Key Takeaways
- • KBRA Analytics launched Private Credit Benchmarking on its Credit Intelligence platform, which it describes as the market's first borrower-level benchmarking solution built entirely on analyst-adjusted financial data.
- • The benchmarks draw on more than 4,000 unique middle-market borrowers and nearly 300,000 analyst-adjusted financial data points, drawn from KBRA's evaluation of more than $1.3 trillion in private credit debt issuance.
- • The tool provides standardized, normalized views of leverage, interest coverage, profitability, revenue growth and other credit metrics, filterable by industry, borrower size and segment.
- • The product is positioned for general partners, lenders and other market participants seeking comparable peer assessments in an asset class KBRA characterizes as multi-trillion-dollar and opaque.
Summary
KBRA Analytics, a provider of data, financial information and credit analysis solutions, announced the launch of Private Credit Benchmarking on its Credit Intelligence platform. According to the company, the product is the market's first borrower-level benchmarking solution built entirely on analyst-adjusted financial data, and it is aimed at a long-standing information gap in private credit: the difficulty of making objective, comparable assessments of middle-market borrowers.
The benchmarks are built on a dataset of more than 4,000 unique middle-market borrowers and nearly 300,000 analyst-adjusted financial data points. KBRA states that these data points derive from its experience evaluating more than $1.3 trillion in private credit debt issuance. The output is a standardized, normalized view of leverage, interest coverage, profitability, revenue growth and other key credit metrics, which users can filter by industry, borrower size and segment. KBRA contrasts its approach with competing offerings that rely on fund-level aggregates or as-reported company financials, arguing that its benchmarks apply the same analytical rigor used in its credit assessment process to deliver a truly comparable peer universe rather than a proxy.
Kate Kennedy, Chief Corporate Strategy Officer at KBRA, said that private credit markets "have matured dramatically but are still opaque," and that the benchmarks are intended to give market participants the foundation to underwrite with greater confidence, monitor portfolios more precisely and communicate credit positioning to investors.
The benchmarking tool is available directly within Credit Intelligence alongside KBRA credit opinions, and users can incorporate it into internal credit committee work and investor reporting. The launch expands Credit Intelligence into a single environment combining benchmarking, proprietary borrower-level data, credit assessments and reporting. KBRA Analytics, LLC is an affiliate of Kroll Bond Rating Agency, LLC and is a portfolio company of Parthenon Capital.
The benchmarks are built on a dataset of more than 4,000 unique middle-market borrowers and nearly 300,000 analyst-adjusted financial data points. KBRA states that these data points derive from its experience evaluating more than $1.3 trillion in private credit debt issuance. The output is a standardized, normalized view of leverage, interest coverage, profitability, revenue growth and other key credit metrics, which users can filter by industry, borrower size and segment. KBRA contrasts its approach with competing offerings that rely on fund-level aggregates or as-reported company financials, arguing that its benchmarks apply the same analytical rigor used in its credit assessment process to deliver a truly comparable peer universe rather than a proxy.
Kate Kennedy, Chief Corporate Strategy Officer at KBRA, said that private credit markets "have matured dramatically but are still opaque," and that the benchmarks are intended to give market participants the foundation to underwrite with greater confidence, monitor portfolios more precisely and communicate credit positioning to investors.
The benchmarking tool is available directly within Credit Intelligence alongside KBRA credit opinions, and users can incorporate it into internal credit committee work and investor reporting. The launch expands Credit Intelligence into a single environment combining benchmarking, proprietary borrower-level data, credit assessments and reporting. KBRA Analytics, LLC is an affiliate of Kroll Bond Rating Agency, LLC and is a portfolio company of Parthenon Capital.
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