacity online in 2027.

• Blackstone Real Estate Debt Strategies launched a lending platform to provide capital for homebuilders to enable construction of 50,000+ for-sale homes annually.

• Corbin Capital announced the final close of Corbin Litigation Finance Fund I (CLF I) with $342M in committed capital to focus on commercial litigation funding opportunities.

• CPP Investments announced its sale of remaining interests in its European NPL portfolio to a new JV managed by Arrow Global Group and Fortress.

• D2 Residential, the multi-family credit platform run by D2 Capital, closed its first CRE CLO of $935.3M backed by 19 multifamily loans.

• FGI Worldwide, a provider of working capital financing and trade credit insurance solutions, announced it has been acquired by Goldman Sachs Alternatives’ private equity business.

• Flexpoint Ford raised $1.1B in initial closings for Asset Opportunity Fund III, its asset-backed credit strategy, and Insurance Opportunity Fund I, its insurance-sector vehicle.

• HPS Partners announced a €15B Private Capital Program with Citi, a strategic collaboration to expand capital solutions and private financing to corporate and sponsor-owned borrowers in EMEA.

• Monroe Capital closed Monroe Capital ML CLO XVIII, its latest $426.6M term debt securitization collateralized by a portfolio of lower and middle market senior secured loans.

• Shamrock Capital, a media investment firm, raised $813M for Shamrock Capital Content Fund IV to identify, acquire, and actively manage media content and rights.

• Stellus Capital Management, a lower middle market direct lending firm, announced the final close of Stellus Credit Fund IV with $1.5B in investible capital.

• Stonepeak, an alternative investment firm focused on infrastructure and real assets, acquired BMO’s Transportation Finance and Vendor Finance businesses, including existing loan portfolios.

• Värde announced the close of VMC 2026-FL6, a $1B managed CRE CLO made of up of a pool of 19 floating-rate mortgages secured by 40 commercial properties.

📈 Visuals

Source: Morgan Stanley

Source: Morgan Stanley

Source: Diameter

Source: Diameter

Source: Diameter

Source: Bessemer Venture Partners

Source: Bloomberg

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “The [AI infrastructure capital requirement] numbers are massive, you’re absolutely right. This is the big question that every buyside investor is trying to get their grips around. There’s a couple of numbers out there. $5 trillion is the total hyperscaler capex over the next five years. If you think through what’s happened in Investment Grade so far, we’ve had $150B already this year. That same time last year was $20B. High yield, $40B this year. Same time last year, $0. So it really has become exponential in the volume we’re seeing.” - David DeBoltz, JPMorgan US Leveraged Finance Managing Director on demand for capital in the AI and Data Center ecosystem

• “Perceived or actual stale valuations may create a first-mover incentive during stress events, leading investors to exit a fund before asset values are potentially marked down. Managers may have potential incentives to manage valuations of their funds in a way that minimises the appearance of volatility, such as by delaying or spreading out the impact of negative shocks that could reduce asset values.” — FSB, Report on Vulnerabilities in Private Credit, on valuation opacity and redemption dynamics

• “PE-backed software, lenders took solace in the fact that you were a low loan--to-value. You would overlook high leverage multiples and would take comfort in the fact that someone was buying the business and you were lending at 40 cents on the dollar relative to the purchase price. At the end of the day, at 40% LTV, you might be 8-10x levered, all of your cash flows goes to support the debt service. When you have all of your cash flow supporting debt service you can’t invest in the future of the business.” - Tony Minella, CEO of Eldridge Capital Management, on the Pitfalls of LTV-Driven Underwriting in PE-Backed Software

• “More recently, semi-liquid private BDCs have been all the rage for public alts managers to raise. Promising liquidity in illiquid assets. $300B raised over the last 5-6 years. Why? Fees. If you can do a $1-2B unitranche deal and put a first lien and second lien into your CLO, you make 40 bps. Putting it into a private BDC, you make 6-7x that number. Why? FRE FRE FRE. Multiples expanded dramatically for public alts managers, driving their stocks higher, with a huge amount of the growth from private credit, from lev fin direct lending. M&A picks up. If you don’t own a private credit business, you have to buy one. When you have that much money to deploy and that much interest in the asset class and you have to raise more to drive your stock higher, how are you going to deploy it? You build an industrial scale deployment platform.“ - Scott Goodwin, Co-Founder and CIO of Diameter Capital Partners, on the Fee Incentives Driving Industrial-Scale Private Credit Deployment

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Reading

• AI Eats the World (Benedict Evans)

• Dispersion Revisited (Oaktree)

• Goldman-backed Lendable plots US expansion after outpacing banks on loans (FT)

• The Crypto Borrowing Gap (Ledn & Protocol Theory)

• Wall Street Takes Its Cut of $34 Trillion in US Homeowner Wealth (Bloomberg)

• WTF Is Going On In Private Credit? (Diameter)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Behind the AI Debt Boom, with David Deboltz from JPMorgan (Bloomberg)

• CLO’s Explained: How they Work and What Drives Returns with Lauren Basmadjian (Flow of Funds)

• Flight Path: Private Credit and Global Aviation Finance (AB CarVal: Uncommon Capital)

• Oaktree’s Deputy CIO of Strategic Credit Milwood Hobbs Jr. (Credit Exchange)

• Scott Goodwin presents at Sohn 2026 (Sohn Conference)

• Conversation with BlackRock CEO Larry Fink & Brookfield Corp CEO Bruce Flatt (Milken Conference 2026)

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 🔍 The Verification Agent Question Capital Providers Aren’t Asking: When you buy a house, you don’t trust the appraiser the seller recommends; so why do capital providers let borrowers choose their verification agent? More from Setpoint’s SVP of Growth, Bart Steenbergen, on why capital providers should rethink how verification agents get selected: 2 min read.

• 💡 The Most Important Financial Institution Nobody Talks About Anymore: GE Capital was a $600B lending platform that shaped the ABF playbook Apollo, Ares, KKR, and others still run today. It’s been dead for five years, but its influence on the architecture of modern private credit is everywhere, linked here.

• 🌆 Upcoming Setpoint Events:

  • LAST CHANCE | Private Credit’s Next Act — May 12: Join Setpoint and Blue Owl for a private panel discussion and happy hour at a16z’s San Francisco office. Apply to attend.

  • Capital Conversations Summer Kickoff — June 2: Join Setpoint and Cross River for Capital Conversations, a happy hour bringing together the asset-backed finance community in NYC. ​Whether you’re an investor, capital provider, or borrower, this is a chance to connect with industry leaders, exchange ideas, and enjoy great cocktails and bites. Apply to attend.

• 🤝 We’re on the road — let’s connect:

  • Secondary and Capital Markets Conference, May 17-20 — New York, NY | Meet with us.

  • IMN’s Residential Mortgage Securitization, June 3 — New York, NY | Meet with us.

  • IMN’s SFR East, May 18-20 — Miami, FL | Meet with us.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• Aspire, an RMBS investment firm, closed a $450M ABS issuance backed by a pool of mortgages.

• Bertelsmann SE, a German media business, agreed to buy Concord, an independent music group and catalog acquisition company. The combined company is valued at $14B.

• Best Egg, a consumer finance platform, announced the completion of its acquisition by Barclays.

• Better Home & Finance Company, a mortgage and home equity finance platform, launched the Better Home Equity Card to offer homeowners prepaid debit access to funds drawn from a secured Better HELOC.

• Castlelake, an alternative asset manager, announced a strategic JV with Redwood Trust to purchase up to $8B of Sequoia-sourced prime jumbo loans.

• Castlelake, an alternative asset manager, acquired a majority stake in Resfin Partners, which owns and operates Eastview, a US mortgage correspondent business and Lendmarq, an RTL origination platform.

• Consumer Portfolio Services, a consumer auto platform, closed a $514.07M ABS issuance.

• Deepinfra, a cloud inference platform for high throughput AI, closed a $107M combined equity and debt financing from 500 Global, Felicis, NVIDIA, Peak6, and Upper90.

• Doc2Doc, a financial services platform for healthcare providers, closed a $150M credit facility to scale origination capacity.

• GLS, a consumer auto finance platform, closed a $1.1B ABS issuance secured by a pool of subprime auto loans.

• Idea Financial, a small business finance platform, closed a $175M asset-backed credit facility with Pinnacle Financial Partners and MA Asset Management to scale origination volume.

• Kapitus, a small business finance platform, closed a $150M ABS issuance backed by a pool of revolving small business loans.

• Kashable, an employer-sponsored personal loan platform, closed a $60M Series C financing led by Goldman Sachs Alternatives’ Sustainable Investing.

• Keystone, a credit fund, closed a $25M senior secured credit facility with a small business finance company to finance origination volume.

• Lendmark, a consumer finance platform, closed a $300M ABS issuance secured by a pool of personal loans.

• Lobel Financial, a consumer auto finance platform, closed a $223.8M ABS issuance secured by a pool of subprime auto loan contracts financing used cars, trucks, minivans, and SUVs.

• OppFi, a consumer finance platform, announced an agreement to acquire BNCCORP Inc. and its wholly owned subsidiary, BNC National Bank, in a cash and stock deal worth approximately $130M.

• Point, an HEI originator, closed a partnership with Tacora Capital to sell up to $300M of home equity investment contracts.

• Power Home Remodeling, an exterior home remodeler, closed a growth investment from Bain Capital, Sixth Street, and Harvest Partners Structured Capital.

• Roc360, a vertically integrated real estate lending and investment management firm, closed a $150M investment from Temasek to increase lending capacity and scale its RTL volume.

• SoFi, a consumer finance platform and bank, closed a $688.5M ABS issuance secured by a static pool of unsecured near-prime consumer loans.

• TowerPoint Infrastructure Partners, a digital infrastructure and telecom platform, closed a $386M ABS issuance.

• Tropical Smoothie Cafe, a restaurant franchise, closed a $270M ABS issuance backed by existing and future franchise and licensing agreements.

• Upstart, an AI lending marketplace and consumer finance platform, closed a $1.25B forward flow commitment with Fortress to buy consumer loans originated through Upstart over 15 months. Upstart also closed a $1.2B forward flow agreement with Centerbridge Partners.

• Vertical Bridge, the largest owner of communications infrastructure in the US, announced a $1.5B strategic equity investment from KKR.

• Watercress Financial, a home improvement financing platform, closed a $550M forward flow partnership with 26North to purchase loans originated through Watercress’s contractor network.

💰️Platform Growth

• Apollo closed Accord Fund VII with $1.9B in commitments to invest in dislocated liquid credit opportunities. Apollo also raised $6.5B in total commitments for Apollo Hybrid Value Fund III to invest in structured equity opportunities and capital solutions with equity participation.

• Blackstone launched Blackstone N1, folding its Blackstone Growth business into a new unit focused on its AI portfolio.

• Crescent Cove, an asset manager, closed Crescent Cove Fund IV with $446M in commitments to provide growth capital solutions to technology companies.

• Dime Community Bank launched an Equipment and Franchise Finance group to serve middle-market companies and experienced franchise operators.

• Domain Capital Group launched its Sports Credit Strategy and closed an SMA focused on receivables tied to European football player transfers and media rights, following the close of Domain Entertainment Fund II with $768M in commitments.

• Hunter Point announced a strategic partnership with Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank.

• Lazard, a financial advisory and asset management firm, announced its acquisition of Campbell Lutyens, a private capital advisory firm, for $575M.

• LibreMax, an alternative asset manager, launched LibreMax Asset-Backed Income Fund (LMIFX), an interval fund providing access to private asset-backed finance and traded structured credit opportunities, with $285M of initial capital.

• Neuberger Berman East Asia Limited, the Japan-based entity of Neuberger Berman, announced a JV with Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation to manage private debt funds investing in LBO senior loans.

• Pioneer Bancorp, a financial holding company, acquired Targeted Lending Co, LLC, an independent equipment finance company with $120M of loans on its balance sheet.

• Primary Wave, an independent music publisher and catalog owner, closed its latest music royalties fund, Primary Wave Music IP Fund 4 with $2.225B in commitments.

• Silver Rock Capital Partners, an alternative credit asset manager, closed over $4B in investable capital for its Tactical Allocation Strategy to provide capital solutions across corporate debt and real assets.

• StepStone Group, a global investment firm, closed StepStone Credit Opportunities Fund II with $1.58B in commitments to invest across credit secondaries and co-investments.

