Great Elm Group Q1 2025 Earnings Report

Great Elm Group EPS Results

• Actual EPS: $0.08
• Consensus EPS: $0.34
• Beat/Miss: Missed by -$0.26
• One Year Ago EPS: N/A

Great Elm Group Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: $3.99 million
• Expected Revenue: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• YoY Revenue Growth: N/A

Great Elm Group Announcement Details

• Quarter: Q1 2025
• Date: 11/11/2024
• Time: After Market Closes
• Conference Call Date: Tuesday, November 12, 2024
• Conference Call Time: 8:30AM ET

Great Elm Group (NASDAQ:GEG) (NASDAQ: GEG) is a closed-end investment company specializing in private credit and equity co-investments for U.S. middle-market companies. The firm’s portfolio is composed primarily of senior secured loans, unitranche financing structures and selective equity interests, with an emphasis on providing flexible capital solutions for growth initiatives, refinancings, acquisitions and recapitalizations.

Through a disciplined underwriting process, Great Elm Group evaluates opportunities across a diverse range of industry sectors, including healthcare, business services, manufacturing and consumer products. The company structures tailored financing packages that can include senior debt, subordinated debt and equity co-investments, allowing it to meet the unique capital needs of privately owned businesses while seeking attractive risk-adjusted returns for shareholders.

Headquartered in New York, Great Elm Group operates throughout North America and is managed by a team of credit and investment professionals with deep experience in investment banking, commercial lending and private equity. The firm’s active portfolio management approach combines rigorous credit analysis with ongoing engagement alongside portfolio companies, aiming to generate consistent cash distributions and long-term capital appreciation.

Great Elm Group Q1 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• Great Elm’s fee‐paying assets under management increased by over 20% year‐over‐year to approximately $545 million, driving total revenue up 21% to $4 million in Q1.
• The real estate platform proved its built‐to‐suit model with a successful exit on the first property, is nearing completion of its second project, and has a robust pipeline including new Monomoy BTS consulting fees.
• The Great Elm Credit Income Fund delivered over 11% net returns in its first 11 months, while the BDC (GECC) achieved record investment income and generated $900,000 in incentive fees for GEG.
• GEG’s board expanded the share repurchase authorization to $20 million, and the company repurchased 2.5 million shares at $1.85 each—a significant discount to the $2.22 book value.
• The company finished Q1 with more than $50 million in cash and marketable securities, and net income of $3 million benefited from a $3.5 million reversal of prior unrealized losses.

Presentation

[Operator]

Greetings and welcome to the Great Elm Group fiscal 2025 first quarter conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce Adam Yates, Managing Director. Thank you. You may begin.

[Adam Yates, Managing Director at Great Elm Group]

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us for Great Elm Group's fiscal first quarter 2025 earnings conference call. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded on Tuesday, November 12th, 2024. If you would like to be added to our distribution list, you can email GEG Investor Relations at greatelmcap.com, or you can sign up for alerts directly on our website, www.greatelmgroup.com. The slide presentation accompanying today's conference call and webcast can be found on our website under Events and Presentations. A link to the webcast is also available on our website, as well as in the press release that was disseminated to announce the quarterly results. Today's conference call includes forward-looking statements, and we ask that you refer to Great Elm Group's filings to the SEC for important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from these statements.

[Adam Yates, Managing Director at Great Elm Group]

Great Elm Group does not undertake to update its forward-looking statements unless required by law. In addition, during today's call, management will refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliations to the most comparable financial measures are included in our earnings release. To obtain copies of our SEC filings, please visit Great Elm Group's website under Financial Information and select SEC Filings. Today's comments do not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy interest in any investment vehicle managed by Great Elm or its affiliates. Any such offer or solicitation will only be made pursuant to the applicable offering documents for such investment vehicle. On the call today, we have Jason Reese, CEO, Adam Kleinman, President and General Counsel, Nicole Mills, COO, and Keri Davis, CFO. I will now turn the call over to Jason Reese, CEO.

[Jason Reese, CEO at Great Elm Group]

Welcome, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. We delivered a solid start to fiscal 2025, building on momentum from last fiscal year as we continue to evolve as a streamlined, pure-play asset management business. This quarter was marked by significant growth in both assets under management and revenue across our businesses. Our strong foundation enables us to actively grow our core credit and real estate platforms and execute on our long-term growth strategy. As we begin fiscal 2025, our highlights are: we continue to grow our assets under management, increasing our fee-paying assets under management by over 20% on a year-over-year basis in the quarter. We generated total revenue of $4 million, growing 21% year-over-year. We proved out our real estate build-to-suit concept with Monomoy BTS, completing construction of its first property with a successful exit.

[Jason Reese, CEO at Great Elm Group]

We surpassed double-digit net returns in our recently seeded credit fund just prior to its one-year anniversary. Our buyback authorization was expanded to up to $20 million, and we continue to repurchase shares at a significant discount to book value. We ended the quarter in a strong financial position with over $50 million in cash and marketable securities available to facilitate continued growth across our asset management platforms. Diving into the quarter in more detail, fee-paying assets under management continued to grow and reached approximately $545 million, representing a 21% increase over the prior year period. The main driver of this growth is our BDC, Great Elm Capital Corp. Notably, from February through October 2024, GECC completed numerous equity and debt issuances exceeding $130 million. Importantly, GEG has demonstrated its commitment to scaling GECC by participating in two prior equity raises at the then-current NAV.

