A 10.6% Contrarian Play On Gunlach’s Private Credit Hysteria
I'm LongbridgeAI, I can summarize articles.Jeffrey Gundlach criticized semi-liquid private credit funds at an investing conference, likening the current situation to the dot-com bubble. Funds like Apollo Debt Solutions and Blue Owl Tech Income Corp faced significant redemption requests, leading to capped withdrawals and losses for investors. In contrast, Ares Capital and Main Street Capital have maintained strong dividends and liquidity, with disciplined underwriting and equity stakes contributing to their success. Gundlach's concerns highlight the risks in the private credit market, while some firms continue to thrive despite the challenges.
Jeffrey Gundlach just made a scene at a very public investing conference. He blasted semi-liquid private credit funds, the $1.5 trillion corner of Wall Street that financial advisors have been quietly stuffing retirees into for the last few years.
Gundlach chastised them for only being liquid when you don’t need the money. He even compared today’s setup to the dot-com bubble and the pre-GFC mortgage market.
Real financial “system bug?” Or imagined? Let’s discuss what it means to be “semi-liquid.” (Hint: It’s a little sketchy.)
The Problem With Semi-Liquid Private Credit Funds
Apollo Debt Solutions (ADS) is one such semi-liquid fund. With $14.7 billion you might suspect ADS would be plenty liquid, but you would be wrong. The fund received redemption requests for 11% (!) of its outstanding shares in Q1. Apollo capped withdrawals at 5%, though, and shareholders got back about 45 cents on every dollar they asked for. The rest stayed locked in the fund.
This is exactly what Gundlach railed about. The money is available when times are good and when they’re not, you can claim 45 cents on every dollar you rightfully own. Yikes.
Another offender is Blue Owl Tech Income Corp (OTIC). This $6 billion fund had a good thing going, lending to high-margin software companies. Then, AI came along and brought competition to business apps that previously enjoyed competitive moats—and high subscription prices. New coding tools allow non-developers to “vibe code” apps from scratch, which means they can dictate to the AI what they want their app to be and essentially “vibe” their way to a product. Very cool for the user, and quite problematic to the entrenched software vendor.
The entire software sector fell out the window earlier this year on vibe-coding concerns and investors asked for their money back. Requests totaled nearly 41% of all shares outstanding! No way enough buyers would satisfy that selling demand. The fund looked dead… until management pointed to a 5% cap on redemptions.
Cliffwater Corporate Lending Fund (CCLFX), the biggest of the trio at $32 billion, delivered the biggest dividend disaster. Investors asked for 14% back, the fund honored 7% and then cut its payout by 11.3%. At which point, on cue, S&P Global Ratings revised Cliffwater’s outlook to Negative. (Analysts and ratings agencies love piling on.)
The headlines are ugly. And yes, Gundlach is rightfully hyperventilating about these offenders, but there are some perfectly good payout babies in this bathwater.
Ares Capital (ARCC) is the largest business development company—private lender to businesses—on the public market. What separates ARCC from the sketchier lenders is disciplined underwriting that’s passed every down-market test since 2004. Their non-accruals—loans where borrowers stop paying—have averaged 2.8% since the Great Financial Crisis.
The BDC industry averages 3.8% non-accruals, so ARCC’s advantage of 100 basis points has compounded sweetly over 22 years. ARCC has only cut its dividend once, in 2009, when the entire credit world was on fire. The team marked their book to its new cheaper reality, trimmed the payout from $0.42 to $0.35 and resumed growing it when the world settled down. Today’s quarterly sits at $0.48—the highest in the company’s history. ARCC yields a terrific 10.6% today.
(Note: ARCC has paid periodic special dividends on top of its regular quarterly payout. Hence the mini spikes above.)
Then there’s Main Street Capital (MAIN), our monthly-paying BDC. We added it to our Contrarian Income Report portfolio in May 2025. Subscribers have collected $4.27 per share in dividends in twelve months. Add in some price gains and they’re up 13% from this income machine which oh, by the way, yields an elite 8.2% including special dividends.
And while everyone in semi-liquid private credit land cuts payouts and slams gates, MAIN celebrates Opposite Day, growing its monthly dividend without a break since the 2007 IPO. What’s MAIN’s secret? Equity stakes.
MAIN doesn’t just lend money. It takes equity positions alongside its debt in many deals. That dual-engine structure is unusual among public BDCs. ARCC, for example, focuses on senior secured first lien loans. They collect interest, period. MAIN collects interest and shares in the upside when its borrowers thrive.
In 2025, those equity stakes threw off $77 million in realized gains plus $150 million in fair value appreciation. That’s the source of the monthly dividend growth and the periodic special dividends on top.
Plus, the folks running MAIN do something crazy. Insiders own 4.11% of the company, roughly 3.7 million shares. They run the place like they own it, because they do! You just don’t see this in BDC land.
ARCC and MAIN don’t have bugs. They’ll give you your money back anytime. But why would you want it, when you can leave it with these dividend machines that keep that wealth compounding.
Brett Owens is Chief Investment Strategist for Contrarian Outlook. For more great income ideas, get your free copy his latest special report: How to Live off Huge Monthly Dividends (up to 8.2%) — Practically Forever.