📈 Visuals

Source: Goldman Sachs

Source: Goldman Sachs

Source: Goldman Sachs

Source: McKinsey

Source: Pitchbook

Source: a16z

Source: a16z

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “But markets evolve. Private credit was good for a while, yields were 12%. Capital flooded into the market. Yields kept coming down into the mid-to-high single digits for the same risk. But there was so much capital, there was more competition for deals so you also lost covenants and things like that. The kind of capital that started to be raised - retail money - where it comes in one month and it has to be invested right away or you have negative drag, means you kind of have to buy the market what’s out there. One of great things about drawdown funds is if there’s nothing good to do, I don’t have to do anything. You kind of lost that. I think there will be some correction in private markets but it won’t be 2008 because it’s not owned by banks at 30-1 leverage. I think one of the great opportunities right now is there are about 30,000 portfolio companies of mid-market private equity firms that can’t be sold and can’t go public - $20T or something worth of value. All of those companies will eventually need to be sold. For capital pools, there’s going to be an immense attractive opportunity to pick company by company - whether it’s co-investments or CVs. I think it’s one of the great times to put money to work.” - Tony James, former President and COO of Blackstone on Evolution of Private Markets

• “The real issue here is the liquidity mismatch between the retail investor and the duration of the investments. We live in a world where retail investors have become accustomed to having immediate liquidity for their investments . . . investing in private credit is a different story. Retail was viewed as a phenomenal channel from which to raise assets. But did the retail investors really understand the nature of the investment they were making?” - Ken Griffin, CEO of Citadel on private credit and liquidity

• “Retail clearly is going to stop fueling the growth in AUM for private credit. There’s an increasing realization it’s an institutional product, not a retail product. There will be nicks and bruises along the way. Underwriting standards are tightening up.” - Paul Taubman, CEO of PJT on Waning Retail Appetite for Private Credit

• “So, valuing assets fairly is a hornet’s nest, and especially so for private assets that have no reference point. Private asset investors must therefore accept that there is no correct answer, and no one answer, when it comes to a loan’s fair value. The only way to avoid the inherent unfairness that the uncertainty around NAVs introduces would be to pay investors leaving the fund the proceeds the manager receives when they sell off the departing investor’s share of the assets. But that’s not how these vehicles are structured.” - Howard Marks, Chairman of Oaktree on structural challenges with private asset valuations

• “Over the last several years because of the same dynamics of the GFC, regulations, because bank balance sheets are full, they’ve pulled out of some areas. They’ve gotten less aggressive. Real estate being one of them - significantly. Because look at office buildings, vacancy rates, Chicago, New York, San Francisco. Banks have lots of real estate on the balance sheet, so they’re less inclined to put more on. That’s generated an opportunity for private credit. Our real estate private credit has increased five-fold over the last three years. That’s one area of alternative private credit. The second area is just good old fashion specialty finance. Consumer finance, buying pools of receivables, healthcare receivables, SPV lending, litigation finance, royalty financing, drug financing, venture debt financing. Areas where it hasn’t been core but it was niche. Those niches are becoming core. Where investors expect to find excess return is in private credit. It’s our job as managers to find that excess return and alpha. We think today one of the best areas today for alpha is alternative credit.” - Ted Koenig, Chairman and CEO of Monroe Capital on Core Opportunities in Alternative Private Credit

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Earnings & Investor Presentations

• Asset Managers: Ares, Apollo, Athene, Blackstone, Blue Owl, Carlyle, CVC, KKR, Rithm, TPG

Reading

• AI isn’t coming for your job. It’s coming for your mind. (Baillie Gifford)

• Banks Get Picky on Asset-Based Lending After Credit Blow-Ups (Bloomberg)

• Cracks in Private Credit (GS)

• Credit Currents (BlackRock)

• Echoes of Junk Bonds Past (Verdad)

• Mexico’s Banks Handed Out Millions of Cards That Nobody Wants (Bloomberg)

• Private Credit Boom Pushes Fund Finance Market Past $1 Trillion (Bloomberg)

• The Coming FinTech Liquidity Supercycle (FT Partners & Blue Dot Investors)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Building Blackstone, Backing Costco, with Tony James (a16z)

• Convergence: Finding Opportunity in a Converging Credit Market (Apollo)

• Drew McKnight, Co-CEO of Fortress, Discusses All Things Credit (Capital Creek Partners)

• Jamie Dimon, CEO JPMorgan Chase: Corporate culture, risk, and the global economy (In Good Company)

• Legends Live @ Citi: Josh Harris (Citi)

• Private Credit in the Institutional Portfolio: Ted Seides, Ted Koenig, Rick Miller, Bouk van Geloven, Jeff Levin, Megan Neuberger (Milken Institute Global Conference 2026)

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 🌆 Upcoming Setpoint Events:

  • Private Credit’s Next Act — May 12: Join Setpoint and Blue Owl for a private panel discussion and happy hour at a16z’s San Francisco office. We’re convening a curated group of investors, capital providers and originators for a candid conversation on where private credit goes from here — you don’t want to miss it. Apply to attend.

• 🤝 We’re on the road — let’s connect:

  • The Annual CLO Industry Conference, April 27-28 — New York, NY | Meet with us.

  • IMN Mortgage Servicing Rights Spring Forum, April 29-30 — Dallas, TX | Meet with us.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• Accord Financial, a commercial finance company, sold its asset-based lending portfolio to a US-based independent finance company.

• Addi, an Colombia-based consumer BNPL platform, closed a $150M senior warehouse facility with JP Morgan and Fasanara Capital to scale origination volume.

• Banker’s Healthcare Group, a consumer and commercial finance platform, raised $396M through an ABS issuance secured by a pool of small business and unsecured consumer loans.

• Bilt Rewards, a consumer credit card for renters, closed a $1.2B receivables sale partnership with Fidem Financial, Blue Owl, Stone Point, Goldman Sachs, and TD.

• Cerebras Systems, an AI infrastructure provider, closed an $850M revolving credit facility with a syndicate of banks including Morgan Stanley, Citi, Barclays, and UBS. Cerebras also filed its S-1.

• Chicago Atlantic, a Chicago-based direct lending and asset-based credit firm, closed a NAV credit facility for a family office secured by a portfolio of public and private equity assets.

• Chord, a music IP platform, closed a $500M ABS issuance secured by music royalties from a portfolio of publishing and master rights.

• Dell Financial Services, the captive financing arm of Dell, closed a $1B ABS deal secured by a portfolio of commercial leases and loans to borrowers in the services, financial services, and real estate industries.

• Dubai Aerospace Enterprise (DAE), a global aviation services company, announced a partnership with Blackstone to launch Equator, investing in aircraft on lease to commercial airlines.

• Eskariam, a Spanish law firm focused on damages litigation, closed a €50M senior credit facility with Victory Park to support the firms litigation model which manages €1.5B+ in claims.

• Jetblue Airways, a US airline, closed a $500M aircraft-backed debt facility secured by 20+ Airbus A320 and A220 aircraft.

• JPalmer Collective, an asset-based lending platform, closed a $135M credit facility led by Texas Capital and Dime Community bank to accelerate portfolio growth.

• Kalon Capital, a mid-ticket equipment finance platform, announced its launch with backing from Bender Equity.

• Klarna, a consumer BNPL and digital banking platform, closed a $1.7B SRT transaction with Värde over a three-year deal representing $40B+ in Euro-denominated loans to free up capital.

• Neo Financial, a Canada-based consumer fintech platform, closed its inaugural $150M credit card securitization with BMO Capital Markets and SAF Group.

• Pier Asset Management, a California-based credit fund, closed a $10M senior credit facility to a revenue-based finance platform for advertising spend to scale originations.

• PIMCO, a Newport Beach-based alternative asset manager, purchased all of a $400M bond issuance by Blue Owl for its Blue Owl Capital Corporation (OBDC) BDC.

• Rizz Lending, a lender focused on luxury collector vehicles, closed a $300M warehouse facility to scale origination volume.

• Sixth Street, a global investment firm, closed an investment in Park Propreties Housing Association, a for-profit registered provider, in partnership with its parent company HPSG, to invest more than £1B to deliver new-build homes and communities.

• Slash, a banking platform for small businesses, closed a $100M Series C financing at a $1.4B valuation led by Ribbit Capital, alongside Khosla Ventures and Goodwater Capital.

• Yamaha Financial Services, the captive finance arm of Yamaha, closed a $400M ABS issuance secured by a revolving pool of receivables from dealer floorplan credit lines.

💰️Platform Growth

• Adams Street raises $7.5B for its third credit fund focused on senior loans to middle-market sponsor backed businesses.

• Ares acquired Whitestone REIT, a community centered REIT, for $1.7B.

• Carlyle raised $1.5B for a new asset-backed finance vehicle, Carlyle Asset-Backed Income Fund.

• Cerberus Capital Management, a $70B AUM alternative asset manager, acquired Lendco, a UK bridging and Buy-to-Let lending business, from Cabot Square Capital.

• Chicago Atlantic launched its Emerging Markets Private Credit strategy to provide senior secured loans, structured credit, and asset-backed finance solutions in Latin America, Asia, Eastern Europe, Middle East, and Africa.

• Hilco Global, a subsidiary of ORIX, launched its expanded asset-based lending platform through its Hilco Global Asset Management practice.

• Monroe Capital closed its merger with Horizon Technology Finance, which has $471M in net assets including $141M of cash through the merger.

• Pollen Street Capital closed £2.5B for Pollen Street Private Credit Fund IV to invest in asset-based private credit across Europe.

• Reckoner Capital Management is growing its book of art loans with an intent to securitize.

• Sila Realty Trust, a net lease REIT, announced its acquisition by affiliates of Blue Owl for $2.4B.

• Sound Point and Skypoint Capital Advisors announced the launch of Sound Point Alternative Income Fund, a multi-asset credit interval fund investing in middle market direct lending, private asset-based capital solutions, and specialty finance.

• StepStone Group, a global private markets investment firm, closed a structured solutions vehicle with $3.1B in commitments, alongside fund financing from Ares Alternative Credit and Barings Portfolio Finance, to invest in private market secondaries.

📈 Visuals

Source: Bloomberg

Source: WSJ

Source: McKinsey

Source: McKinsey

Source: Ares

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “What began as opportunistic private-capital deployment into legacy annuity and life insurance blocks has evolved into a convergence of insurance carriers, alternative asset managers, and long-duration capital providers. At the center of this transformation is a self-reinforcing value creation model—often described as a “virtuous flywheel.” It aligns liability origination, differentiated asset management, flexible capital structures, and, increasingly, technology-enabled operating efficiency to drive growth and returns. Private-capital-backed insurers have scaled assets at rates exceeding 20% annually, with assets totaling nearly $1.5T in 2025. These insurers are supported by more than $100B in capital across majority- or wholly owned onshore and offshore platforms and sidecars.1 The ability to pair predictable long-duration liabilities with higher-yielding private assets has created a powerful engine for balance sheet expansion and earnings growth for insurers.” - McKinsey on the convergence of life insurance and alternative asset managers

• “You can see [private credit and NBFIs are] not a significant exposure for us, right, at $22 billion of loans. 98% investment grade, and that’s because we have ample subordination, right, in terms of the position that we take and all the protections that I was alluding to. We also have additional protections in terms of our collateral. We have broad controls. We utilize third parties where appropriate, so that we just don’t rely on attestations and warranties. And so,we feel very good and comfortable that we are able to navigate a range of environments with the portfolio. And it’s all anchored in the strength of our risk appetite that we’ve built over time. This is not built in a day. It comes from years of constantly strengthening.” - Gonzalo Luchetti, Citi CFO on Citi’s exposure to private credit and non-bank financial institutions

Source: Citi

• “The price to get out of these loans is not par. You can market to model all you want. But to transact in these loans, some of them are going to get transacted in the 70s, some in the 60s, some in the 50s, some in the 40s. So the BDCs are telling you what you need to know about these when the BDCs are trading at 25-30% discounts to NAV. And they’re trading there because of all of the exposure to software. Lenders shouldn’t be lending at all more than 5-6 turns of leverage. And yet to software companies,somehow some way, the lenders were way off the ranch lending at 8-10x leverage because they could justify it based on ARR. I don’t believe you should be lending based on ARR.” - Bruce Richards, Chairman and CEO of Marathon Asset Management on current sentiment in direct lending to software businesses

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Earnings & Investor Presentations

• Asset Managers: BLK, Rithm Annual Report

• Banks: BAC, C, COF, GS, JPM, MS, TFC, WFC

Reading

• Beyond $1 trillion: The next chapter for insurance and private capital (McKinsey)

• Competitive Advantage Period: The Neglected Value Driver (Counterpoint Global - Morgan Stanley)

• In The Gaps: Ares Alternative Credit Newsletter - Spring 2026 (Ares)

• Real estate credit’s consistency shines in a turbulent market (Brookfield)

• Shuffling Risk: An Asset Class Reborn (Net Interest)

• Trump Visa Curbs Derail Student Lender’s Securitization Push (Bloomberg)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Apollo’s Jim Zelter on AI Disruption,and the Future of Private Credit (GS)

• Fund Finance: Evolution, Opportunity, and Portfolio Construction for Insurers with Michael Timms of Bayview (InsuranceAUM)

• Private Credit: The Link in the Capital Chain (AB CarVal)

• What’s Going on in Private Credit? (Howard Marks - Oaktree)

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 🆕 What we built in Q1: Collateral risk comes from data you can’t verify. The firms with an edge in asset-backed finance don’t compromise on data integrity. Learn what we built in Q1 to support them.

