Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Solar Capital Limited First Quarter 2016 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session and instructions will follow at that time. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, today’s conference may be recorded. I would like to introduce your host for today’s conference, Mr. Michael Gross, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. Sir, please go ahead.

Thank you very much and good morning. Welcome to Solar Capital Limited’s earnings call for the first quarter 2016 ended March 31. I’m joined here today by Bruce Spohler, our Chief Operating Officer; and Richard Peteka, our Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin, Rich, could you please start off by covering the webcast and forward-looking statements?

Sure. Thanks, Michael. I’d like to remind everyone that today’s call and webcast are being recorded. Please note that they are the property of Solar Capital Limited and that any unauthorized broadcasts, in any form, are strictly prohibited. This conference call is being webcast on our website at www.solarcapltd.com. Audio replays of this call will be made available later today as disclosed in our earnings press release. I would also like to call your attention to the customary disclosures in our press release regarding forward-looking information. Statements made in today’s conference call and webcast may constitute forward-looking statements, which relate to future events or our future performance or financial condition. These statements are not guarantees of our future performance, financial condition or results and involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially as a result of a number of factors, including those described from time-to-time in our filings with the SEC. Solar Capital Limited undertakes no duty to update any forward-looking statements, unless required to do so by law. To obtain copies of our latest SEC filings, please visit our website or [Technical Difficulty] 1670. At this time, I’d like to turn the floor back to our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Michael Gross.

Thank you, Rich. In the context of a volatile market environment, Solar Capital makes steady progress in the first quarter. Our conservative approach during the frothy credit markets over the past two years has resulted in us having a portfolio with strong credits and fundamentals together with available capital to drive our earnings at the right time in the right investments. The first quarter of 2016 was quiet with syndicated leverage loan and high-yield new issuance, given the heightened market volatility and continued economic uncertainty. The choppy public markets impacted middle market sponsor activity and what is traditionally a seasonally slow first quarter. Private equity buyers remain cautious during the quarter, given the recent financial market instability and valuation discrepancies between buyers and sellers. As a result, overall sponsor-driven middle market volume declined 21% quarter-over-quarter, the lowest levels recorded since the second quarter of 2013 according to PitchBook. And the value of upper middle market transaction volume fell over 70% compared to the fourth quarter 2015. This trend has begun to revert itself reaching a recent pickup in sponsor activity supported by the record levels of capital raised by private equity fund managers over the past two years. Solar remains focused on building the portfolio of earnings power for utilizing our available capital to make prudent investments across additional cash flow lending, asset-based lending for Crystal Financial, our senior secured unitranche program SSLP and Voya and PIMCO and our life science lending platform. As a result of slower sponsor activity, we had modest net originations in the first quarter, but that doest not tell the entire story. Approximately, $75 million of the $100 million of our total platform origination in the quarter came from our Crystal and life science lending team. The life science and asset-based origination demonstrate strategic value…

Thank you, Michael. Solar Capital Limited net asset value at March 31, 2016 was $890.6 million, or $21.08 per share, compared to $882.7 million, or $20.79 per share at December 31. At March 31, 2016, our investment portfolio had a fair market value of $1.34 billion, in 56 portfolio companies and 30 industries, compared to a fair market value of $1.31 billion in 54 portfolio companies and 30 industries at December 31. At March 31, the weighted average yield on our income-producing portfolio was 10.3%, measured at fair value versus 10.5% at December 31. For the three months ended March 31, investment income totaled $34 million versus $31.5 million for the three months ended December 31, 2015. Net expenses totaled $17.1 million for the three months ended March 31, compared to $14.5 million for the three months ended December 31. The investment manager voluntarily waived 795,000 of incentive fees for Q1 versus 994,000 for Q4 2015. Accordingly, the company’s net investment income for the three months ended March 31, 2016, totaled $16.9 million, or $0.40 per average share versus $17.0 million, or $0.40 per average share for the three months ended March – December 31, 2015. Net realized and unrealized gains for the first quarter 2016 totaled approximately $11.3 million versus the net realized and unrealized loss of $31.2 million for the fourth quarter 2015. Ultimately, the company had a net increase in net assets resulting from operations of $28.2 million, or $0.67 per average share for the three months ended March 31. This compares to a net decrease of $14.2 million, or $0.33 per average share for the three months ended December 31 2015. Finally, our Board of Directors declared a Q2 distribution of $0.40 per share payable on July 1, 2016 to shareholders of record on June 23, 2016. With that, I’ll turn the call back to our Chief Operating Officer, Bruce Spohler.

