The Data Tapes: October Edition II – Key Moves in ABS and Debt Markets

Welcome to The Data Tapes, your go-to source for the latest in private credit and ABS markets. Twice a month, we deliver bite-sized updates on debt financings, platform fundraises, data insights, market analysis, and the latest from Setpoint.

 🚀 What’s New at Setpoint

• Heading to ABS East next week? Let’s connect! Fill out your info here to schedule time with our team.

• Catch our CEO Stu Wall on Peter Renton’s Fintech One-on-One podcast, discussing how Setpoint is automating decades-old manual processes in capital markets.

• We're honored to have just been named Best AI-Powered Platform by Inman, recognizing how Setpoint’s AI capabilities are transforming debt facility management for lenders and borrowers.

💸 Debt Financings

• Aaron’s, a lease-to-own platform for consumer retail, closed a $120M asset-based credit facility agented by Second Avenue Capital Partners and Pathlight Capital, as part of a broader financing package for Aaron’s take-private by IQVentures.

• America’s Car-Mart, a buy-here, pay-here used car dealership, completed a $300M term securitization transaction.  

• Americor Funding, a consumer finance platform, is raising a $105.9M ABS issuance underwritten by Jefferies. 

• Backflip, a fintech platform for real estate entrepreneurs, raised two private credit funds totaling $30M in equity and $154M of asset-backed financing to fund residential transition loans from ECMC, Setpoint Capital, and others.  

• Best Egg, a consumer lending platform, announced a $500M forward flow commitment from Fortress and Edge Focus, which includes a forward flow purchase commitment and purchases of back-book loans facilitated by Best Egg. 

• Clara Capital, a SMB lending platform, closed a $20M credit facility with Revere Capital to finance originations. 

• Concord, a music and entertainment company that acquires catalogs including Genesis, Phil Collins, R.E.M., Carrie Underwood, and Creed, is raising $850M through an existing ABS deal to acquire approximately $217M in new assets. 

• CoreWeave, a cloud infrastructure provider for artificial intelligence, closed a $650M credit facility from a bank syndicate including JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and others. 

• Dell Equipment Finance, the captive financing arm of Dell, is issuing $1B in ABS backed by a pool of commercial loans and leases on technology related equipment and software licenses. 

• FirstLight Fiber, an independent fiber bandwidth infrastructure provider, closed a $120M credit facility with Sixth STreet and Palistar Capital. 

• Hilton Grand Vacations, a global timeshare company, announced a $400M Senior Secured Term Loan A issuance to reduce interest expense and optimize balance sheet. 

• Hometap, a home equity investment platform, closed a $230M ABS transaction with Texas Capital Securities serving as structuring lead and joint bookrunner. 

• Idea Financial, a small business lending platform, closed a $50M warehouse facility led by Performance Trust Capital Partners to scale originations. 

• Lendbuzz, a consumer auto finance platform, completed a $262M asset-backed securitization collateralized by a pool of auto loans. 

• Mercury, an SMB neobank and credit platform, closed a $100M warehouse facility with Natixis to fund corporate credit card receivables for SMB customers. 

• Mulligan Funding, a small business lending platform, received KBRA ratings on a $120M ABS issuance secured by a portfolio of receivables with participation interests in business loans. 

• OpenAI secured a $4B revolving credit line from a bank syndicate including JPMorgan, Citi, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Santander, Wells Fargo, SMBC, UBS, and HSBC. 

• Porsche Financial Services, the indirect financing arm of Porsche, issued a $966M auto lease ABS offering by a pool of auto lease contracts. 

• SoFi, a consumer fintech platform, announced a $2B partnership with Fortress to support SoFi’s lending business by referring pre-qualified borrowers to loan origination partners as well as origination loans on behalf of third parties.  

• Southland Holdings, a construction company focused on large-scale infrastructure projects in the US, closed a $160M senior credit facility from Callodine Commercial Finance. 

• Upstart, a consumer lending platform, announced a $2B forward flow agreement from Blue Owl / Atalaya.

💰️Platform Growth

• Apollo closed Apollo Origination Partnership II with $4.8B of investable assets focused on corporate and sponsor-backed direct lending. 

• Arena Investors and Ceres Life Insurance announce a combination to create an integrated insurance and asset management platform, catalyzed through a $250M investment from CC Capital into Westaim.

• Ares announced an acquisition of GCP International, a global real estate investment manager. 

• BlackRock completed its acquisition of Global Infrastructure Partners. 

• Blue Owl announced an agreement to acquire IPI Partners, a digital infrastructure fund manager with $10.5B in AUM, from ICONIQ Capital and Iron Point Partners for a purchase price of $1.0B. 

• Canyon Partners launched an evergreen fund strategy targeting performing, income-oriented credit strategies across corporate, real estate, and asset-backed credit. 

• Forum Investment Group, a private real estate fund focused on multi-family, closed a $226M new fund vehicle. 

• Pagaya and LendingClub announced a joint acquisition of the IP behind Tally Technologies.

📈 Visuals

 🗣️ Market Commentary

• “We’ve always been focused on the disintermediation of the banks…Whether it’s equipment, rail, aerospace, consumer funding, the total addressable market is way bigger than the private credit market.” - Blue Owl Co-CEO Doug Ostrover on the growth of asset-based finance

• “We are growing our asset-backed financing business…We are putting a lot of focus there and investing in it.” - Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon 

• “So we are going to [participate in private credit] directly and we are going at $10 billion, could be $20 million or $30 billion, not limited today. I will say today we're extending -- we will do $500 million, we will do $1 billion, we will do more billion, we'll do it sole-handed or do it with partners. Very importantly, we are not going to allocate ourselves to one partner. So we have -- and I think we've announced a bunch of co-lenders, but that just creates more flexibility and more size.” - JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon

📖 What We’re Reading & Listening To

• Alt Goes Mainstream podcast interview with Evercore’s Glenn Schorr on the growth of alternative asset managers in public markets, from Michael Sidgmore

• Changing Face of Finance, from Marc Rubinstein 

• Measuring the Moat, an updated edition from Michael Mauboussin 

• Navigating the Asset-based Finance Frontier, from KKR

• Marc Rowan interview on private markets, US election, and Fed interest rates, from Bloomberg

• Primer on AI Data Centers, from Eric Flaningam of Generative Value