• 🌆 Upcoming Setpoint Events:

  • Private Credit’s Next Act — May 12: Join Setpoint and Blue Owl for a private panel discussion and happy hour at a16z’s San Francisco office. We’re convening a curated group of investors, capital providers and originators for a candid conversation on where private credit goes from here — you don’t want to miss it. Apply to attend.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• 42 Asset Management announced a partnership with MP Real Estate Capital, a mortgage origination and servicing platform, to deliver CRE mortgage loans to the annuity insurance market.

• Apollo, an alternative asset manager, acquired Gatehouse Living Group, a vertically integrated UK residential investment and management platform, from Gatehouse Bank.

• Axos Bank, a regional bank, closed a $300M revolving line of credit for a real estate lender in the Build-to-Rent sector to finance ground up construction of BTR communities across the US.

• Braviant Holdings, a consumer lending platform for non-prime borrowers, closed two revolving asset-backed credit facilities totalling $145M in committed capacity, alongside a forward flow renewal to liquidate defaulted assets.

• Conduit Power, a developer and operator of distributed power generation assets, closed a $200M equipment financing facility with Eldridge to support the buildout of a 200MW distributed generation portfolio in ERCOT.

• Convene Hospitality Group, a global hospitality platform, closed $230M in strategic growth capital from TPG alongside an additional equity investment from Ares.

• CoreWeave, an AI hyperscaler, closed a $8.5B financing facility with an investment-grade rating with MUFG, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, and Blackstone.

• Crestline Investors, an alternative asset manager owned by Rithm, closed a $200M NAV loan to a diversified alternative asset manager.

• Elevex Capital, an equipment finance platform, acquired BancLeasing, an equipment leasing platform with $83M in managed assets.

• FCC Finance, a consumer finance company, closed its inaugural securitization secured by a pool of home improvement assets.

• Firmus, an Australia-based data center infrastructure and compute capacity provider focused on AI, closed a $505M equity investment led by Coatue valued at $5.5B.

• Frontlands, a credit card secured by natural resource rights, closed a $50M credit facility with StarMesa Capital alongside a $5.5M equity financing.

• GM Financial, the captive finance company for GM, is raising a $1.27B in an ABS deal secured by a pool of prime auto loans.

• GoodLeap, a home improvement finance platform, closed a $408.9M ABS issuance secured by a pool of home improvement loans.

• Harbour Point Equipment Finance, an equipment finance platform affiliated with AIP Capital, acquired a $17M seasoned loan portfolio of 800 commercial transportation assets.

• Hilton Grand Vacations, Hilton’s timeshare platform, closed a $400M ABS issuance secured by a pool of fixed-rate timeshare loans.

• Kalamata Capital, a small business finance platform, closed a $111.87M ABS issuance backed by a pool of small business receivables originated by Kalamata.

• MediaHedge, the parent company of film finance platform FilmHedge, is launching a film and TV JV fund with a NY-based asset management firm to provide structured capital solutions to producers and studios.

• Neon, a consumer data monetization platform, raised a $25M debt and equity financing from Lightspeed, Upper90, and Upfront Ventures.

• North Mill Equipment Finance, an equipment finance platform, closed a $355.8M ABS issuance sponsored by Oaktree Capital and secured by a pool of equipment finance assets acquired from Midland Equipment Finance.

• Pagaya, a consumer finance and residential real estate platform, closed a AAA-rated $600M ABS transaction secured by a pool of personal loans.

• PIMCO, an alternative asset manager, is in talks with Bank of America to help provide $14B in debt financing to Oracle for a data center development in Michigan.

• Vuelo, a London-based travel fintech platform, closed a £50M debt facility from Viola Credit to finance BNPL originations alongside a £6M equity funding.

• Working Capital Partners, a structured capital platform for talent across sports, music, and entertainment, closed a Series A financing led by WTSL.

💰️Platform Growth

• 17Capital raised $7.5B for 17Capital Credit Fund 2, its latest NAV loan fund.

• Andalusian Credit Company announced a strategic partnership with Carlyle to form $200M Andalusian Credit Rated JV I LLC to invest in middle market loan assets.

• Antares Capital closed a $1.7B private credit continuation vehicle led by Ares to purchase assets from a closed-end private credit fund comprising of 300+ first lien, floating rate loans originated by Antares.

• Ares raised a combined $5.4B for US and Europe value-add real estate strategies. Ares also raised over $9.8B for its Opportunistic Credit strategy (ASOF III).

• Blackstone announced its final close of Blackstone Capital Opportunities Fund V (COF V) with over $10B of investable capital.

• Blue Owl announced $2.9B final close for Asset Special Opportunities Fund (ASOF IX).

• Brookfield acquired Fidere Patrimonio Socimi SA, a portfolio of Spanish rental properties from Blackstone for over €1B.

• Callodine Group announced the addition of Corrum Capital Management as a subadvisor to the Callodine Specialty Income Fund, adding capabilities across asset-backed finance within Sports, Music, & Entertainment.

• Capital Southwest, Trinity Capital formed a $100M JV to invest in first-out senior secured debt opportunities in the lower middle market.

• Mesirow Alternative Credit announced a strategic partnership with GMO Payment Gateway, where GMO will provide capital for specialty finance transactions originated by Mesirow.

• Orion Resource Partners, an investment firm specializing in metals and materials, closed its $2.2B Mine Finance Fund IV to provide financing for construction and acquisition of strategic metals and critical mineral assets.

• Square Nine Capital, a private investment firm providing capital solutions to middle-market companies, announced a strategic partnership with Liberty Mutual to collaborate on deals sourced through Square Nine’s platform.

• Sun Life completed the acquisition of remaining equity interests in BGO, a global real estate investment manager, for $C$1.59 billion; it also paid C$829 million to acquire the remaining 49% in Crescent Capital Group, an alternative credit manager.

📈 Visuals

Source: Gordon Brothers

Source: Apollo

Source: TCW

Source: JPMorgan Chase

Source: WSJ

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “I do believe that when we have a credit cycle, which will happen one day, losses on all leveraged lending in general will be higher than expected, relative to the environment. This is because credit standards have been modestly weakening pretty much across the board; i.e., more aggressive and positive assumptions about future performance (called add-backs), weaker covenants, more use of PIK (payment-in-kind; not paying interest in cash but accruing it), more aggressive private ratings (particularly in insurance companies) and more arbitrage (not always a great sign). Also, by and large, private credit does not tend to have great transparency or rigorous valuation “marks” of their loans — this increases the chance that people will sell if they think the environment will get worse — even if actual realized losses barely change. Additionally, actual losses right now are already a little higher than they should be, relative to the environment. Finally, if rates or credit spreads ever go up, the companies that borrowed will have to borrow at even higher rates, putting them under even greater stress. However this plays out, it should be expected that at some point insurance regulators will insist on more rigorous ratings or markdowns, which will likely lead to demands for more capital. It has always been true that not everyone providing credit is necessarily good at it. There are many players who are late to this game, and it should be expected that some credit providers will do a far worse job than others.” - Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chairman & CEO on Prognosis for Leveraged Lending and Private Credit, including Projected Losses and Drivers

• “I think and hope that this is going to be a recalibration, people are going to readopt a more prudent underwriting. I think people in the industry will change behaviors. And by the way in some cases the market will change your behaviors because you may not be able to raise more capital. So the market mechanism will work. And hopefully, the best thing about the current moment is that this happened not in a deep recession. It happened when the economy is pretty, relatively helpful. I mean there’s definitely risk out there to be worried about, but this would be much different. If you think about redemptions on a lot of these wealth vehicles if it were a distressed environment, the redemptions would be 2-3x what they are. So to me, this is a gift to the industry to recalibrate.” - Alan Waxman, CEO of Sixth Street on Catalysts for Recalibration in the Private Credit

• “When origination is outsourced to sponsors, paper flows to you. But you are not setting terms, you are competing for allocation. That is not origination. That is access. And access is not a durable edge. There are bad loans out there. Loose underwriting at peak multiples will produce losses. But loan performance is not the primary issue. This is not just a bad loan cycle. It is a structural mismatch between how capital was raised, what it was promised, and what the underlying assets can actually deliver.” - Billy Libby, Co-Founder & CEO of Upper90 on Structural Challenges of Product, Positioning, and Origination in the Private Credit Market

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Investor Letters & Outlooks

• 2025 Chairman & CEO Letter to Shareholders (JPMorgan Chase)

• 2026 Global Asset Insight Report (Gordon Brothers)

• Credit Currents Quarterly (BlackRock)

• Private Markets Investment Outlook Q2 2026: Resilience reinforced (Schroders)

• Q4 2025 Private Credit Quarterly (Configure Partners)

Reading

• A Guide to the Private Credit Crisis (The Economist)

• Leading With Investment-Grade Private Credit (Apollo)

• Private Credit Has an Origination Problem (Upper90 Capital)

• The Balance Sheet Behind the AI Revolution (Apollo)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Alan Waxman - Private Credit and the Modern Financial System (Invest Like the Best)

• Apollo’s Jim Zelter Discusses Credit Markets, AI Infrastructure and Economic Resilience (Bloomberg)

• Churchill’s Kencel on the State of Private Credit (Bloomberg)

• Kieran Goodwin - Private Credit Concerns (Capital Allocators)

• Stonepeak Credit’s Ryan Roberge - building an infrastructure credit strategy (Alt Goes Mainstream)

• The Business Builder: New Mountain Capital’s Steve Klinsky (GS)

• The Private Credit Unwind is Coming - Tony Yoseloff (Master Investor Podcast)

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• Affiniti, a software and financing platform for SMBs, closed a financing agreement with Column.

• Applied Data Finance, a consumer finance platform focused on near-prime and non-prime borrowers, expanded its warehouse facility to $300M with a new $100M institutional investor commitment and a three-year extension.

• Attain Finance, a Canadian SMB finance platform, closed a second Canadian credit facility to scale originations.

• Credit9, a debt consolidation platform, closed a $122.4M ABS issuance secured by a pool of consumer loans from a debt settlement program.

• Edge Focus, a consumer lending platform, closed pass-through ABS deals worth more than $100M across two new consumer loan securitizations.

• Fidelis, a real estate asset manager, closed a $143.92M ABS issuance secured by a pool of RTL loans across 29 different lenders.

• Fidium, a fiber broadband platform, closed a $664.6M fiber-backed ABS, its third securitization, achieving its lowest rates to date with a 5.4% WAC.

• Greenbrier Companies, a railcar manufacturer and lessor with a ~17,000-unit fleet, closed a $300M railcar ABS rated AA/A by S&P with a 5.2% blended rate.

• Merit AirFinance, an aviation lending platform, priced an $817M aviation loan ABS (MERIT 2026-1), its first issuance under the MERIT shelf, achieving the 2nd lowest Class A spread in aviation ABS history.

• Nitra, an AI-native platform for healthcare practices, raised $95M warehouse facility from Treville Capital and Encina Lender Finance alongside a $50M Series B.

• PGIM Real Estate, through its real estate credit business, provided $103M in acquisition financing to Alterra IOS secured by a 23-asset industrial outdoor storage portfolio across 18 US markets.

• Pier Asset Management, an LA-based credit fund, closed a $10M senior secured credit facility to a niche litigation finance platform focused on resolving disputed property damage insurance claims.

• Pipe, a small business finance platform, upsized its credit facility with Victory Park Capital to $225M and extended the term by two years.

• Pollen Street, a European specialty finance investor, backed Irish SME lender SME Finance and Leasing Solutions with a €100M facility to finance originations to Irish SMEs and farmers.

• Propel Holdings, a consumer finance platform, closed a $150M capital commitment from Column to scale FreshLine, its new unsecured personal line of credit product.

• Propel Finance, a UK equipment finance lender, raised £306M via its inaugural securitisation (Velocity 2026-1), rated AAA by S&P and Fitch on the Class A tranche.

• Reliant Net Lease, a Blackstone-backed net lease REIT, closed a $348M ABS deal (RLNT 2026-1) secured by 183 net lease properties leased to service-oriented businesses.

• Saluda Grade, an alternative investment firm focused on asset-based finance, closed a $300M securitization backed by a revolving pool of RTL loans.

• SageSure, a property insurance platform, scaled its Seawall Re sidecar franchise and secured $200M in reinsurance with Flexpoint Ford.

• SAGE Residential, an originator and owner of mortgage servicing rights, closed a $247.8M ABS issuance backed by a portfolio of 3,000 fixed-rate, prime and near prime mortgages.

• Together Financial Services, a UK specialist property lender, priced a £528M first-charge RMBS (TABS15), with 90% of notes expected to be rated AAA by S&P and DBRS.

