New Mountain Finance Corporation (NASDAQ:NMFC) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

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John Kline: Sure. I can take a shot at that. Assets are being reset on a three-month to six-month basis. In some cases, one-month, but it’s a mix. And so you are right there. On our liabilities, the biggest facility that we have is with Wells Fargo, and that is reset to one-month LIBOR on a daily basis. So, that is I’d say, the number one driver of this mismatch that we see. Now, when rates go the other way, it will be good for us. But as rates continuously go up, it has been a headwind as we show on Page 12.

Ryan Lynch: Do most of your borrowers have the ability to switch to resetting on a monthly basis so that if rates do go the other way, you will still have a nice positive spread if your largest facility is resetting on a daily basis, but the spread won’t be quite as big if all your borrowers then switch to a monthly reset?

John Kline: Yes. So, borrowers in most credit agreements have the ability to do one-month, three-month or six-month. And so that’s a decision that CFOs at all of our borrowers are constantly making. And they don’t make this €“ they don’t all make the same decision at once. So, it’s a mix. But in the context of our main credit facility re-pricing daily in sort of a deflationary base rate environment regardless of whether the CFOs choose one, three or six, it will be a tailwind. Hopefully, that makes sense.

Ryan Lynch: Yes, that makes sense. Alright. Thanks for the clarification.

Operator: And our next question will come from Bryce Rowe with B. Riley. Please go ahead.

Bryce Rowe: Good morning guys. I wanted to maybe ask about the senior loan funds. You had kind of a nice uptick in dividends from the senior loan funds or programs. John or Rob, just curious if that same kind of lag exists within those funds that you see kind of with your on-balance sheet assets.

John Kline: It’s actually a lot less pronounced, namely because the leverage in the SLP or the LF , the senior loan funds that invest in syndicated loans is much more matched. So, when you think about just the overall, I guess the leverage in the funds it’s really 3:1 on average or a little bit less than 3:1. And so generally, just the €“ we are just less sensitive to that dynamic. And the only one of our SLPs does re-price on a daily basis.

Bryce Rowe: Okay. And then maybe one more for me. You had some nice realized activity here in the fourth quarter. I think last quarter, in November €“ in November’s call, you talked about being able to monetize. There were some highlights of that here as we look out over the next couple of quarters. Can you kind of talk about what’s €“ maybe what’s driving that? Is that kind of from the sponsor side of things, or are you actively looking to help to monetize some of these equity investments. Thanks.

John Kline: Sure. So, the equity investments that we have the ability to monetize and where we have a control or at least a lot of influence are really listed on Page 18. And so the names that you see on Page 18 are the names that were over the medium-term focused on selling and then using those proceeds to reinvest in cash yielding loans. So, it is an opportunity. The first of those assets that will be monetized should be Haven, and you can see the value of that. And then when you look at these other names, we think that over the next 12 months to 18 months, there could be another monetization, which could I think really drive a positive evolution of our book from either non-yielding or PIK yielding assets to cash-yielding assets.

Bryce Rowe: Got it. Okay. Thank you guys much. Take care.

Operator: This will conclude our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to John Kline for closing remarks.

John Kline: Great. Thank you very much for your time and joining our call, and we look forward to speaking with you next quarter.

Operator: The conference has now concluded. Thank you very much for attending today’s presentation. You may now disconnect your lines.

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