Net Zero (Page 3)

Clifford Capital is an equipment credit leasing program focused on creation, distribution, and investment across infrastructure and other genuine assets globally.

The Singaporean government supports the business, which has a plan authority to boost exports and foreign investments, and has pledged to fund projects around the world since it was founded in 2012. &nbsp,

The largest transaction to date for Clifford Capital recently sold for$ 5 million, making it the fifth public infrastructure asset-backed securities ( IABS ) transaction. A subsidiary of Clifford Capital and a wholly owned and newly incorporated distribution vehicle of Bayfront Infrastructure Management ( Bayfront ), which also includes the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank ( AIIB ) as a shareholder, is Bayfront Infrastructure Capital V ( BIC V ).

BIC V features a collection size of approximately$ 508.3 million multiply across 37 personal money and bonds, 36 tasks, 15 states and 10 market sub-sectors. BIC V has an original aggregate main balance of US$ 218.4 million of ready green and social resources, as defined under Bayfront’s Sustainable Finance Framework, which represent 4 % of the overall principal balance of the profile.

FinanceAsia&nbsp, recently caught up with P. Murlidhar ( Murli ) Maiya, Clifford Capital’s group chief executive officer, to discuss the infrastructure debt financing landscape and its scalability.

FA: Describe your company and the sweeping changes being made to the environment of structured financing options, especially in network purchases, on which Clifford Capital focuses.

Maiya ( pictured&nbsp, above ): &nbsp, Clifford Capital was established 12 years ago, with the support of the Government of Singapore, to address a financing gap in long-tenor credit for infrastructure companies and projects with a nexus to Singapore. We as a group enjoy over$ 5 billion in government guarantees, which give us the ability to raise money at a very competitive price, which in turn allows us to extend credit across long tenors.

Our main areas of focus have always been on the power and coastal infrastructure sectors. However, the concept of system has evolved significantly over time, especially with technological&nbsp, development and the growing emphasis on responsible and socially equal development. As a result, we internally redefined infrastructure to encapsulate all sectors that provide essential services to people and raise the standard of living.

From a credit standpoint, conducting an in-depth analysis of the organization’s or project’s likely cash flows has always been a part of infrastructure financing. One of the keys to our success has been our constant effort to uphold a high standard of analytical rigor throughout the credit process. This analytical rigor is readily applicable to what is now a much wider range of relevant infrastructure sectors, enabling us to provide clients with creative debt financing solutions even for those that were previously viewed as infrastructure.

FA: Could you describe some of the subtleties of these industries and how you see them as the originators of long-term debt financing deals?

Maiya: Beyond renewable energy and digital infrastructure, there is a lot of interest in the data center market, which will grow as demand increases as AI becomes more prevalent. Unlike conventional real estate projects, data centres often enter long-term contracts with hyper-scalers, like major cloud service providers, and these long trem contracted cash flows provide the basis on which non-recourse debt can be structured.

Given the important roles that social infrastructure plays in society and their advantages over traditional long-tenor financing, such as schools, universities, and hospitals.
In industrials and transportation, we see sectors like steel, cement, and aluminum in transition to cleaner and more energy efficient production methods. Financing for intriguing new technologies is also being fueled by a combination of policy support and corporate sustainability goals.

Additionally, the transportation sector is undergoing significant changes, particularly in the electric vehicle space. Parts of the electric vehicle ( EV ) value chain, such as charging infrastructure and batteries lend themselves to infrastructure-like financing solutions. This evolution demonstrates how important verticals, such as transportation and industrials, are both experiencing significant shifts in sustainability.

Lastly, for our natural resources vertical, our focus is on new resources like green hydrogen, green ammonia, and key mineral resources like lithium, nickel, etc. to propel the upcoming sustainable economy.

FA: Given your various strategic priorities, how do you decide which client opportunities to pursue?

Maiya: We primarily assist businesses with debt financing when they want to invest regionally or globally. We do this by supporting those with strong ties to Singapore. We look into any financing issues they might have in commercial markets. Notwithstanding our government support, we operate on a commercial basis, and always ensure rigorous credit assessment and market-based pricing.

Our industry groups all benefit from our credit analysts ‘ expertise. We have been making real progress on this front, and sustainability is another area of focus for us. In 2023, 52 % of new primary loans originated were for infrastructure projects that are green and/or sustainable.

FA: Could you elaborate on how sustainability is affecting the industry you run in?

Maiya: The rise of green and sustainable initiatives has a significant impact on the growth trajectory of infrastructure debt financing. Across client organisations, we’ve observed varying approaches, but they all converge on a common challenge: the immense funding needed for the green transition to achieve net zero emissions. The Asia-Pacific region receives only about 10 % of global funding, despite having a third of the world’s funding needs. This discrepancies offer significant opportunities for businesses like us.

Another powerful tool is blending finance, which can sometimes be a challenge in Asia, to unlock funds for sustainable development. Local governments, multilateral development banks, and other concessional capital sources are making tangible commitments to blended finance.

For instance, the MAS’s Financing Asia’s Transition Partnership ( FAST-P), a blended finance initiative that aims to mobilize up to$ 5 billion to finance transition and marginally bankable green projects in Asia.

Clifford Capital is also responsible for its commercial operations, and it is crucial to demonstrate positive commercial outcomes. By delivering returns to our private sector shareholders, we are also demonstrating our ability to combine public policy objectives with private capital initiatives. This demonstration demonstrates that it is possible to incorporate a public policy goal into a successful business model, allowing it to catalyze other sources of capital over time.

FA: How do you stand out from the competition when it comes to providing debt financing for infrastructure projects?

Maiya: Due to our ability to take on greenfield construction risk and longer tenor financing, we have a unique approach in comparison to most institutional capital providers. Institutional capital frequently struggles with construction risk, preferring to invest in already-active assets that generate cash flow.

Our area of expertise is in managing risks at this stage. We develop a specialized financing plan that addresses the needs of the borrowers while upholding a code of ethics for creditworthiness and market-clearing pricing. Due to the variations in contracts and economic business models, this combination calls for specialized technical skill sets that vary by industry. We have invested a lot of time in developing teams and procedures that make it easier for us to operate in the demanding world of infrastructure credit.

FA: How do you intend to expand your debt-free solutions to make room for the significant funding gap?

Maiya: Clifford Capital has a proven method for distributing infrastructure credit. We established the Infrastructure ABS asset class in Asia and still run a highly profitable securitization business under the name” Bayfront.” We also obtain loans from both primary and secondary loan markets, primarily from the banking industry, in addition to originating our loans from corporate clients. Then, based on their risk appetites, we then divide the loans into securitized portfolios and divide them into various tranches. We keep a sizable portion of these structures ‘ original losses.

Our end-to-end origination and distribution model makes the company’s ability to raise significant capital quickly, allowing us to fund higher credit volumes without having to rely solely on our own, expanding the company’s scalable business model. Through Infrastructure ABS, our efforts to bring institutional debt capital into the infrastructure market bridge the financing gap in the Asia Pacific region for green infrastructure. &nbsp,

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