• Upstart, an AI lending marketplace, closed a $1B forward flow with Eltura Capital Management and Aperture Investors to purchase consumer loans originated through the Upstart platform.

💰️Platform Growth

• Avenue Capital is targeting $1B for Avenue Europe Special Situations Fund VI, focused on senior secured, asset-backed loans to underserved borrowers in Northern Europe. The fund has already raised $250M.

• Goldman Sachs AM is raising ~$13B for GS Mezzanine Partners IX, targeting PE-backed companies in NA and Europe with net returns of 11–13% levered. The firm is also raising $10B for West Street Loan Partners VI.

• Lone Star Funds closed its latest residential mortgage fund, Loan Star Residential Mortgage Fund IV with total capital commitments in excess of $1B.

• Mount Logan Capital will acquire the assets of Yieldstreet Alternative Income Fund (YS AIF), increasing Mount Logan’s Opportunistic Credit Interval Fund (SOFIX) assets by over $100M.

• Oak Hill Advisors is launching a new private credit interval fund (OFLEX) targeting direct lending, asset-based finance, CLOs, and public credit.

• Orion Resource Partners completed its largest-ever fundraise, taking total AUM to over $9B.

• Sound Point Capital held final close for its oversubscribed Strategic Capital Fund III at $1.5B in equity.

• State Street launched an investment-grade public and private ABS ETF, providing retail access to IG asset-backed finance.

• Treville Capitalclosed its inaugural Capital Solutions Fund at $500M+, investing across senior secured loans, junior debt, and preferred equity.

📈 Visuals

Source: a16z

Source: Brookfield

Source: Brookfield

Source: McKinsey

Source: McKinsey

Source: Apollo

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “There’s not enough bank capital in the world to grow the economy, and particularly as governments have leveraged themselves, there’s really just not enough capital to grow the economy. With the capital expenditure that’s going into technology, AI, and the underlying infrastructure, you’re not going to be able to do that without private pools of capital.” - Scott Kapnick, Founding Partner & CEO of HPS on Post-GFC Need for Private Pools of Capital to Finance Growth

• “There’s going to be a huge amount of secondary activity in the private-credit market, and we are well-positioned for that and have spent a lot of time thinking about it. Not all private credit will perform the same—anticipating a dispersion that will require close attention to details.” - Alisa Mall, CIO of Michael Dell’s Family Office, on PC secondaries as a buying opportunity amid turmoil

• “Over the past several years, new vehicles designed with incentives that sacrificed robust capital and liquidity guardrails in favor of short-term asset gathering were introduced and proliferated, targeted at a largely retail client base with which the industry has shallower relationships compared to the institutional investors that initially funded the sector (and that still predominantly make up Sixth Street’s capital base). These “dollar in, dollar deployed” structures for BDC investors fundamentally changed how BDC assets were originated. The need to scale deployment and the constant search to put dollars to work became the paramount driver of new origination. In the process, direct lending began to move away from the core attributes that made it successful in the first place: deep operational diligence, prudent loan structuring and covenant documentation, an awareness of the forward rate curve, and how to finance durable earnings and therefore distributions. Deployment trumped investment discipline.” - Sixth Street Specialty Lending on Evolution of BDC Incentive Structures and its Implications

• “Private credit funds are highly capitalized, with equity typically accounting for 65–80% of total assets—more than six times the capitalization of U.S. banks. Fund lives average 10–12 years, while underlying loan maturities are generally shorter, implying little or no maturity mismatch. Overall, private credit funds appear conservatively structured and unlikely to pose systemic risks comparable to traditional banks.” - Matvos, Piskorski & Seru, NBER Working Paper: Private Credit, Balance Sheets and Financial Stability

• “Efforts to make private credit tradable face obstacles and risk undermining one of the main reasons—earning an illiquidity premium—that investors look to private assets. The promise of greater secondary liquidity is, in some cases, being used to justify a meaningful erosion of the illiquidity premium in direct lending relative to public markets.” - Lotfi Karoui, PIMCO, on public-private spread convergence

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Investor Letters & Outlooks

• 2026 Market Overview: Private Credit (Hamilton Lane)

• Fund Finance: 2026 Market Pulse (Akin Gump)

• Optimizing the Efficient Frontier: Opportunistic Credit Amid a Capital Reset (Davidson Kempner)

• Private Credit Market Pulse (Campbell Lutyens)

• Private Credit: Beyond Direct Lending (Brookfield)

• Recent Trends in Corporate Direct Lending 2H25 (StepStone)

• Sixth Street Specialty Lending Letter to Stakeholders (Sixth Street)

• Spreads May Be Converging, But Liquidity Is Not (PIMCO)

Reading

• Cliffwater Private Credit Fund Under Pressure in Redemption Cycle (Bloomberg)

• How a British Mortgage Company Became Private Credit’s Latest Black Eye (WSJ)

• How Promote Giving, a new investment model, will raise millions for charities (AP)

• Next Era of Private Credit (McKinsey)

• Real Assets in 2026: The Year of Intelligent Infrastructure (PGIM)

• Private Credit, Balance Sheets and Financial Stability (Working Paper) (NBER)

• Who Is On the Other Side? A Framework for Understanding Market (In)Efficiency (Morgan Stanley IM)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Ali Hamed: From a College Dorm to $3B AUM + Mr. Beast (Forged in America)

• Connor Teskey: Inside Brookfield’s Culture, Capital Allocation, and Competitive Edge (The Knowledge Project)

• HPS CEO Kapnick on the Next Wave in Private Credit (Bloomberg)

• Reflections on Oaktree Conference 2026 with Howard Marks (Oaktree)

• TCW’s Koch: Opportunities in New Private Credit Loans (Bloomberg)

• The Rise of Private Credit: How $1T in Capital is Reshaping Finance (Interplay)

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• Aspire Mortgage Trust, an RMBS securitization platform sponsored by Redwood Trust, closed a $391.2M ABS issuance secured by first lien-mortgages from multiple originators.

• Avant, a Chicago-based consumer finance platform, closed a $200M ABS transaction with a AAA rating secured by a pool of unsecured personal loans originated through the Avant platform.

• Bravo, a Spanish financial advisory and debt management platform, closed a €200M credit facility with Fortress to accelerate the development of its credit operation.

• Broadleaf Financial Group, a specialty finance company focused on equipment leasing and financing, closed a new warehouse facility with Deutsche Bank to scale origination volume.

• CAN Capital, a small business finance platform, acquired the equipment finance portfolio of Republic Bank Finance, a division of Republic Bancorp.

• CoreWeave, an AI hyperscaler, is in market to raise $8.5B from MS and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group to finance the buildout of of cloud computing capacity for Meta.

• DailyPay, an earned wage access platform, closed a $200M upsize of its secured credit facility to bring total capacity to $960M.

• Fundbox, a US-based small business finance platform, closed a forward flow facility with Mesirow Alternative Credit. Fundbox also expanded its credit facility with ATLAS SP and Blue Owl.

• FundingCircle, a UK-based SMB finance platform, closed a £700M forward flow with Waterfall Asset Management, expanding their existing partnership with senior financing from Citi.

• Genesis, a Dublin-based commercial aircraft leasing platform, entered into a partnership with Flexpoint Ford to acquire and service a portfolio of commercial aircraft on behalf of Flexpoint. Genesis also closed a $90M credit facility with DB to strengthen its funding platform.

• GoldState Music, a music-focused investment platform, closed a partnership with BridgePoint Group to invest in profitable music-oriented businesses across the music value chain.

• Gracie Point, an insurance-focused specialty finance platform, closed a $250M warehouse facility with Goldman Sachs to scale insurance premium finance originations.

• Inhale Capital, a UK-based bridge lending platform, closed a £50M senior revolving credit facility with TriplePoint to scale originations.

• Homestead Capital, an investor and owner of farmland assets in the US, closed a $300M asset-based finance program with Barings to expand loan origination.

• Keystone National Group, a Utah-based credit fund, closed a $44M credit investment via a senior secured credit facility for a specialty finance company.

• Ledn, a Cayman-based bitcoin-backed lending platform, closed its inaugural ABS issuance of $188M secured by a portfolio of bitcoin-collateralized loans.

• Lendbuzz, an auto finance platform, closed a $246M ABS issuance secured by a pool of auto loans for new and used autos, light duty trucks, and vans, marking its 11th public securitization.

• Marathon Asset Management, a global asset manager, closed a $615M aircraft securitization secured by a portfolio of 27 Airbus and Boeing narrowbody aircraft on operating leases.

• MEP Capital Management, a media-focused investment firm, took a majority stake in BondIt Media Capital, an independent film and TV financing platform, alongside a new $100M credit facility.

• Morgan Stanley Investment Management, through its AIP Alternative Lending Group, closed its first pre-funded securitization of $220M secured by a portfolio of consumer loans from multiple originators.

• Navient, a student loan finance company, closed a $683M ABS deal secured by a pool of refinance student loans.

• North Mill Equipment Finance, a commercial equipment finance platform, closed a $440M ABS issuance backed by a pool of equipment loans and leases.

• Onslow Bay, a mortgage finance company and RMBS aggregator, closed a $452.7M ABS issuance secured by a pool of first and second-lien revolving HELOCs.

• Point, a home equity investment platform, closed a $346.4M ABS issuance secured by a pool of home equity investment agreements.

• Propel Holdings, a Toronto-based consumer finance platform, closed a $60M forward flow purchase agreement with Mesirow Alternative Credit to finance originations through Freshline.

• Purchasing Power, an employee benefit program provider, closed a $225M ABS issuance backed by a pool of consumer receivables originated from Purchasing Power’s payroll purchase platform.

• Service Properties Trust, a Boston-based REIT with $10B in investments closed a $745M ABS deal secured by a pool of net lease mortgage notes.

• SME Finance and Leasing Solutions, an Irish nonbank lender, closed a €100M credit facility with Pollen Street to finance originations to Irish small and medium enterprises and farmers.

• Upstart, a consumer finance platform, closed a $333M bulk sale of auto loans to Bayview. Upstart also closed a $200M forward flow with Wafra to sell auto loan assets originated through Upstart.

• Vero Finance Technologies, a SaaS and servicing platform for floorplan financing, closed a partnership with CIM to launch an EV floorplan financing program.

• Wayflyer, a Dublin-based working capital provider for small businesses, closed a $250M credit facility with ATLAS SP to finance originations.

• Yendo, a vehicle-secured credit card, closed a $200M committed credit facility with i80 to finance new credit card originations.

• YouLend, an embedded financing platform for e-commerce, payment, and technology platforms, closed a $225M forward flow agreement with Värde.

💰️Platform Growth

• Brookfield acquired Ori Industries, a distributed AI cloud platform offering on-demand access to GPU compute.

• Nuveen to buy Schroders Plc in a £9.9B acquisition, creating a $2.5T AUM asset manager.

• Oaktree closed $2.4B in commitments for Oaktree Special Situations Fund IV.

• Saluda Grade hires Patrick Lo, formerly Co-CIO of Waterfall, to join the firm as Co-CIO to lead expansion into a broader range of asset-based finance capabilities.

📈 Visuals

Source: Cox Capital Partners

Source: Rithm

Source: Nuveen

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “With rising redemptions and limited liquidity, private BDCs and intervals funds are facing one of their toughest periods yet – leaving many investors with limited options. To help retail investors navigate this challenging period, today Saba and Cox Capital Partners announced our intent to offer liquidity for OBDC II, OTIC and OCIC shareholders through tender offers, subject to certain terms & conditions and the number of shares to be purchased.” - Boaz Weinstein, Founder & CIO of Saba Capital Management on Proposed Tender Offer to investors in 3 Blue Owl BDCs to buy shares at 20-35% below recent NAVs.

