How Oaktree's Head of Sourcing Finds the Next Great Deal
Nov 28, 2024
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Milwood Hobbs, Managing Director at Oaktree, shares his expertise in credit investing, highlighting the challenges in sourcing deals. He explains how he navigates the private credit landscape, focusing on relationship management and negotiation tactics. Listeners learn about the impact of the Dodd-Frank Act on market dynamics and the evolution of credit markets. Hobbs emphasizes the significance of due diligence to uncover potential risks and stresses the importance of adaptability in forging essential partnerships.
Millwood Hobbs highlights the vital role of relationship-building in private credit, emphasizing how connections influence deal origination and negotiations.
The podcast discusses the significant evolution of the private credit market post-Dodd Frank, requiring firms like Oaktree to adapt to new capital dynamics.
Effective negotiation in finance involves anticipating future disputes while balancing relationship management with achieving favorable deal terms and outcomes.
Deep dives
The Importance of Deal Toys in Finance
Deal toys serve as commemorative items for professionals involved in mergers and acquisitions, marking the successful completion of financial transactions. These tokens can vary widely, from simple Lucite blocks to more creative representations related to specific deals, such as car keys for a Ford-Hertz transaction. The discussion reveals how deal toys not only celebrate achievements but also reflect the personal attachment professionals have to their work, with memorable instances highlighting the fun nature of some tokens. Collecting these mementos represents a form of nostalgia and pride within the finance industry, showcasing the blend of professionalism and personal recognition.
Evolving Roles in Private Credit
The private credit market has undergone substantial evolution, especially post-Dodd Frank legislation, which changed how capital markets operate and how private equity firms are structured. As traditional roles within firms have adapted, companies like Oaktree have shifted to emphasize relationship-building and deal origination. Millwood Hobbs discusses the necessity of developing strong connections with counterparties to ensure that his team is not only involved in the first call but also maintains the last call in critical deal negotiations. This change indicates a broader industry trend that values interpersonal relationships as much as financial acumen in securing and facilitating transactions.
The Changing Dynamics of Capital Markets
The capital markets have transformed dramatically, particularly with the distinction between public and private finance becoming more pronounced. Post-Dodd Frank, banks have decreased their leverage, resulting in more capital migrating to private credit markets which offer flexible financing solutions. This shift allows larger private equity firms to move towards making use of private capital sources for their transactions, requiring firms like Oaktree to remain agile and knowledgeable about market dynamics to stay competitive. Understanding this landscape is crucial for securing capital and ensuring that both relationships and strategic positioning align with market trends.
The Art of Negotiation in Finance
Effective negotiation strategies are key in finance, where relationships and pricing often dictate the success of deals. Millwood Hobbs highlights the intricacies of negotiations, noting that a successful negotiator anticipates future points of contention rather than solely focusing on immediate terms. This methodology involves a delicate balance of achieving a favorable outcome while maintaining relationships with all parties involved in the deal. Such negotiations require sensitivity to the dynamics of both the relationship and the business context, illustrating that finance is as much about people as it is about numbers.
Managing Relationships and Expectations
In the competitive landscape of finance, the ability to maintain relationships while managing differing expectations is critical. Millwood emphasizes that his team seeks not only to be the first call for sponsors but ensures they become the last call through genuine engagement and consistent performance. The challenge lies in reconciling the demands from investment committees who may be focused on strict financial metrics with the broader relational aspects his team values. Ultimately, establishing trust and open communication with all counterparts allows finance professionals to nurture long-term partnerships that yield fruitful opportunities.
When it comes to credit investing (or really any investing), there's an analytic art in deciding the right price to pay for a security. But often that's only part of the challenge. First you need someone to want to sell it to you. In something like public-market equity, this usually isn't hard. Liquidity is deep, and the "ask" price is well known. In something like private credit, it's much trickier. Someone has to sell you the deal. Someone has to call you about it and tell you about it. So how do you get the call? And how do you know when to say yes? On this episode, we speak with Milwood Hobbs, the Managing Director and Head of Sourcing & Origination at Oaktree. Prior to this role, he was at Goldman Sachs, also in leveraged finance origination and sales. So he's been involved in numerous credit deals in his career. On this episode, he talks us through his role, what's involved in it, how he gets offered deals, and how he determines what opportunities are better or worse.
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