Thank you, Rich. Let me begin by providing an update on the credit fundamentals of our portfolio. The financial health of our portfolio companies remain sound, with the trends of continued modest growth and deleveraging continuing through the first quarter. On average, the most recently reported latest 12 months revenue and EBITDA across our portfolio companies for which we hold debt securities was up 5.2% on revenue and 9.7% on EBITDA, respectively, consistent with Q4’s results. Measured at fair value, weighted average interest coverage for our portfolio companies was 2.7 times at March 31, again, consistent with the prior quarter reading. At the end of the first quarter, the fair value weighted average EBITDA for our portfolio companies was just under $90 million. Clearly, we’re operating at the large end of mid-market. The weighted average investment risk waiting of our portfolio was 2.1 times when measured at fair market value, based on our 1 to 4 risk rating scale with one representing the least amount of risk. Measured at fair value just under 100% of our portfolio was performing at March 31. On a cost basis, our one investment on non-accrual accounted for 0.6% of the total portfolio. Excluding this one 2007 legacy asset, Direct Buy, our portfolio is performing extremely well. Furthermore, as Michael mentioned, we continue to have no direct exposure to the oil and gas and commodity sectors. At March 31, the weighted average yields on our income-producing portfolio was 10.3%. On a current cost basis, the weighted average yield on our income-producing portfolio was 10.1% at March 31. During the first quarter, our NAV increased 1.4% due to a combination of mark-to-market appreciation, resulting from the rally in the liquid credit markets, as well as fundamental improvement across specific credits, including WireCo and Global Tel Link.…

Thank, you Bruce. Since the inception of Solar Capital 10 years ago, our portfolio investment and management decisions have been focused on building long-term value and maintaining alignment with our shareholders. As credit market conditions became frothy over the past few years, we consciously migrated portfolio to approximately 90% senior secured subordinated loans in order to create a more defensive portfolio and conservative risk profile. In addition, during the waive of refinancings and elevator repayments, we did not chase the market and we were highly selective in our investments. As a result of choosing not to double or triple our pace of originations, we allow the portfolio to shrink and regulatory leverage to fall to zero on a net basis. Our portfolio decisions were driven by a focus on maintaining our disciplined underwriting standards and acting as a significant shareholder. Over the same period, we developed highly differentiated investment platform through Crystal’s asset-based lending and our life science venture lending businesses. Both strategic lending initiatives are less correlated to our traditional cash flow sponsor lending business and provide attractive risk-adjusted returns, while diversifying our opportunities for growth. We also created strategic partnership with Voya and PIMCO to provide additional origination scale that increase our opportunities and enhance our compatibilities to underwrite Unitranche Loans that we believe offer superior risk reward, protect with full covenants, and control as a $1.1 lender. In spite of the first quarter slowdown in the traditional sponsored finance business, we benefited from our diverse lending platforms with approximately $75 million of $100 million total platform originations coming from asset-based lending and life science teams. Moreover, having available capital enabled us to take advantage of our proprietary investment opportunity to acquire a diversified portfolio of life science loans. This transaction will have a significant impact on net…

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from the line of Jonathan Bock with Wells Fargo Securities. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Thank you for taking my questions. So clearly, we see the benefit of having a diversified platform, and I noticed that, you did predominantly only life science investments in the quarter in addition to the large portfolio transaction – beneficial portfolio transaction that you did in life sciences at this quarter. Yes, we wouldn’t have expected to see zero in terms of the kind of a steady stable cash flow lending business. So can you give us a sense of whether or not that picks up, and walk us through the reason, was effectively – was de minimis this quarter, relative to the market volatility, which we would have thought – would have presented you some opportunities to put some money out there at attractive yields in your core business?

Sure. Well, I guess, a couple of things, Jonathan. I would say that our core business is evolving, as you know, to incorporate our Crystal platform and our life sciences business. I think on the sponsor business, which has been on platform since inception, as you know, when dislocation occurs, it takes a few months for that to actually drift through to deal activity. So we’re starting to see that activity pick up in Q2, and would expect to see some more sponsor volume. But as you know, we operate at the upper end of mid-market and statistics are out that show volume of transaction activity was off 75% 80% in Q1 for the upper mid-market sponsor community. I would further add that our focus, as you know, was really on the – providing the unitranche spread senior product. That’s the risk that we are most comfortable with other than some opportunistic second liens like the MedAssets investment that we highlighted that unfortunately didn’t last long enough. So that product is starting to ramp, but we see more opportunities, as we get into Q2 and Q3. And that’s why I think you’ll see most of our sponsor activity.