• “One has to worry about opaque assets where there’s illiquidity,” he said in the interview airing Sunday. “We’re getting close to the end of late stages of cycles on this — and we’re due for a kind of a reckoning.” - Lloyd Blankfein, former CEO of Goldman Sachs on Impending Corrections in Financial Markets

• “What we’re seeing now is banks trying to reduce their exposure across some of their data center names, not because of risk, not because of fears. Because they want to buy more. Because they’re already at capacity issues. Because the opportunity set is so big. So I do think the thing that is going to happen is frankly, if you think about the power demand that’s needed as well as the power demand that’s needed, I don’t know that it’s fully achievable to the levels that have been modeled in. I do think you’re going to hit a bit of a wall because of power. You’re going to hit a wall because of the sheer capital that’s supposed to be there to finance that piece. So right now, there’s this huge demand, and there’s a lot of different projects. I think you’ll see a slowdown of that because I think it’s probably unsustainable for the sheer amount of capital, financing, and power that needs to go into these projects. The power is going to become more of a problem than the data centers.” - Joel Holsinger, Co-Head of Alternative Credit at Ares on Current Dynamics and Demand Drivers in Data Center Financing

• “Will AI affect some companies and will some companies or loans to some companies not pan out as expected or multiples paid too high for businesses. Yes, that happens in every cycle. This is not that big of a deal for the financial system. That’s the most important thing that the news is overlooking. People are worried about change - we’re going through faster changes today than we’ve ever gone through before. But I would go back. We’ve been building the backbone of the global economy for 40 years. The types of things we’re building are just different. Before it was water systems, pipelines, toll roads. Then it was telecom towers. Now it’s data centers and AI factories. The backbone evolves. I think people just get unsettled by that.” Bruce Flatt, Brookfield CEO on Overblown Concerns on Software, Private Credit, and AI Infrastructure Expansion

• “Here’s the big takeaway to think about. As it relates to public credit markets, only 3% of the high yield market in the US is software. So that’s in really good shape. In the BSL market, which is also a liquid credit market, its 13% exposure. Probably manageable, but will be under pressure. In the private credit market, it has 23% exposure. In the public equity markets in the S&P 500 and Russell 2000, only 7% of the companies are software companies. If you’re a private equity manager or private credit manager and you have less than 10% exposure, I think you adjust the market and you’re perfectly fine. But if you have 23% exposure which is actually the number for private credit exposure to software companies, you’re having a lot of pain right now and you’re going to have to deal with a lot of fallout from this. At the end of the day there will be two types of software companies. Software is going to survive and do quite well overall. But the multiples that they trade at have contracted and they’ll probably stay contracted until we can sort out the winners from the losers. The winners will see the creative destruction from AI allow it to sort to new values that are much greater than what we see today. But the fallout is that companies won’t survive this because it’s not creative destruction, it’s just destruction. That will be very problematic. In credit, here’s the problem. In the public equity markets, the companies aren’t very levered. They’re only a half a turn of leverage which means they’re less than 1% debt-to-ebitda net of cash. But in the private credit markets they’re 10x levered. So any type of problem with debt financing is a real problem.” - Bruce Richards, Marathon Asset Management founder & CEO on Software Exposure in Private Credit and Leverage Disparities between Public and Private Software Businesses

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Investor Letters & Outlooks

• AI Hurtles Ahead (Oaktree)

• Ares Annual Letter (Ares)

• Brookfield Letter to Shareholders (Brookfield)

• The Total Approach: A Practical Framework (KKR)

Reading

• FY2025 Secondaries Market Overview (Campbell Lutyens)

• MFS Creditors Warn of £930 Million Shortfall in Collateral (Bloomberg)

• Opportunistic Credit as a Complement to Direct Lending (MidOcean Partners)

• Private Markets Hiring Defies Gloom with $2.5M Pay Deals (Bloomberg)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Ares’ co-head of alternative credit (Joel Holsinger) says AI will hit a bit of a wall due to ‘sheer capital’ (Credit Exchange)

• Former Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein Says the Market Is Due for a Reckoning (Bloomberg)

• Ramp founder Eric Glyman on the many ways AI is changing corporate spending (Cheeky Pint)

• The Three Main Verticals of ABF with Missy Dolski of Varde Partners (Credit Clubhouse)

The Data Tapes

Setpoint’s Bite-Sized Debt Newsletter: February Edition I

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 🔦 ABF’s Risk Reckoning: We hosted a dinner with ABF leaders across banks, funds, and asset managers to compare notes on what’s changing in the industry and where risk is showing up first. Our Co-Founder and CEO Stu Wall captured four takeaways from the conversation, and what they mean for operators and capital providers. Read the blog.

• 💡 Lessons From a Market Wake-Up Call: Recent failures in asset-backed finance have raised the bar for transparency and control—our Head of Capital Solutions, Bart Steenbergen, breaks down what’s driving this reset and the verification standards lenders need to meet rising expectations from boards, investors, and regulators. Download the whitepaper.

• 🤝 On the road this winter — let’s connect. We’re attending SFVegas, Feb. 22-25, and we’d love to meet you. Book time with our team.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• Avtech Capital, an equipment finance and leasing company, completed its inaugural ABS deal of $141M backed by a portfolio of commercial equipment leases.

• Consumer Portfolio Services, an auto finance platform, closed a $345.6M ABS issuance secured by a pool of subprime auto receivables.

• Create Music Group, a digital rights monetization platform, is investing $300M in Nettwerk Music Group to fund a management buyout and provide additional growth capital.

• Exponent Financial, a US-based specialty finance originator, closed a $20M senior secured revolving credit facility from Jovian Capital.

• Firmus, an Australia-based data center infrastructure and compute capacity provider focused on AI, closed $10B in debt financing from Blackstone and Coatue to fund the next phase of Project Southgate.

• Float, a Canadian business finance and banking platform, closed $100M CAD through two debt facilities with SVB and a tier-1 Canadian bank.

• GLS, a subprime auto lender, closed a $907.7M ABS issuance secured by a pool of subprime auto loans.

• Greenbriar, a rail equipment company, issued a $300M ABS deal through its subsidiary GBX Leasing secured by a pool of railcars and leases.

• Jersey Mike’s, a QSR chain owned by Blackstone, closed a $760M whole business securitization secured by revenue from existing and future franchise agreements.

• Kinetic Advantage, an independent floorplan financing platform, closed a $225M credit facility with MUFG to scale origination volume.

• Lendable, an asset-based credit platform, closed over $500M with the launch of two new funds.

• MidOcean Partners, an alternative asset manager, closed a $100M revolving credit facility from Cross River Bank to support the acquisition of HEI contracts from Point.

• Nada, an home equity investment platform, closed a $150M forward flow purchase agreement with Medalist Partners.

• Neo, a Canadian fintech and neobank platform, closed a $68.5M equity financing from AIMCo, Northleaf, Sandstone Asset Management, and others.

• Pasadena Private Lending, a private credit provider to lower middle market businesses, closed a $105M strategic capital partnership with Eagle Point.

• PEAC Solutions, an equipment finance platform, closed a $680.8M ABS issuance collateralized by equipment loans and leases.

• Peachtree Group, a vertically integrated U.S. commercial real estate investment, closed a $50M warehouse facility from Western Alliance Bank to support the extension of Peachtree’s equipment finance division.

• Propy, a real estate technology company, closed a $100M credit facility from Metropolitan Partners Group to finance the acquisition of title and escrow businesses.

• Saluda Grade, an alternative investment firm focused on asset-based finance, closed a $367M securitization backed by recently originated first- and junior-lien HELOCs originated by Homebridge Financial Services.

• Serverfarm, a data center infrastructure provider, closed its inaugural ABS deal issuing $589M secured by three facilities in Atlanta, Chicago, and LA.

• Sotheby’s Financial Services, Sotheby’s captive art financing company, closed a $900M securitization backed by art-secured loans and collectible car-secured loans.

• Upgrade, a consumer finance originator, upsized its revolving credit facility with Cross River Bank to $250M to finance its personal credit line assets.

• Vantage, a hyperscale data center campus, closed a $2.4B debt facility with Ares to refinance existing debt and support development and construction of new data center campuses.

• Vervent, a servicing technology platform, closed a forward flow agreement with Mesirow Alternative Credit of up to $80M to support origination of unsecured credit cards across Vervent’s portfolio.

💰️Platform Growth

• AB CarVal and Investec launch a new aviation financing platform to provide secured asset-backed lending solutions to airlines and aviation leasing companies.

• Apollo and Schroders announced a strategic partnership to develop wealth and retirement investment solutions for UK clients.

• Atlas Real Estate Partners launches A4 Credit Partners to originate small-balance residential transition loans.

• Banco Santander entered into an agreement to acquire Webster Financial Corporation for $12.2B.

• Benefit Street Partners announced the purchase of a $391M loan portfolio secured by eight multifamily properties across the US.

• Catalyst Investment Partners, one of the largest owners and operators of industrial outdoor storage, announced the final close of its third fund at $400M in LP commitments.

• Coller Capital closed a continuation vehicle for Ares US Direct Lending’s 2018-vintage fund with more than $1.3B in commitments.

• Crescent Capital closed a $3.2B private credit CV to acquire a portfolio of performing loans from Crescent Mezzanine Partners’ 2016-vintage fund with Pantheon.

• Dawson Partners is launching a credit secondaries strategy.

• Fern Ridge Capital, a London-based credit fund, set a $250M target for its debut asset-based finance fund.

• Great American Holdings launched Great American Capital Corporation to originate collateral-backed middle-market loans between $20-100M.

• KKR to acquire Arctos Partners, an institutional investor in professional sports franchise stakes and asset management solutions for sponsors, in a transaction valued at $1.4B.

• Ridgepost Capital (fka P10) acquired Stellus Capital Management, a $3.8B AUM lower-middle market direct lending platform for $250M upfront with an additional $60M in earnout consideration.

• Victory Park Capital and Privacore Capital, affiliates of Janus Henderson, launch Privacore VPC Asset Backed Credit Fund, a registered interval fund to provide institutional quality exposure to asset-backed credit.

• Viola Credit launched a $300M fund called Customer Growth Financing to offer credit solutions to B2C startups to finance direct market expenses for customer acquisition, competing with General Catalyst’s Customer Value Fund.

📈 Visuals

Source: S&P

Source: S&P

Source: Oaktree

Source: Oaktree

Source: Ridgepost Capital (fka P10) Investor Relations

Source: Apollo

Source: Evercore

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “There’s tremendous latency between when problems happen and when they’re found out by the market. There’s been incredible ‘innovation’ for better or worse in terms of hiding those markets in various ways. Hold to maturity, LMEs, or different forms of secondary transactions that allow people to kick the bucket further and further down the road. I think it’s a 2027 to 2032 problem. If you think about leveraged finance, you may not see secondary market bank debt trading down, but you will see that very same company coming to us to factor their receivables or lease their equipment at very high rates or potentially give up certain collateral that they otherwise wouldn’t to keep things going. They alternatively might be part of a secondary transaction that allows it to move along as well. The balloon gets pushed and it comes out in different ways that we haven’t seen before but it’s there “ - Dan Zwirn, Founder, CEO, and CIO of Arena Investors on latency between credit fundamentals and market feedback

• “We can look into those databases, and we can see exposures, whether the company’s growing. We can see leverage levels. We can see equity coverage. What we’re seeing is defaults are sitting at sub-2%—which is historically their normal low—and dropping. It’s been low, and it’s staying low. It’s actually dropping further. And leverage levels, if we put them in context, are actually not rising. They’re staying flat or dropping, which means equity coverage is also rising. All those data points are kind of flashing green. The opaqueness is what is concerning to people. And that I understand. It’s that you don’t have the ability to look in our database today to see what’s happening in there. But I think there is enough data available around the big points of average lending levels, equity coverage, default rates, etc., that I think are just not showing you that there’s some big crisis on the horizon.” - Erik Hirsch, Co-CEO of Hamilton Lane on overblown fears surrounding private credit

• “The ABF space, asset-based finance space is the hottest thing that any asset manager is going out to talk about. Our ability to differentiate ourselves where we could actually originate these loans and service these loans gives us a real edge over a lot of competition. So you’re going to continue to see, I think, the non-agency space grow. We just got to make sure that not just on us, quite frankly, as an industry, we maintain discipline around credit here.” - Michael Neirenberg, Rithm Chairman, President, and CEO on Rithm’s structural advantages in the ABF market

• “The tech portfolio continues to be the most pristine amongst all of our portfolios, amongst all of our subsectors. I appreciate we’re all looking forward, but remember, these are loans that are on average 30% of the value of the enterprise at the time of acquisition or LTV, with huge equity cushions. These are companies, on average, let’s be fact-based as opposed to headline-driven. Since November 2022, the advent of ChatGPT as some kind of moment of AI’s arrival, since that time, the portfolio on average has grown revenue 40% and EBITDA 50%. We’ll bring it much more current because we can all agree that in November, it was doing poems, so maybe it didn’t matter. But let’s bring it to this quarter. Fourth quarter, the revenue growth was 10%, and the EBITDA growth in those software names was mid-teens. That’s fourth quarter, quarter over quarter. It is not a monolith, and it’s listen. This is the opportunity. Obviously, when this happens, of course, markets get deeply disrupted.” - Marc Lipschultz, Blue Owl Co-CEO on Direct Lending exposure to software businesses

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Earnings

• Apollo, Ares, Blackstone, Blue Owl, Brookfield, Carlyle, Franklin Resources, Hamilton Lane, KKR, Rithm, TPG

Investment & Macro Outlooks

• 2026 Investment Perspectives (Blackstone)

• Crescent Private Credit Insights: January 2026 (Crescent)

Reading

• 2025 Annual FinTech Almanac (FT Partners)

• AI’s Promise and History Lessons (Guggenheim)

• AI’s Lending Risk Getting Tougher to Compute (Bloomberg)

• Easy-Money Loans Backfire on Rookies in the Home Flipping Market (Bloomberg)

• Hobbit-Inspired Startup Becomes First New Bank Greenlighted by Trump 2.0 (WSJ)

• How Ares Built an ABF Platform the Slow Way (Covenant Lite)

• How Fake Invoices Duped BlackRock Unit into a $400M Loan (WSJ)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Disperson (Oaktree)

• Distressed Buyer HIG Sees Most Loan Distress In Years (Bloomberg Credit Edge)

• Don Edwards: From Billions in Private Equity to 100,000 Students (Forged In America)

• Hard Lessons: Blackstone President and COO Jon Gray (Morgan Stanley)

• Jonathan Lewinsohn - Credit Microcycles at Diameter (Capital Allocators)

• Mike Gitlin: Inside Capital Group’s Philosophy, Ownership Model, and Long-Term Edge (In Good Company)

• State of Distressed Debt: Andrew Milgram on Middle-Market Opportunity (Bloomberg FICC Focus)

The Data Tapes

Setpoint’s Bite-Sized Debt Newsletter: January Edition II

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 💡 Lessons From a Market Wake-Up Call: Recent failures in asset-backed finance have raised the bar for transparency and control—our Head of Capital Solutions, Bart Steenbergen, breaks down what’s driving this reset and the verification standards lenders need to meet rising expectations from boards, investors, and regulators. Download the whitepaper.