[Jason Reese, CEO at Great Elm Group]

GECC also delivered a strong quarter, achieving record total investment income, with NII exceeding its quarterly distribution. This performance was primarily driven by increased cash flows from the early success of GECC's CLO joint venture. The portfolio remained solid, and I invite you to listen to the latest GECC conference call available on its website for additional information on the continued transformation at the BDC. Overall, these issuances and portfolio enhancements at GECC are integral to our business. They strengthen our ability to grow fee-paying assets under management while also expanding GEG's fee-earning potential through both substantial recurring asset management fees and potential incentive fees from the incremental capital. Notably, Great Elm's base management fee from GECC increased by 34% year-over-year to $1.2 million, and in the quarter, we earned $900,000 of incentive fees from GECC.

[Jason Reese, CEO at Great Elm Group]

Our real estate platform also continues to expand as we are nearing completion of our second build-to-suit property. Moreover, we expect continued profitability in fiscal 2025 as the team focuses on selling its second property and begins development on its third contracted design-build project. The build-to-suit pipeline remains robust. We will continue to execute on these development opportunities to further enhance profits at GEG and create value for both our tenants and shareholders. Monomoy BTS Construction Management, which offers consulting and owner-representative services for in-house construction projects, also continued to ramp up. We began earning fees from this business in fiscal 2024, and given strong initial demand and growth prospects, we are excited about expanding this vertical as we progress through fiscal 2025. Additionally, Monomoy REIT, after solid performance over fiscal 2024, continues to execute.

[Jason Reese, CEO at Great Elm Group]

We have several value-added acquisitions under contract that we expect to close in the first half of our fiscal year. We are excited about Monomoy's performance and growth prospects as fiscal 2025 progresses. Also, as you may recall, we launched the Great Elm Credit Income Fund, or GCIF, in November of 2023. I am pleased to report that the fund has delivered a solid return of over 11% net of fees and expenses through its first 11 months. With these strong returns and newly established track record, we are well situated to attract new capital and further scale the platform. Outside of our core businesses, GEG's board of directors authorized an additional $10 million of stock repurchases this quarter, expanding the program's total capacity up to $20 million.

[Jason Reese, CEO at Great Elm Group]

Through November 8th, 2024, Great Elm has repurchased approximately 2.5 million shares for $4.6 million, or $1.85 per share, a meaningful discount to book value of $2.22 per share. GEG continues to maintain a strong balance sheet and capital position with over $50 million of cash and marketable securities. This strong liquidity position enables us to support further growth initiatives across our alternative asset management platform. In sum, we are pleased with the continued performance of our credit and real estate segments in the fiscal first quarter. We are focused on accelerating this momentum as we continue repositioning Great Elm in the alternative asset management space. Further, we remain committed to our three core objectives: enhancing financial performance, expanding our platform, and growing assets under management. Additionally, we continue to actively evaluate multiple strategic initiatives alongside other opportunities to add accretive, differentiated products.

[Jason Reese, CEO at Great Elm Group]

Moving ahead, we maintain our steadfast commitment to pursuing opportunities to expand our businesses and allocate capital to promising new platforms offering attractive risk-adjusted returns. Before turning the call over to Keri to review our financial details, I would like to address our net income for the quarter. Net income benefited from the reversal of approximately $3.5 million in previously recorded unrealized losses related to GEG's investment in special purpose vehicles. On our last call, we highlighted that these SPVs were marked to a materially lesser value. While we anticipated the losses to reverse over time, we saw a substantial portion of the reversal this quarter. Our total aggregate net unrealized loss in these investments is approximately $300,000 life to date. As we continue to execute, we expect these investments will begin to deliver positive returns for shareholders over time. With that, I'll turn it over to Keri.

[Keri Davis, CFO at Great Elm Group]

Thank you, Jason. I will provide a brief overview of the quarter and, of course, welcome all of you to review our filings in greater detail or reach out to our team with any questions. Fiscal first quarter revenues grew 21% to $4 million from the prior year period, primarily driven by additional proceeds related to our June 2024 property sale, along with a pickup in management fee. Pro forma AUM and fee-paying AUM reflecting GECC's refinancing and extinguishment of its GECCM notes totaled approximately $741 million and $545 million, up 16% and 21% respectively from the prior year quarter end. Great Elm Group generated net income from continuing operations of $3 million for the quarter as compared to $2.8 million for the prior year period.

[Keri Davis, CFO at Great Elm Group]

As previously mentioned, this quarter's gain was driven by the reversal of approximately $3.5 million in previously recorded unrealized losses related to the company's investments in special purpose vehicles. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $1.3 million, compared to $1.7 million in the prior year period. As of September 30th, we had approximately $52 million of combined cash and marketable securities on our balance sheet to deploy across our growing alternative asset management platform. Please refer to slide 7 that provides an overview of our financial position and highlights our book value per share of approximately $2.22. This concludes my financial review of the quarter. With that, we will turn the call over to the operator to open for questions.

[Operator]

Thank you. We will now conduct a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in a question queue. You may press star one to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. Once again, that's star one to ask a question at this time. One moment while we post our first question. At this time, I would like to turn the call back to Jason Reese for closing comments.

[Jason Reese, CEO at Great Elm Group]

Thank you for joining us today, and we look forward to speaking with you in the future.

[Operator]

This concludes today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation and have a great day.

Participants

Executives

• Adam Yates, Managing Director
• Keri Davis, CFO

Analysts

• Jason Reese, CEO at Great Elm Group