Got it. And then, Michael, you mentioned the mid-teens IRR on the new purchase of life science’s assets just a question here. What’s the actual coupon coming off of that in that portfolio on average today?

Yes. The coupon is consistent with our current portfolio in the mid to high-teens. But given purchase price discount that we will be amortizing as we do any of our closing fees on deals over the life of the security. That takes you up to mid-teens, assuming their health and maturity. But as you know, most of these will repay in prior maturity. So there’s some upside on that yield. But the yield is nothing more than upfront discount and the coupon.

Got it. And then in terms of dividend policies with the acquisition of the life science portfolio with recent – and adding recent NOI going forward in the potential further mid-teens on the levered SSLP, is that grows, we’re pretty solid in seeing that Solar will start over earning the dividend as you have – as you grow leverage. And I would love to get your thoughts on dividend policy and spillover right, because you’re in a pretty unique position and a lot of folks can really be growing earnings in this environment and relative to their dividend, at least, and view on whether you pay more out, or whether you retain it, would be helpful?

Yes, I think what we – as we talk or we expect to be able to March earnings in the mid-40s level, I think, when we get there, we believe it’s sustainable that we have visibility over the next several quarters that will stay at that level. We’ll sit down with the Board and talk about increase our dividend. We do expect to increase our dividend at that time. And – but we wanted to do in a way that we provide adequate excess covenant as well.

Okay, great. I’ll hop back in queue. Thank you.

Thanks for your time.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Mickey Schleien with Ladenburg. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Yes, good morning, everyone. I was hoping you could give us an update on the SSLP’s credit facility, and the trajectory we might expect for growth in that vehicle?

Yes, I think to Jonathan’s question around the sponsor business, that is maybe where we’re focusing our sponsor activity is on the SSLP. We do have some transactions that are in pipeline as well as some things that we thought about perhaps moving in from on balance sheet that are some nice – low risk, but also lower returns that would benefit from the structure. So I think you’re going to see that pick up as we move into the second-half of the year. And I think as we talked about, we’re looking to time the closing of a credit facility. So that we can begin to leverage that entity as we have over at Solar Senior with FLLP.

Bruce, can you just remind us what kind of terms you’re thinking about for the facility?

Yes. The borrowing costs are in the L-2.75 area all in with upfronts, again, pretty similar to what you’ve seen us have and others on platform its borrowing base depending on the assets your – leverage – your advance ratios are anywhere from 0.55 up to 0.7 and it’s living breathing advance rate. So as the underlying credits improve, you can increase the advance rate in the effective leverage. But they tend to range between 1.5 and 2 turns of leverage and there are non-recourse facilities looking only to the assets.

I understand. In the past, you disclosed that the senior secured portfolio, if I recall correctly was in the neighborhood of 60, 40 second lien and first lien. But we’ve got lot of moving pieces now and with the addition of this new life sciences portfolio and the Unitranche strategy. Could you perhaps give us an update on what is, at least, within a range what is through the first lien and second lien and to the extent, you’re selling our first lien pieces, what’s Unitranche?

Yes. So as we mentioned our – as we look at – look through to your point, our comprehensive portfolio with this life science acquisition approaches $1.6 billion. And it is predominately first lien either Life Sciences, Crystal or Solar, traditional Unitranche. I would say that that number is approaching of second lien, as we continue to rotate out, is approaching roughly 30% with first lien being closer to 70%.

And that 70% includes the Unitranche deals?

Yes, yes.

Okay. And do you – how actively do you sell out first pieces of Unitranche?

Not at all.

Not at all, okay.

Just to be real clear there, I think that’s a great question. We generally – our attractive to Unitranche, because it is $1 risk and are uncomfortable by and large selling off the first lien in order to try to enhance our economics and effectively we create a first lien – second lien structure in a first out – last out. So…

We’d rather be in that securitization and get our additional return to additional leverage against the asset itself along itself as opposed to putting more risk in the world of enrollment.

I understand. My last question, I’m sure you’re frustrated that the stock is till trading below book value, although, obviously it provides an opportunity to buy back shares at accretive price. But from my perspective, perhaps one of the reasons that continues to be the case of the fee structure, which is to some extent out of line with more recent vintage BDCs. Is the Board taking a look at that at this point in time? And what is the outlook for perhaps a change in the fee structure to bring it more in line with the – with your competitors?