• 🚀 We’re growing at Setpoint: Fresh off being named 2025 Fintech Game-Changer of the Year by Opportunity Austin’s A-LIST Awards and #1 Startup in Austin on LinkedIn’s 2025 Top Startups list, we’re expanding our team across key roles. Check out our open positions.

• 🤝 On the road this winter — let’s connect. We’re attending a number of industry events in the coming weeks. Here are three upcoming conferences our team will be attending, and we’d love to meet you.

  • MBA’s Independent Mortgage Banker’s Conference | Feb. 2-4, Amelia Island, FL. Book time with our team.

  • FFA’s Global Fund Finance Symposium | Feb. 2-4, Miami, FL. Book time with our team.

  • SFVegas 2026 | Feb. 22-25, Las Vegas, NV. Book time with our team.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• AB CarVal expanded its CRE private credit capabilities through new partnerships with Cedarline Lending to fund homebuilder loans, Sunday River to fund first lien transitional multi-family loans, and North River Partners for multi-family construction loans.

• Alterra IOS, an industrial outdoor storage (IOS) acquisition platform, closed a $100M revolving credit facility with BMO to support its acquisition pipeline.

• Atlantic Screen Group, a UK-based music and media company, raised $30M from Corrum Capital to finance acquisition of film and TV scores.

• Block (fka Square), a financial technology and payments platform, has surpassed $200B in global lending volume since inception across Cash App Borrow, Afterpay, and Square Loans.

• Bolton Capital, a specialty finance platform for the bulk hauling and transportation industry, closed a $20M revolving line of credit from Texas Capital.

• Crayhill, a credit fund, and Monarch Private Capital, a tax equity investment platform, closed a $300M JV to facilitate tax equity investments for renewable energy projects.

• Dext Capital, an equipment finance platform, closed its sixth ABS transaction.

• Duetti, a music investment company focused on indie music rights, closed a $50M Series C led by Raine Group alongside a $125M private ABS transaction. They also launched the Music Finance Index in partnership with Billboard.

• eHealth, a private online health insurance marketplace, closed a $125M asset-based revolving credit facility with Comvest.

• Elevex, a commercial equipment finance platform, closed a $1B forward flow agreement with TPG.

• Encina Lender Finance, an asset-based credit platform, closed a $75M senior credit facility to a specialty finance company to scale origination of its consumer lease-to-own assets.

• EquipmentShare, a connected jobsite and construction equipment rental platform, filed its S-1.

• GLS, an auto finance platform, raised $225.3M in a new securitization backed by a pool of prime auto loans.

• GM Financial, the captive finance company for GM, raised $1B in an ABS issuance secured by a pool of prime retail installment auto loan contracts.

• Goal Investment Management, a private credit manager specializing in US consumer assets, formed a JV with Ares to acquire consumer loan portfolios.

• LuminArx, a global asset manager, closed a capital solution for counterparties of an IG issuer to convert $140M in future payments due over eight years from the Issuer into immediate proceeds.

• Marblegate Capital, a fleet operator and specialty finance lender in the NYC taxi market, closed a $120M term loan with DZ Bank and a $17.2M term loan from Auxilior Capital Partners to expand its Signal Taxi operation.

• OneMain, a consumer finance platform, announced a $2.4B forward flow program with TPG.

• Pagaya, a consumer finance and residential real estate platform, closed a $350M revolving personal loan ABS with investment from 26North.

• Perseus Aviation, an aircraft leasing and finance company managed by Apollo, is preparing to sell $680.1M in an ABS deal secured by lease revenue on a portfolio of 27 aircraft assets.

• Reach Financial, a consumer finance and debt settlement platform, raised $550M in its first ABS issuance of 2026 secured by a pool of unsecured consumer loans.

• RESIDCO, a transportation equipment asset manager, closed a $100M commercial aircraft acquisition facility from Huntington Bank.

• Stellify Capital, an equipment finance platform, closed a $75M credit facility with SLC Management.

• Stream, a cash advance platform, closed a $10M senior credit facility from Pier Asset Management.

• Targeted Lending Co, an equipment finance platform, expanded its senior credit facility with Wells Fargo to $125M.

• Westlake, a technology-based auto finance company, raised $1.3B in an ABS deal secured by prime, subprime, and near prime contracts financing new and used vehicles.

💰️Platform Growth

• Ares raised $7.1B for its Credit Secondaries Strategy, including the final close of Ares Credit Secondaries Fund.

• Benefit Street Partners closed $10B for its flagship US Real Estate Debt strategy to originate senior and junior CRE debt investments across US with emphasis on multi-family.

• Brookfield announced its private wealth platform launched Oaktree Asset-Backed Income Fund (OABIX) with $400M in committed capital.

• CVC will manage insurance-focused private credit mandates for AIG of up to $2B, with an initial 2026 deployment target of $1B.

• Davidson Kempner announced the final close of DK Income Fund II, the firm’s global asset-backed private credit fund, to over $1.1B to invest across structured residential, corporate, specialty finance, and hard asset-backed loans.

• Invesco launches European Upper Middle Market Income Fund (ELTIF 2.0) to invest in a portfolio of European upper middle market, senior secured corporate loans.

• KKR increased its ownership stake in Altavair and AV AirFinance to deepen an existing partnership under which KKR has committed over $5B to aircraft leasing and lending transactions.

• KKR acquired Arctos Partners, a sports and secondaries investor, for over $1B

• Monroe Capital announced the final close of its 2025 Monroe Capital Private Credit Fund V with total investable capital of $6.1B to provide senior secured loans to lower middle market US companies.

• Nassau Global Credit, a $7B AUM multi-strat credit manager, launched a new Credit Opportunities strategy with commitments of up to $400M to deploy in performing, opportunistic, and structured credit.

• Patrimonium, a Swiss asset manager with €5B in AUM, entered into a strategic partnership with Bayview to launch a Commercial Real Estate lending platform with €500M in commitments.

• SCIO Capital, a UK-based asset-based private credit fund, closed a $600M commitment from Moody Aldrich Partners.

• Sixth Street announces the final close of Sixth Street Specialty Lending Europe III (SLE III) at its hard cap of €3.75B to provide financing solutions for companies across Europe.

📈 Visuals

Source: Apollo

Source: Apollo

Source: BlackRock

Source: Bloomberg

Source: Bloomberg

Source: Davidson Kempner

Source: Duetti, Billboard

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “We’ve built the capability in private credit over these past few years. It’s now a significant contributor to our balance sheet. In 2024 when [my deputy CIO] would’ve spoken to you, it was the best performing asset class for us. Last year it was strong, mid-double digits. I think there’s more headwinds in that space, but if you’re with the right partners and given the platforms we’ve built over the past few years, we remain quite bullish and firm on that space.“ - Khaldoon Al Mubarak, CEO of Mubadala, on private credit opportunities in 2026

• “Against the backdrop of European banks avoiding more complex, bespoke financing, there is a significantly lower quantum of leveraged credit investor capital in Europe – 5% in Europe versus 12% in the U.S. in GDP terms – resulting in less competition.28 Among the non-bank lenders in Europe – where there is roughly 50% of the private credit capital in GDP terms compared with the U.S. – there tends to be less scale and structuring depth. The gap is magnified for SMEs. By expanding the credit package to include revolving facilities, backed by accounts receivable and inventory, and term facilities, backed by property, plant and equipment and cash flow across different countries, an agile lender is able to structure a more holistic and efficient financing package that aligns with a borrower’s working capital needs and growth plans” - Davidson Kempner on the Private Credit and ABL Opportunity in Europe

• “When an industry grows this fast, there are going to be bumps and scrapes. There are going to be increases in defaults which are going to create headlines. Credit spreads are tight right now, so it’s a time to be thoughtful and defensive rather than lean in. Skewing away to the more complex, artisanal…large scale complex deals is where we’ve been able to generate returns as opposed to just bidding down the plain vanilla leveraged finance transactions. Large cap direct lending has been tight. Anybody who thinks otherwise isn’t really talking plainly.” - Julian Salisbury, Sixth Street Partner and Co-CIO on market dynamics in private credit

• “For the purposes of this call, given how little we know at this point, the way I would prefer to talk about it is just assume for the sake of argument that something in the general mode of price controls on credit card interest rates goes through, what would be the consequences of that. And I think the first thing to say, which you obviously know very well, is that the card ecosystem is an exceptionally competitive ecosystem. It’s among the most competitive businesses that we operate in.And that’s true for all levels of borrower credit score from a high FICO to low FICO. And so, in that context, just basic economics, when you start with that as your starting point, the right assumption about what the response of the system is going to be to the imposition of price controls is not that you will simply compress the profit margins, which are already at their sort of competitively optimal level, and thereby, pass on benefits to consumers. What’s actually simply going to happen is that the provision of the service will change dramatically. Specifically, people will lose access to credit like on a very, very extensive and broad basis, especially the people who need it the most, ironically.And so, that’s a pretty severely negative consequence for consumers, and frankly, probably also a negative consequence for the economy as a whole right now. I don’t want to let this pass without saying that I think it should be obvious that that would also be bad for us. I’m not going to get into quantifying.” - Jeremy Barnum, JPM CFO on Potential Risks to JPM, Consumers and the Economy driven by Proposed Regulatory Caps on APRs

• “We will be spending more in – I think that AI – we will be spending more, but it is not a big driver. I do think it’ll be driving more efficiency down the road. But I’d also point out about that, efficiency, because other banks have to do it too, will eventually be passed on to the customer. This isn’t like you’re going to build 3 points of margin and you get to keep it – you don’t. So, you need to build some of these things just to keep up. And you know we have – we look at – and we look at all of our competitors, but those competitors include all the fintechs. You have Stripe. You have SoFi. You have Revolut. You have Schwab. You have everyone out there. And these are good players, and we analyze what they do and how they do it and how we’d stay out front. And we are going to stay out front, so help us God. We’re not going to try to meet some expense target, and then 10 years from now you’ll be asking us the question how did JPMorgan get left behind.” - Jamie Dimon, JPM CEO on AI Spending and Fintech Competition

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Earnings

• Asset Managers: BlackRock

• Banks: BAC, C, FHN, FITB, GS, JPM, KEY, MS, MTB, PNC, RF, WFC

Investment & Macro Outlooks

• 2026 Credit Outlook: From Scarcity to Selection - The Return of a Buyer’s Market (Apollo)

• 2026 Market Outlook (Axar Capital)

• Medalist Partners 2026 Securitized Credit Outlook (Medalist Partners)

Reading

• Diameter Q425 Quarterly Letter (Diameter)

• Less for You, More for Me: Credit Reallocation and Rationing Under Usury Limits (NY Fed)

• A Series On Moat Trajectory: Part 1, Part 2 (WCM)

• Private Credit: A Primer on a Broadening Asset Class (BlackRock)

• The Perfect Storm: Why We Are So Bullish on the Asset-Based Private Credit Opportunity Set (Castlelake)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Europe (The Insight from Oaktree)

• Rapids of Private Credit: Opportunities in the Eddies of ABF (DK Extra Credit)

• Scott Kleinman - Apollo’s Integrated Alternatives Platform (Capital Allocators)

• Ted Koenig on Deploying $100B in Private Credit (Forged in America)

The Data Tapes

Setpoint’s Bite-Sized Debt Newsletter: January Edition I

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 💡 Lessons From a Market Wake-Up Call: Recent failures in asset-backed finance have raised the bar for transparency and control—our Head of Capital Solutions, Bart Steenbergen, breaks down what’s driving this reset and the verification standards lenders need to meet rising expectations from boards, investors, and regulators. Download the whitepaper.

