Michael Hart
Analyst · JPMorgan. Your line is open
Thanks, Dan. Good morning, everyone and thank you for joining us today for our quarterly earnings call, which as you know, is our first as a public company. I’m joined today by our management team, including our President, Jeff Levin; our Chief Risk Officer, Tom Hennigan; our CFO, Venu Rathi; and our Head of Originations, Grishma Parekh as well as other members of the team. I’d like to begin by welcoming our new and old investors as well as the analyst community to the call today. The second quarter represented not only another period of solid operating results, but the achievement of two important strategic initiatives. I’ll touch on a few of the highlights and provide a little historical perspective on our business. I’ll then turn it over to my colleagues to provide a more in-depth look at the financial results. Today, you’ll hear from Jeff, Tom and Venu, but on future calls and presentations, you’ll have an opportunity to hear from other team members at different times, and of course today during Q&A. Yesterday after the close, we reported second quarter net investment income of $0.47 per share, up from $0.46 in the previous quarter. We paid a second quarter dividend of $0.37 per share and the board on Monday of this week approved the third quarter dividend, which again will be $0.37 payable to shareholders of record on September 29th, and payable with payment date of October 18th. All components of our business contributed to the strong operating results, including the continued solid performance of our core portfolio, a record level of investment opportunities sourced by our origination team, and the continued scaling of our strategic partnerships. However, before we delve further into the operating results for the quarter, as I mentioned, I did want to take a few minutes to provide some historical perspective on our business and its strategy. More so than what I would expect to do in the future, but I think it’s important to level set given the inaugural nature of our discussion today and the important milestones that were achieved in the quarter. It’s been almost five years since our two private BDCs, GMS Finance and NF Investment Corp. were organized. Our investment thesis to our initial investors was to provide stable current income in the form of quarterly dividends with low volatility and capital preservation. The investment focus was sponsor back U.S. middle market financing activity, primarily in senior secured floating-rate loans. As we began investing, we were very focused on scaling the portfolio for all the related benefits. However, we balance that with the recognition that we were ramping during a period that was inarguably competitive. This influenced the pace of investment, which was very measured and where in the capital structure we chose to invest. It was also during this time that Carlyle invested strategically in the business, both in terms of people and in the development of strategic partnerships, by focusing on the platform it also allowed us to build out our origination and underwriting capabilities and also allowed us to put dollars to work at a pace we felt best match the market environment. In our investment selection, we avoided the more cyclical industry sectors and we have virtually no energy exposure. We’ve taken the approach of being more opportunistic when we invest down the capital structure, doing so, only when we saw highly attractive risk adjusted returns. Additionally, we look to leverage the Carlyle network and resources at every opportunity. This approach led us to evenly deploying approximately $ 3 billion of capital, putting it to work where we saw best relative value. Our view of the market over this time is probably best reflected in the composition of our portfolio. Today, we have a highly diversified portfolio of $1.7 billion, made up of over 100 investments, supported by over $1.1 billion in equity with approximately 74% of our exposure in first lien. The quality and scale of the portfolio allowed us to deliver a highly competitive yield. We often talk about a yield with defensive characteristics. The result of having the majority of our underlying investments positioned at the top of the capital structure. As a permanent capital vehicle, we didn’t want anyone cohort in the credit cycle to define the business. We do, however, think it’s important to have the capability to invest throughout the capital structure, and the experience of our origination and underwriting professionals reflect that. We think, a balanced business model is important to be competitive over the long term, and importantly through different points in the credit cycle. The platform in our portfolio today are a reflection of the strict adherence to our original investment thesis. The application of a consistent disciplined approach to underwriting and the connectivity to 1 of the leading alternative asset managers in the world. The second quarter saw the completion of two important strategic events. The first was the merger of our 2 BDCs: NF and TCG BDC, formally known as Carlyle GMS Finance. The merger was beneficial for both sets of shareholders. NF shareholders received accelerated liquidity, while the merged entity achieved greater scale and diversification as the NF portfolio represented largely overlapping positions. The merger was the final positioning of our business in advance of the second major strategic event in the quarter, our initial public offering, which was the largest IPO ever for a fully ramped BDC and reopened the BDC IPO market after a two plus year hiatus. We were very pleased with the outcome, as well as the process, which gave us the opportunity to meet new investors and establish many new relationships. So it was quite a quarter from a strategic standpoint. We’re very grateful to all of our investors as well as the many partners that have helped us arrive at this point in our development. While we feel a lot was accomplished in the quarter, we’re also extremely excited about looking forward, because in many ways, the IPO marks a new beginning for our firm. Our strategic partnerships are maturing and hitting critical acceleration levels. We’ve grown into one of the largest providers of capital in the middle market, and we continue to find new ways to further leverage our Carlyle capabilities. We have a lot of hard work ahead of us, plenty of opportunity and plenty of room for improvement, but we commit to all of you that we’ll continue to work hard to deliver to you the best risk- adjusted returns that we can. So with that, let me turn it over to Jeff to expand on our view of the market as well as our operating results.