Yes, we talked about it on a regular basis as you would expect us to, I think the Board and most of our significant institutional supporters who have been with us for years, to your point, it’s an old structure, but I guess might not have been around a long time and they take comfort from our behavior rather than the contractual structure as evidenced by us both waiving fees as well as not putting on leverage in order to drive increased fees over the last couple of years that we have seen some frothy credit market. So it is something we continually evaluate. But I think based on the actual fees paid they’re very comfortable with where we are.

Okay. My last question, any comments you can give us on the issues that are confronting Bishop Lifting?

Yes, so as I touched on Wire Rope is the largest manufacturer of Wire Rope for variety of industrial applications including into the oil sector. Bishop Lifting is actually one of their largest customers. It is a distributor of Wire Rope, but that is not their only product. And so Bishop has struggled just as Wire did in terms of its sales of Wire Rope into the oil and gas sector. But they have much broader product offering and end markets that they’re selling into. So there is some technical mark there, but we feel very comfortable where we sit with the investment.

Terrific, thanks for your time this morning.

Thanks Mickey.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Ryan Lynch with KBW. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

I have one question, the pro forma you guys Life Sciences portfolios, it says about $210 million. I think you guys also mentioned a target portfolio size about $250 million. Just want to get a clarifications, is that target size based on kind of the capabilities you feel comfortable with the current team like current Life Sciences team you have in place today, or is that $250 million kind of based on relative size share portfolio, when I’m driving that is their potential at – you guys are looked to further expand your Life Sciences team, which would eventually be able to expand that target portfolio size?

Yes, good question. I think as mentioned, we are ahead of plan in terms of the ramp of that portfolio. These assets do have high amortization on a monthly basis, once you get typically 12 to 18 months into your investment period and this was the season portfolio. So both the assets that our team originated year or so ago on our platform as well as this portfolio will begin to run off. Having said that, while at GE, the team had its peak of portfolio approaching $500 million, so I think it’s fair to assume that we would see a target that would approach $300 million given how quick we ramped here. But bear in mind, the team similar as the rest of the Solar platform, shares are conservatism in terms of underwriting. And so we’re trying to keep them focused on taking the best-in-class assets out there rather than growing the portfolio then in particular size, but I think there is some upside beyond that 250.

Okay, great. That’s actually helps me. Thanks.

Okay, Chris.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Chris York with JMP Securities. Your line is open, please go ahead.

Good morning guys, and thanks for taking my questions. Some following up on Jonathan’s and Mickey’s questions a bit. So the manager has waived fees for a three consecutive quarters and so I was hoping if you could provide us an update on how we should be thinking about the sustainability in those fees, given that the purchase of their Life Sciences portfolio is now going to bring earnings above the dividend run rate?

Right, I think where we said pretty clearly on the conference call two months ago that we had volunteered to the Board as a manager to waive whatever incentive fees we took to make sure that we earned – not unchanged.

Okay, and then secondly, so I believe pro forma balance sheet leverage for the portfolio acquisition is maybe around 0.56 times. Would you say it below the target leverage of 0.65? So fully ramped, what you expect the ROEs should expand too?

Look as we said, when we hit our target debt-to-equity we expect to be in the mid-40s on terms of earnings, on a quarterly basis and when we get SSLP fully ramped, which is no additional leverage to us effectively on a regulatory basis, that number should grow beyond that.

And Chris, the target is 0.65 to 0.75.

Okay. 0.75, okay. So that would maybe, so 9% ROE kind of on the net investment income basis, sound about right?

Probably a little higher when you get SSLP fully ramped.

Got it, okay. And then lastly for me, it look like Aeropostale filed reorg paperwork in Manhattan and it appears that Crystal is providing the dip. So I was curious, if you could provide us an update on the terms of this facility, and then if you have any exposure related to the bankruptcy?

Yes, we’re…

Yes, we went into the part of bankruptcy, this was a strategy. We put the money as a dip going to bankruptcy and that’s what it based on.

And you should see some exposure on both Crystal as well as Solar’s balance sheet. Question will be sort of how long the duration will be based on the company’s strategy? But we’re excited that we can capitalize on Crystal’s longstanding track record of lending to and investing in retailers and underwriting their current assets. And so we think this is the unique opportunity. Crystal was extremely well-positioned and we expect to see more of these.

Great, that’s it from me. Thanks, guys.

Thanks.

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from line of Doug Mewhirter with SunTrust. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hi, good morning. I just have one question. I think you bought back a few shares this quarter kind of slow. What – how are you approaching share repurchases? I know you had that the big life sciences purchase, but you’re still relatively under levered and the core sponsor business is still trying to get traction. So if the core sponsor business is still a little slow in the second quarter, would you anticipate repurchasing additional shares?

