December 31, 2020
December 31 2020 – Trez Capital Investment Update — Fourth Quarter 2020
Year-in-Review from Trez Capital’s Chairman & CEO
Twenty-twenty tested us all, in ways we could not have imagined. We are pleased to share that despite headwinds, Trez Capital closed out the year strong and is able to begin 2021 with optimism. As we entered the global pandemic in late February 2020, we encountered unprecedented volatility as businesses had to deal with never-before-seen challenges. We took decisive action to keep our staff safe, our investors whole and our business intact.
Protecting our investors by ensuring liquidity
To support the stability of our funds, we continue to place a high priority on liquidity. We made this decision to ensure we could pay our monthly distributions, which so many of our investors rely on for regular income. To this end, we stopped lending and halted redemptions in our funds. While gating the funds caused understandable concerns among investors, we made this decision solely to protect investors. Ultimately, it was the right decision to make and we appreciate the support we received from investors in the early stages of the pandemic.
We are in excellent shape in terms of liquidity with ample cash on hand and access to credit lines, putting us in a strong position to seize opportunities in our continued pursuit of strategic growth objectives. Trez Capital and its funds have been operating normally, and we continued to accept new subscriptions and honour all redemptions.
Driving growth through the pandemic
Our AUM grew from $3.8 billion at the end of 2019 to more than $4.1 billion at the end of December 2020. In terms of loan payoffs, approximately $1.7 billion was paid back to us during 2020, which meant roughly 50% of the portfolio was turned over – a testament to the quality of our loan portfolio.
Although we were closed to lending from March 2020 to September 2020, we still made new loan commitments of approximately $1.3 billion for the year and have been receiving new requests every day. We will continue to be vigilant in our lending.
Continuing to build a winning team
Regarding the strength of our leadership team, I am pleased to announce that Dean Kirkham was promoted to Chief Operating Officer. Dean has been instrumental in leading our success during the last five years and will continue to lead these efforts in the years to come.
Furthermore, two of our long-time partners are retiring – Sandy Manson, our Chief Financial Officer, who has been with us for 15 years, and Ken Lai, our Head of Loan Administration, who has been with us for 18 years. We have been planning for these retirements since 2019 and, as a result, the transition process has been seamless.
Today, Trez Capital has grown to nearly 140 employees strong. Even during the pandemic, we continue to attract top talent and add new members to our team.
Throughout all the uncertainty of 2020, we remained focused on what matters most, our investors. Without your continued faith in us we would not have navigated the year as well as we did. I look forward to continuing our strong relationships together and reaching new heights in 2021.
Sincerely,
Morley Greene
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
About Trez Capital
Founded in 1997, Trez Capital is a diversified real estate investment firm and preeminent provider of commercial real estate debt financing solutions in Canada and the United States. Trez offers private and institutional investors strategies to invest in a variety of opportunistic, fully secured, high-yield mortgage investment funds, and provides property developers and owners with quick approvals on flexible short- to mid-term financing.
With offices in Vancouver, Toronto, Dallas and Palm Beach, Trez Capital has over $4.1 billion in assets under management and has funded over 1,500 transactions totaling more than $12 billion since inception.