• 🚀 We’re Growing at Setpoint: Fresh off being named 2025 Fintech Game-Changer of the Year by Opportunity Austin’s A-LIST Awards and #1 Startup in Austin on LinkedIn’s 2025 Top Startups list, we’re expanding our team across key roles. Check out our open positions.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• Achieve, a consumer finance platform, closed a $271.2M securitization backed by newly originated HELOCs. The company also closed its first debt settlement fee securitization, a $217.2M issuance backed by fees earned through Achieve Debt Relief.

• Atlanticus, a consumer finance platform, refinanced an existing $750M term securitization facility through the Mercury subsidiaries of Atlanticus.

• Balancehero India, the parent company of True Credits, closed a $75M USD credit facility from CIM.

• CapRelease, a UK-based embedded finance platform for ecommerce retailers, closed a $33.3M senior debt facility from PFG alongside a $2.7M equity financing.

• Cross River Bank, a NJ-based bank and fintech platform, completed a $288M CMBS issuance converting a pool of commercial real estate loans into bonds purchased by institutional investors.

• DailyPay, an earned wage access platform, closed a $195M senior secured revolving credit facility with JPMorgan.

• Enova, a consumer finance platform, agreed to acquire Grasshopper Bank, a digital bank with $1.4B in assets, for an aggregate purchase price of $369M.

• Equify Financial, a commercial lending platform, closed a $100M capital facility with JPMorgan to scale origination volume and strengthen its balance sheet.

• EquipmentShare, a connected jobsite and construction equipment rental platform, closed its fourth ABS deal raising $454M secured by EquipmentShare-managed equipment.

• Finance of America Companies, a home equity-based financing platform, closed a $2.5B strategic partnership to support origination growth alongside a $50M equity investment with Blue Owl.

• Forward Financing, a small business financing platform, closed its first ABS transaction totalling $170M.

• Harvest Commercial Capital, a small business lending platform, closed a $1B forward flow program with Blackstone (BXCI) to acquire business loans secured by first lien mortgages of owner-occupied commercial real estate.

• i80 Group, an asset-based credit fund, announced the acquisition of $250M of re-performing auto loans from a global financial institution.

• Imprint, a co-brand credit card issuance platform, raised a $150M Series D at a $1.2B valuation led by Khosla Ventures, with participation from Thrive, Ribbit, Kleiner Perkins.

• Katapult, a consumer lease-to-own platform, entered into an agreement to combine with The Aaron’s Company and CCF Holdings in an all-stock transaction.

• Lendistry, a tech-enabled small business lender, closed a $100M debt facility from KeyBank.

• Mondu, a Berlin-based B2B payments platform, closed a €100M debt facility from JPMorgan to scale payment solutions and expand across Europe.

• Morpheus Lending, a UK-based digital bridge lending platform, closed a £110M senior funding line with Pollen Street.

• Octane, a financial platform for recreational purchases, raised $100M Series F equity financing led by Valar Ventures alongside Upper90 and Huntington Bank.

• Pagaya, a consumer finance and residential real estate platform, closed a $321.4M ABS deal backed by a pool of unsecured consumer loans.

• Plata, a Mexico-based financial technology company, raised $500M in financing capacity from Nomura to scale origination growth.

• Point, a home equity investment platform, closed a $600M forward flow purchase agreement with MidOcean Partners.

• Redaptive Sustainability Services, an integrated energy-as-a-service platform, closed a $216M ABS deal secured by a pool of 1,445 performance contracts from 46 F500 obligors.

• Rostrum Pacific, an independently operated music company, closed a $150M financing from Crayhill to identify, acquire, and grow music catalogs.

• Unlock Technologies, a home equity investment platform, closed a $403.9M ABS deal secured by HEAs originated and managed by Unlock.

• Vield, an Australia-based crypto-backed lending platform, closed a $50M warehouse facility to finance secured loan originations.

• Willis Lease Finance, a commercial aircraft engine lessor, closed a $1B partnership with Blackstone to scale growth of their current and next gen aircraft engine portfolio.

• Zip, a consumer BNPL platform, closed a $283M warehouse facility with Victory Park and ATLAS SP.

💰️Platform Growth

• Abacus Global Management, an alternative asset manager, launched an asset-based finance strategy led by Monty Cook and Elena Plesco.

• Beach Point closed its second CLO totalling $402.5M, bringing the firm’s CLO origination platform to $1.7B.

• Brookfield is launching its own cloud business to lease chips inside data centers directly to AI developers.

• Deerpath Capital Management, a provider of senior, cash-flow based loans to sponsor-backed lower middle market borrowers, closed Deerpath Fund VII, exceeding its $2B target.

• First Eagle Investments to acquire Diamond Hill Investment Group for $473M.

• Janus Henderson Group plc to be acquired by Trian Fund Management and General Catalyst for $7.4B.

• KKR launches a European Rail Leasing platform with Green Mobility Partners to support demand for sustainable rail infrastructure in Europe.

• Monroe Capital launched Monroe Capital Enhanced Corporate Lending Fund (MLEND), a perpetual life, non-traded BDC to provide access to retail investors.

• PIMCO raised more than $7B for its asset-based finance strategy.

• Pinnacle Financial Partners announced the completion of the merger of Pinnacle Financial Partners and Synovus, operating as one bank holding company with a pro forma combined $117.2B in assets, deposits of $95.7B and loans of $80.4B.

• Silver Point Capital acquired a controlling interest in claims of Onset Financial and certain of its funding partners against First Brands Group and affiliates.

• SoftBank to acquire DigitalBridge, a global asset manager managing $108B of infrastructure assets, for $4B to expand SoftBank’s data center and connectivity capacity for AI.

• TPG, Jackson Financial to establish a strategic investment management partnership with a minimum commitment of $12B of AUM, beginning with an allocation to TPG Credit, initially focused on Investment Grade Asset Based Finance and Direct Lending.

• Transformco (formerly Sears Holdings), a provider of homeowner, loyalty, and financial services Fidem Financial, and Blue Owl, launched Aress Financial Services, a next-gen credit card and servicing platform for co-branded credit cards.

📈 Visuals

Source: WSJ

Source: Bloomberg

Source: Bloomberg

Source: KKR

Source: KKR

Source: KKR

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “The problem is that direct corporate lending has been pitched as a double-digit asset class, and it’s not today…As returns come down, it’s going to look more and more like a mid- to high-single-digit asset class.” - Tony Yoseloff, managing partner and chief investment officer at Davidson Kempner on return compression in direct corporate lending

• “Using an education analogy, we think a B is an A in this environment, but a C could be an F. Importantly, we do not believe that we are on the edge of a broad-based credit cycle in 2026. However, we do think that some of the excesses, especially from the 2021 vintage, are going to further manifest themselves in 2026. Beyond the 2021 vintage, pay particular attention to roll-up strategies that benefitted from suppressed interest rates and rich equity valuations coming out of COVID.” - Henry McVey, Partner & Head of Global Macro & Asset Allocation, CIO of KKR Balance Sheet on Caution around ‘Cheap’ Assets facing Competitive Pressures and Bad Balance Sheets

• “What we have really seen this year is Europe kind of having its renaissance…Investors are much more intrigued about how to diversify geographically…If that reform — which looks like it’s trending in the right direction — happens, that can open up what we estimate as close to $1 trillion of high-grade ABF opportunities. Insurers today are essentially penalized from a capital charge perspective to hold that type of exposure.” - Tal Reback, global investment strategist at KKR on the ABF Opportunity in Europe

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Investor Presentations & Outlooks

• 2026 Global Outlook: Pushing Limits (BlackRock)

• 2026 Outlook: The Year Ahead in 14 Sparks (Apollo)

• Credit in 2026: A Market That Demands Insight, Not Just Capital (Carlyle)

• Credit Outlook: Discipline Is an All-Weather Strategy (Brookfield)

• High Grading - 2026 Outlook (KKR)

• Private Credit: Fact vs. Fiction (Apollo)

• Stone Ridge 2025 Investor Letter (Stone Ridge)

Reading

• A Few Things We Learned - Q4 2025 (Octahedron Capital)

• Barclays bet on personal loans with $800M Best Egg acquisition (Rohit Mittal)

• Collateral Control Failures: What First Brands and Tricolor Reveal about ABF Oversight (Rithm)

• Defaults on art-backed loans soar in struggling market (FT)

• The Financing Gap in Sports: Unlocking a $2.5T Opportunity (Apollo)

• The Institutional Migration of Merchant Cash Advance and Revenue-Based Finance (Edgar Matthews)

• The Private Credit Party Turns Ugly for Individual Investors (WSJ)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Blue Owl’s Sean Connor - a growth company in a growth industry that is investing in megatrends (Alt Goes Mainstream)

• Credit Crunch: KKR’s Pietrzak on Asset-Based Finance, AI Impact (Bloomberg)

• Mike Gitlin - The Century of Capital Group (Capital Allocators)

• Patrick O’Shaughnessy, Colossus & Positive Sum (David Senra)

• Unpacking First Brands, rise of coercive restructurings - Eagle Point founder Tom Majewski (Credit Exchange)

• ‘Who’s the Next Winner?’: Diameter Capital’s Scott Goodwin (GS)

The Data Tapes

Setpoint’s Bite-Sized Debt Newsletter: December Edition I

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 🚘 Auto Finance News Spotlights the Push for Collateral Integrity in ABF: AFN Journalist Truth Headlam featured Setpoint and our Co-Founder & CEO Stuart Wall on how PledgeCheck delivers independent verification to confirm every asset is truly unique — and how it’s earning interest from 250+ institutions. Read the article.

• 🏆 Setpoint Named in ABF Journal’s 2025 Power Players: Technology: We’re honored to be recognized among the industry’s leading innovators for our work advancing facility management and driving new standards for collateral integrity in asset-backed finance. Read the feature.

• 🚀 We’re Growing at Setpoint: Fresh off being named 2025 Fintech Game-Changer of the Year by Opportunity Austin’s A-LIST Awards and #1 Startup in Austin on LinkedIn’s 2025 Top Startups list, we’re expanding our team across key roles. Check out our open positions.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• Ansley Park Capital, an equipment finance platform and portfolio company of Ares Alternative Credit, closed a $400M+ inaugural ABS deal.

• Eclipse Business Capital, an asset-based lending platform, upsized its senior credit facility with Wells Fargo to $2.355B.

• EquipmentShare, an equipment rental company, closed a $2.75B asset-based senior secured credit facility with Wells Fargo.

• Flex, a digital banking and lending platform for SMBs, raised a $60M Series B led by Portage.

• Haven Energy, a distributed energy platform, closed a $40M financing combined of equity, led by Giant ventures, and a debt facility provided by Turtle Hill.

• Hometap, a Home Equity Investment platform, announced a new $50M financing from Gallatin Point Capital.

• Jefferson Capital, a buyer of charged off consumer debt, completed its acquisition of the credit card portfolio from Bluestem Brands.

• Keystone National Group closed a $18.7M senior credit facility with a national specialty finance company to originate and grow its portfolio of debt receivables.

• LuminArx Capital, an global asset manager, announced the pricing and closing of UPGHI 2025-2, a $395M public securitization co-sponsored with Upgrade secured by a pool of home improvement loans.

• Nada, a home equity agreement platform, raised a $10M Series A led by Interlock Partners.

• North Mill Equipment Finance, an equipment finance platform, acquired Midland State Bank’s equipment finance portfolio for $502M in cash.

• Octane, a financial platform for recreational purchases, closed a $219M ABS deal secured by fixed-rate installment RV and marine loans.

• Omni Fiber, a provider of high-speed fiber optic internet services, raised a $150M debt financing from Stonepeak Credit and Oak Hill Advisors alongside a $50M equity investment.

• PayJoy, an emerging markets credit provider, announced a $140M corporate debt facility with Neuberger Berman.

• Point, a Home Equity Investment platform, announced a $2.5B capital commitment from Blue Owl to expand origination volume and extend their existing partnership.

• Shop Circle, an software acquisition platform, closed a $100M credit facility with i80 to scale enterprise software acquisitions.

• Splitero, a Home Equity Investment platform, closed a $283.3M inaugural rated securitization with Blue Owl, Antarctica Capital, and Kingsbridge Investment Partners.

• Thrivory, a healthcare AI platform with instant claims settlement, closed a $25M credit facility from Trinity Capital alongside a $3.5M equity financing led by Redesign Health.

• TriplePoint Venture Growth, a lender to venture-backed companies, amended and extended its credit facility of up to $400M with a syndicate of banks.

• Westwood Financial, a real estate investment firm, upsized its credit facility to $470M with a bank syndicate led by KeyBank, Capital One, and Truist.

