Investing.com – S&P Global Ratings affirmed the ’A’ long-term issuer credit rating on Cliffwater Corporate Lending Fund (CCLF) today but revised the outlook to negative from stable. The rating agency cited potential liquidity risks if the large flow of redemption requests continues and if the decision to allow more than the minimum 5% quarterly redemptions becomes the norm.
CCLF incurred large investor redemption requests in the first quarter this year amid rising questions about asset quality and valuations in the private credit space. The fund received redemption requests totaling 13.95% of net asset value in the first quarter of 2026, following 5.3% in the fourth quarter of 2025. CCLF decided to meet redemptions up to 7% of NAV in the first quarter, higher than the 5% threshold required by law, meaning investors will receive about half of their redemption requests in cash.
The fund, which is the largest interval fund in the market with $32 billion of NAV at the end of December 2025, invests about two-thirds of its assets into senior loans to middle-market companies in the U.S. and the remaining third into private managed vehicles and limited partner stakes in private credit funds and business development companies. CCLF is a 1940 Act-registered U.S.-based perpetual life fund incorporated in Delaware and launched in June 2019.
S&P affirmed the ’A’ rating because the fund maintains good asset quality, low leverage compared with peers, and satisfactory liquidity despite the wave of investor redemptions. The nonaccrual loan rate has barely ticked up from last year and remains well below 100 basis points. Leverage stood at 0.23x debt to NAV at the end of February and has edged up to 0.3x after the fund drew on its corporate revolver to meet quarterly redemptions.
The fund has ample capacity on its committed lines of credit, including a recently upsized corporate revolver of $4.66 billion from $4.3 billion, $812 million of additional capacity on the delayed draw term loan, and $500 million short-term financing capacity. The borrowing base for the revolver is not subject to mark-to-market triggers or unilateral valuation haircuts that could be requested by lenders.
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