TriplePoint Venture Growth BDC Corp. (NYSE:TPVG) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Crispin Love: Okay. Okay. That makes sense. And then just a broader question on the industry and the competitive environment. I’m curious if you could just talk about how the competitive environment has shifted recently or I guess, over the last few quarters since the bank turmoil earlier this year? Are you seeing any recent activity from banks getting involved or a pickup from private lenders or just — or any others in the space where that’s impacting the competitive landscape there?

Sajal Srivastava: Yes, I would say, if anything, we continue to see pullback of the nontypical nontraditional non-long-term participants in the market. And then I would add, overall, as you’ve seen just from most of us reporting that I’d say deal volume has slowed down. And so I wouldn’t say anyone is taking necessarily more market share or the competitive dynamic, particularly on the tech side, has materially changed.

Operator: The next question comes from Christopher Nolan with Ladenburg Thalmann.

Christopher Nolan: Given your comments on the leverage, should we assume that the cash levels remain at elevated levels in the fourth quarter?

James Labe: Yes.

Sajal Srivastava: And then Jim can comment a — and then the comments in terms of maintaining the NAV rather than increasing the dividend, should we read into that higher excise taxes going forward?

James Labe: Yes. Yes. So we had an additional accrual of about $325,000 this quarter to do, I’ll call it, catch-up given that we were over earning consistently so far this year. So we should expect a higher level of excise tax through the end of the year.

Christopher Nolan: And final question. A while ago, I believe the Journal had an article talking about how the SEC was looking possibly at applying a fiduciary standard to venture capital investments where it would effectively raise the bar in terms of the responsibility of the venture capital investor in new companies. And I don’t know whether or not you heard of anything like that and if you have, if you have any comments on it?

James Labe: I have not — just looking around the table, not heard about or look too deeply. I would only comment, Chris, that given the fact that we work with a very select group of venture capital investors whom we’ve had long-standing relationships, they’re generally very active investors in their portfolio companies as well. And so with their board seats with their involvement and with their strong opinions. So I would say, well, I guess, generally, it could be viewed as a good thing. I would say our investors are already pretty active with our portfolio — or their portfolio companies in general.

Operator: The next question comes from Vilas Abraham with UBS.

Vilas Abraham: Just on the nature of the repayments that you received in the quarter, the prepayments there as high as they’ve been in a couple of quarters. Is any of that pull forward from what you may have expected in Q4?

James Labe: No, not really. So ForgeRock was the largest that we had indicated we expected a prepayment, and that’s the lion’s share of the prepayment that occurred this quarter, and that was not pulled from, say, a Q4 event.

Vilas Abraham: Okay. And then as we think about deleveraging starting the beginning of next year, is that just really going to be a function here of what prepayments look like in the first half?

Christopher Mathieu: Yes. You think it’s a combination of contractual repayments, just the normal aging of the portfolio and the schedule of the principal that comes through. We have a couple of loans that are also maturing in the first half of the year. And usually, we see 1 or 2 loans prepay each quarter. So even if it’s a more muted prepayment environment, we still expect to see some of that. So it’s a combination of all of that.