• WhiteHawk Capital Partners, a private credit investment firm, upsized its credit facility with First Citizens Bank to $300M.

• Xposure Music, a tech-enabled financing platform for independent artists, closed a $42.5M debt financing from Andalusian Credit Partners alongside an equity financing.

💰️Platform Growth

• Allianz Global Investors raised EUR 1.2B for the first close of Allianz Private Debt Secondaries Fund II to focus on senior opportunities across managers, sectors, and geographies.

• Ares Management launches Marq, a new brand representing Ares’ vertically integrated global logistics real estate platform, that spans 600M square feet across the Americas, Europe, and APAC.

• Jefferies announced its acquiring a 50% interest in Hildene Holding Company, the parent company of Hildene Capital Management, a credit-focused asset manager with over $18B AUM.

• Nuveen Real Estate raises $650M for the final close of its US Strategic Debt Fund to invest in transitional commercial real estate opportunities across the US.

• Sardis Group, an investment firm specializing in securitized credit, launched Sardis Credit Opportunities Fund to invest in asset-backed, residential, and commercial real estate credit.

• Sculptor raised $4.6B for Sculptor Real Estate Fund V, exceeding the $3B target.

• TD Asset Management announced a sub-IG global private credit strategy across direct lending, real estate debt, infrastructure debt, and specialty finance markets.

• TPG announced a $6.2B fundraise for TPG Credit’s third Credit Solutions Fund to originate bespoke debt financings to public and private borrowers.

• Virtus Investment Partners announced a majority acquisition of Keystone National Group, a $2.5B AUM credit fund for $200M at closing with up to $170M in additional deferred consideration.

📈 Visuals

Source: JPMorgan Asset Management

Source: JPMorgan Asset Management

Source: JPMorgan Asset Management

🗣️ Market Commentary

• “Not much of this is new. When I joined PIMCO back in the late 1990s, I spent a good portion of my initial time at the firm focused on the underwriting of private assets. We called them pure privates. These were 4(a)(2) privates that were created as part of the Securities Act of 1933. 144(a) privates which are popular; I think the first one was issued in 1990. The technology being utilized to fund AI infrastructure today - some of these off-balance sheet contingent or make guarantee frameworks - were around in the mid-to-late 1990s. The difference today is you have this massive capital investment need so the deals are larger. But a lot of the technology has been dusted off so to speak for the new era. What’s been so unique in terms of credit asset performance in general has been the post-GFC period. Where we haven’t had a sustained period of economic weakness. Since the GFC, just blindly buying the lowest quality credit on the board, whether its private credit or lower quality public credit, you generated 7% a year more than high quality bonds. That explains a lot. Not surprisingly, you’ve seen massive growth in that part of the market. The reality is when you’ve grown this much, when you’ve lent so much money to weaker quality borrowers, when covenants have weakened, when spreads are tight, when equities have gone up as much as they have, you’re going to have challenges in these markets.” - Dan Ivascyn, CIO of PIMCO on Technology and Market Tailwinds Driving Growth of Private Credit

• “The infrastructure for AI requires a lot more power than anything we’ve ever seen from the computing infrastructure world. The individual racks to power these AI computing workloads are as much as 140 kilowatts, whereas a legacy rack to support a cloud data center 15 or 20 years ago was two to four kilowatts. The next generations are going to be 600 kilowatts, and then from there, a megawatt. That amount of power has depleted a lot of the existing energy that’s available to power data centers, and the demand for power for data centers has grown dramatically. That’s left us in this situation where we don’t have the energy that’s needed to power the demand coming from AI, so we need to build it. Crusoe has taken an energy-first approach, which entails building in areas where we can access low-cost, abundant energy resources to accelerate more abundant intelligence.” - Chase Lochmiller, CEO of Crusoe on Energy Requirements for AI Infrastructure Buildout

• “Today, the total addressable market for asset-backed securities represents many multiples of the private corporate credit market at ~$1.7T. This migration is unlocking scalable, high-quality opportunities (many investment grade) for investors and new financing avenues for issuers seeking true partnership. One large theme we are seeing is more corporates shifting to asset-light models and banks are moving toward longer-term funding partnerships rather than one-off sales.” - Daniel Pietrzak, Global Head of Private Credit at KKR on Private Credit Under the Hood

• “The cornerstone of any investor due diligence should be an understanding of the manager’s ability to source proprietary, diversified origination and a proven ability to do so over an extended period of time through multiple cycles.” - Steven Tenenbayev, CIO of InterVest capital partners on the importance of proprietary origination

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

Investor Presentations & Outlooks

• 2026 Annual Investment Outlook (Invesco)

• Alternative Investments Outlook 2026 (JPMorgan)

• Blue Owl Investor Presentation - Third Quarter 2025 (Blue Owl)

• Private Credit Potential and Peril (Wells Fargo)

Reading

• ABF Capital Flow Survey (DealCatalyst)

• Latest Howard Marks memo: Is It a Bubble? (Oaktree)

• Q3 2025 Private Credit Quarterly (Configure Partners)

• Moving America: Mortgages, Mobility, and Unlocking the American Dream (Citi GPS)

• Secretive $3T Fund Giant Makes Flashy Move Into Private Assets (Bloomberg)

• The Forgotten History of Insurance as America’s Original Private Lender (Covenant Lite)

Podcasts & Interviews

• Affirm’s Max Levchin Breaks Down How Buy Now, Pay Later Really Works (Odd Lots)

• Dan Ivascyn Is Excited About a New Era in Fixed Income (Odd Lots)

• David Rubenstein: Defining Great Investors, Guiding Presidents, and Preserving History (In Good Company)

• Gavin Baker - Nvidia v. Google, Scaling Laws, and the Economics of AI (Invest Like the Best)

• Henry Kravis on Building KKR, Deal-Making, and the Future of AI in Private Equity (Elad Gil)

• The AI Infrastructure of Our Future with Chase Lochmiller, CEO of Crusoe (McKinsey)

The Data Tapes

Setpoint’s Bite-Sized Debt Newsletter: November Edition II

The Latest in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes—your biweekly snapshot of private credit and ABS markets. In each edition, we bring you concise updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market trends, and the latest from Setpoint.

🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• 📽️ Setpoint on NYSE TV: Our Co-Founder and CEO, Stuart Wall, sat down with Ashley Mastronardi at the NYSE to discuss PledgeCheck, our newest product designed to help lenders & borrowers verify collateral integrity and prevent double pledging—bringing greater transparency and trust to the asset-backed finance ecosystem. Watch the full interview.

• 🎧 Beyond the Double Pledge — Building Trust in Private Credit: On The Credit Clubhouse, our Co-Founder and CEO Stuart Wall explains why stronger operational standards are needed in asset-backed finance, and how PledgeCheck helps rebuild confidence between lenders and borrowers through independent verification. Listen via DealCatalyst, Apple, YouTube or Spotify.

• ✅ PledgeCheck — A New Standard for Collateral Integrity: For decades, asset-backed finance has relied on borrower attestations and manual reviews — creating blind spots around whether assets are truly unique and properly pledged. PledgeCheck changes that, giving borrowers and capital providers a shared, independent certification of collateral integrity. Learn more.

• 🤝 We’re on the road — let’s connect: We’ll be at a few more industry conferences before 2025 comes to a close, and we’d love to meet.

  • SFR West, Dec. 2-4 — Scottsdale, AZ | Meet with us.

  • Opal ABS & Fintech Specialty Finance Forum, Dec. 9-11 — Dana Point, CA | Meet with us.

💸 Debt Financings & Acquisitions

• American Community Lending, a real estate bridge lender, closed a $17.5M IG corporate note financing to support lending operations and portfolio growth.

• Americor, a debt settlement platform, closed a $153.15M rated ABS deal collateralized by debt settlement fees. This represents the first rated debt settlement deal secured by settlement fees.

• Aviva, a Mexico-based consumer finance platform, closed a $50M debt facility with CIM.

• Beequip Equipment Finance, a Dutch equipment leasing platform owned by Apollo, closed a $576M ABS deal backed by leases for cranes, containers, maritime, and construction equipment.

• Bonside, a brick-and-mortar retail financing platform, closed a $100M capital partnership with i80 to scale origination volumes through Bonside’s Repeatable Revenue Agreement (RPA).

• Cardinal Capital Group, a private lender to real estate investors, closed its first RTL securitization backed by $130M in collateral.

• Capital On Tap, a UK-based small business credit card and spend management platform, closed a £500M asset-backed securitization secured by a pool of business credit card receivables.

• Cornerstone Financing, creator of Cornerstone Home Equity Insurance/Investment Funding Solutions (CHEIFS), announced a strategic asset purchase agreement of up to $1B with Fortress.

• Credit Acceptance Corp, a consumer auto lending platform, closed a $500M asset-backed financing.

• Drip Capital, a global trade finance platform, closed a $50M credit facility with TD Bank to support Drip’s Buyer Finance program in the US and Canada.

• ElmBlue Equipment Finance, a commercial equipment finance platform, raised a $125M credit facility from Wells Fargo to support additional lending capacity and scale originations.

• Keyzy, a UK-based rent-to-own platform, closed a £130M asset-backed, OpCo-PropCo partnership with Crayon Partners to expand its portfolio by 250+ homes in the greater London area.

• Klarna, a consumer BNPL platform, has agreed to sell up to $6.5B in long-term loans to funds controlled by Elliott Management, scaling the forward flow partnership they struck last year.

• Lambda, a GPU cloud business, raised over $1.5B in its latest funding round led by TWG Global to continue to buy additional GPUs and build its own data centers.

• Lighter Capital, a revenue-based financing platform for SaaS and technology businesses, closed a new $100M senior credit facility with i80 Group to expand origination volumes.

• Nelnet, a student loan servicing platform, closed a $745.1M ABS issuance backed by a pool of private student loans.

• PayPal, a consumer payments and credit platform, has agreed to sell up to €65B in BNPL loans to KKR as part of an extension to a two-year forward flow agreement that was struck in 2023.

• Pier Asset Management, a Los Angeles-based credit fund, closed a $15M senior secured credit facility to a construction payments and financing platform.

• Quantum Lending Solutions, a credit underwriting and small business lending platform, raised $400M in combined debt and equity from ATLAS SP, an unnamed private credit firm, and LL Funds.

• Regents Capital, an equipment leasing and financing platform for middle market borrowers, extended and upsized its credit facility with Bank OZK to $150M to fund new originations.

• SAPI, a UK-based small business finance company, closed a $75M debt financing with Hudson Cove alongside a $5M equity financing.

• TeamShares, a tech-enabled acquirer of small businesses, announced its combination with Live Oak Acquisition Corp V, a publicly traded SPAC, supported by a $126M common equity PIPE anchored by T. Rowe Price Investment Management. Investor Presentation can be found here.

• TruckSmarter, a freight software platform, announced the sale of its factoring business to OTR Solutions.

• Unlock, a home equity investment platform, closed a $303.5M HEA securitization sponsored by Saluda Grade.

• Upstart, a consumer finance platform, closed a $320M ABS deal secured by a pool of unsecured consumer loans.

• Virginia Atlantic Airways, a global airline, announced a $745M senior secured financing with Apollo secured by Virgin’s portfolio of take-off and landing slots at London Heathrow.

• Wisetack, a home improvement financing platform, announced a partnership with LendingClub where LendingClub will purchase participation certificates from Wisetack’s existing forward flow production and originate larger-ticket home improvement loans in the future.

💰️Platform Growth

• Arrow Global Group, a pan-European credit and real estate asset manager, announced a €1.5B Final Close for Arrow Lending Opportunities Fund I and a €2.7B close for its European Credit Opportunities and Related Credit Strategies.

• Brookfield Asset Management is launching a new AI infrastructure fund targeting $10B in equity, raising over $5B to date from investors including Nvidia, KIA, and Brookfield’s balance sheet.

• Diameter raised $4.5B in new commitments for Diameter Dislocation Fund III to invest in market dislocations through stressed, distressed, and special situations.

• Flagship Credit Acceptance, an auto finance platform, announced its acquisition by InterVest capital partners.

• Greystar announced the final close of GO II to originate, purchase, and manage senior, mezz, and pref equity investments collateralized by for-rent residential assets.

• Monomoy Capital Partners announced the final close of Monomoy Credit Opportunities Fund III, with over $500M in commitments to invest in senior secured debt in middle market businesses.

• Monroe Capital closed a $730.7M private CLO secured by a portfolio of lower and traditional middle market senior secured loans.

• Neuberger Berman raised $7.3B for NB Private Debt V, inclusive of leverage, to invest in senior secured, first-lien and unitranche loans to sponsor-owned companies.

• Newmarket, a Philadelphia-based credit fund, closed its fourth SRT fund with over $1B in commitments.

• Pollen Street AUM has grown to £6.7B in Q3 2025, up 32% year over year, driven by private credit and private equity fundraising.