The answer to current level is, no, we’re trading pretty close to $0.09 book value. We don’t think it’s a great use of capital to buyback stocks yielding dividend in $0.08 and given our potential return on new investments. That said, we put the plan in place to originally to allow us to buy stock in periods of extreme dislocations. The stock we bought was sub-$15, which we think was a great purchase price sub-$16, I’m sorry, a great purchase price. And so you should expect that we come back into our blackout period, where we put other 10b5 plan in place. So that if we do hit extreme dislocation again that we have the ability to buy stock.

Okay, thanks. That’s all my question.

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Christopher Testa with National Securities Corporation. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. Just with your remarks on better covenants and structure from last year, I was just curious how you see those – how you see those different in the sponsor or non-sponsor sides of the business?

Sure. On the non-sponsor slide and that’s pretty much where Crystal operates. There’s always covenant packages, it’s just a matter of degree of tightness. But that is generally not a covenant like product. I would say, the same is true for Unitranche, which is another reason we like it in addition to being $1 in the capital structure of the borrower is that, they do come with full covenant packages. I think where covenants have come in is in the broader market. You’ve seen less – light issuance in the first quarter, obviously, there was also not a lot of issuance in an absolute basis. But you have seen covenants come back into some of the syndicated structures in order to clear deals.

Okay, great. And with the life sciences, one thing, are you seeing less competition, more people kind of pulling back there? And also with regards to life sciences, where are you seeing most of the pipeline of opportunity there in terms of ROE intermediate late stage et cetera.

Yes. So the life science business really hasn’t changed dramatically. It is a clubby business, in which two or three people who maybe four who would operate in it, tends to share paper with each other depending on who wins the mandate. It’s not typical for somebody to take down the whole deal, again, it’s a club deal. And the only real change that happened is obviously GE exiting the business, also having the good portion of bringing their team on our platform and now Capital One exiting the business as part of the sale of the portfolio to Solar. I’m sorry, second part of your question?

Just, where Life Sciences, where the pipeline is most concentrated whether it would be early stage or later stage?

Yes, so our key focus is on late stage exclusively that’s where we are most comfortable from a risk perspective that we have diversified portfolio of drugs or devices that has either commercialization in some cases, some of our deals are actually have revenues and we have an occasional deal or two that has positive cash flow, which is unique for the sector. But we like late stage, we don’t like binary outcome, we feel that’s more of an equity play where you’re taking a lot of warrants and you’ll have some wins and losses. So our team has a phenomenal track record in consistency of returns and that’s where we like to play and that tends to be in late stage.

Great, and just with the unrealized depreciation, do you have an indication of what percentage of that came from specific credits, and how much was from the general recovery and markets at the end of the first quarter?

Yes, I would say that roughly 60% was from specific credits and as you know the mark was up a little bit by the end of the quarter and so call it 40%, or so was across the market.

Great, that’s all for me. Thanks guys.

Thank you.

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from the line of Rich Shane with JPMorgan. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Thanks, guys for taking my question. Just like a little bit of additional information on the portfolio you bought from Capital One, specifically that was a pretty significant acquisition for them, love to understand why this specific portfolio that you acquired wasn’t a good fit and what for them and why it is for you?

Yes, I mean I’m not going to speak for them, but our speculation is that this was a very small piece of the entire healthcare portfolio that they bought from GE. And one of the reasons is why GE add to the business was regulatory issues and frankly these assets are quite expense from regulatory perspective for the commercial banks to whole given that there is no cash for these businesses. And so I think given the size of it, they decided to divest it and given that we had a very unique knowledge base of the portfolio. We were the logical party for them to go to and they did so effectively and exclusive basis. And for us it basically allowed us to move towards our goal and our ramp with asset, but our team knew and we’re able to re-underwrite and add additional diversification and met all of our return environments.

Got it, okay. And I apologize, we’re bouncing around between conference calls today, so if you mentioned this specifically, I know that you were the exclusive bitter for this, but did they actually approach you directly because of that history?

Yes.

.:

Great, thank you, guys.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. And I’m showing no further questions, and I’d like to turn the conference back over to Mr. Michael Gross for any closing remarks.

Thank you, very much for your time and attention this morning continued support, we look forward to talking to you in next few weeks and at the end of our next quarter.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for participating in today’s conference. This does conclude the program, and you may all disconnect. Everyone have a great day.