MILWAUKEE--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Looking Glass Investments (LGI), a fixed-income alternative investment firm focused on marketplace lending, announced today that Main Street Capital Corporation (NYSE:MAIN), a Houston-based capital solutions partner for lower middle market companies seeking to grow or transition ownership, purchased an equity stake in LGI and invested directly in private investment vehicles managed by LGI.
“By any measure, Main Street is a top-tier business development company and their investment represents an important recognition of what we have accomplished,” said Matthew O’Malley, President and Chief Operating Officer. “Main Street’s investment capital will be used to support the ongoing development of our underwriting technology, our data management, and our rigorous investment research process managed by our team of Ph.D. economists.”
“We are pleased to become a strategic partner with Looking Glass Investments,” said Dwayne Hyzak, President and Chief Operating Officer of Main Street. “Looking Glass has built superior predictive analytics models supported by efficient technology. As this asset class continues its explosive growth we believe LGI will emerge as the premiere manager in this space.”
The increased level of federal and state regulation after the Great Recession placed traditional banks in position to essentially discontinue unsecured lending products. Marketplace lending has addressed this demand in a way that has brought positive feedback from regulators, such as the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, which wrote last year, “Individuals who either cannot get loans from traditional banks or who wish to consolidate their credit card balances at lower interest rates find peer-to-peer (marketplace) lending an attractive alternative.”
According to Morgan Stanley, domestic marketplace loan origination has doubled every year since 2010 and is expected to reach $122 billion by 2020. According to data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, marketplace lending has been growing at an average pace of 84 percent a quarter.
Said O’Malley, “The partnerships we have established with Lending Club, Prosper, Funding Circle, and Peerform over many years places our firm in a position to grow with the market. These platforms, among many others, have created a market for investors and consumers which we believe will drive significant growth in the U.S. and around the world. This is the future of finance.”
About Looking Glass
Looking Glass Investments (www.lgiresearch.com) manages a series of proprietary fixed-income alternative investment strategies for accredited investors and institutions. Founded in 2006 to research marketplace lending, and investing since 2012, the firm seeks to generate consistent income with low volatility. The firm’s statistical and mathematical models are researched, developed and maintained by PhD economists, mathematicians and experienced financial professionals.
About Main Street Capital Corporation
Main Street (www.mainstcapital.com) is a principal investment firm that provides long-term debt and equity capital to lower middle market companies and debt capital to middle market companies. Main Street’s portfolio investments are typically made to support management buyouts, recapitalizations, growth financings, refinancings and acquisitions of companies that operate in diverse industry sectors. Main Street seeks to partner with entrepreneurs, business owners and management teams and generally provides "one stop" financing alternatives within its lower middle market portfolio. Main Street’s middle market debt investments are made in businesses that are generally larger in size than its lower middle market portfolio companies. Main Street’s common stock trades on the New York Stock Exchange (“NYSE”) under the symbol “MAIN.” In addition, Main Street has outstanding 6.125% Notes due 2023, which trade on the NYSE under the symbol “MSCA.”
