Advanced Flower Capital Inc (AFCG) 2022 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the AFC Gamma Fourth Quarter 2022 Earnings Call. (Operator Instructions). Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Gabe Katz, Chief Legal Officer. Please go ahead.

美好的一天，謝謝你的支持。歡迎來到 AFC Gamma 2022 年第四季度財報電話會議。 （操作員說明）。請注意，今天的會議正在錄製中。我現在想把會議交給今天的發言人，首席法律官 Gabe Katz。請繼續。

Good morning, and thank you all for joining AFC Gama's Earnings Call for the fourth quarter and full year ended December 31, 2022. I'm joined this morning by Leonard Tannenbaum, our Chief Executive Officer; Jonathan Kalikow, our Head of Real Estate; Robin Tannenbaum, our President; and Brett Kaufman, our Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin, I would like to note that this call is being recorded. Replay information is included in our February 23, 2023 press release and is posted on the Investor Relations portion of AFC Gamma's website at afcgamma.com, along with our fourth quarter and full year 2022 earnings release and investor presentation.

早上好，感謝大家參加 AFC Gama 截至 2022 年 12 月 31 日的第四季度和全年財報電話會議。今天早上，我們的首席執行官 Leonard Tannenbaum 也加入了我的行列； Jonathan Kalikow，我們的房地產主管；我們的總裁 Robin Tannenbaum；和我們的首席財務官 Brett Kaufman。在我們開始之前，我想指出這個電話正在被錄音。重播信息包含在我們 2023 年 2 月 23 日的新聞稿中，並發佈在 AFC Gamma 網站 afcgamma.com 的投資者關係部分，以及我們的第四季度和 2022 年全年收益發布和投資者介紹。

Today's conference call includes forward-looking statements and projections that reflect the company's current views with respect to, among other things, future market developments, anticipated portfolio yield and financial performance and projections in 2023 and beyond. These statements are subject to inherent uncertainties in predicting future results and conditions and certain factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in these forward-looking statements. Please refer to ASC Gamma's most recent periodic filings with the SEC for certain significant factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements and projections.

今天的電話會議包括前瞻性陳述和預測，反映了公司目前對未來市場發展、預期投資組合收益率和財務業績以及 2023 年及以後的預測等方面的當前看法。這些陳述在預測未來結果和條件時受到固有的不確定性的影響，某些因素可能導致實際結果與這些前瞻性陳述中預測的結果存在重大差異。請參閱 ASC Gamma 最近定期向美國證券交易委員會提交的文件，了解可能導致實際結果與這些前瞻性陳述和預測存在重大差異的某些重要因素。

During this call, we will refer to distributable earnings, which is a non-GAAP financial measure. Reconciliations of net income, the most comparable GAAP measure to distributable earnings can be found in ASC Gamma's earnings release and investor presentation available on AFC Gamma's website. The format for today's call is as follows. Len will provide introductory remarks and overview of our fourth quarter performance and strategic commentary. Brett will summarize our financial results, and we will then open the lines for Q&A. With that, I will now turn the call over to our Chief Executive Officer, Leonard Tanenbaum.

在本次電話會議中，我們將提及可分配收益，這是一項非 GAAP 財務指標。淨收入調節表是與可分配收益最具可比性的 GAAP 衡量標準，可在 ASC Gamma 的收益發布和 AFC Gamma 網站上的投資者介紹中找到。今天電話會議的格式如下。 Len 將提供介紹性評論以及我們第四季度業績和戰略評論的概述。布雷特將總結我們的財務結果，然後我們將開通問答熱線。有了這個，我現在將把電話轉給我們的首席執行官 Leonard Tanenbaum。

Thank you, Gabe. Good morning, and welcome to AFC Gamma's Earnings Call for the Fourth Quarter and Full Year ending December 31, 2022. I would like to thank our analysts and investors for joining us today to discuss our results. I am pleased to have continued to execute on our business plan during the fourth quarter of 2022. AFC Gamma generated distributable earnings of $0.62 per weighted average share of common stock.

謝謝你，加布。早上好，歡迎來到 AFC Gamma 截至 2022 年 12 月 31 日的第四季度和全年收益電話會議。我要感謝我們的分析師和投資者今天加入我們討論我們的結果。我很高興在 2022 年第四季度繼續執行我們的業務計劃。AFC Gamma 的可分配收益為每股加權平均普通股 0.62 美元。

As a reminder, distributable earnings is the primary metric that the Board considers when declaring AFC Gamma's quarterly dividend. The Board of Directors declared a $0.56 dividend per share for the December quarter, which is in line with our previous 3 quarters. Since going public, we have generated distributable earnings in excess of our dividend in each quarter and paid out $3.54 in dividends per share, including paying out $2.23 per share during the 2022 fiscal year.

提醒一下，可分配收益是董事會在宣布 AFC Gamma 的季度股息時考慮的主要指標。董事會宣布 12 月季度的每股股息為 0.56 美元，這與我們前三個季度的情況一致。自上市以來，我們每個季度產生的可分配收益都超過股息，每股派息 3.54 美元，包括 2022 財年每股派息 2.23 美元。

For the full year 2022, AFC Gamma paid out approximately 90% of distributable earnings in the form of dividends. For the first quarter of 2023, the Board of Directors has declared a fourth consecutive $0.56 dividend, which will be paid on April 14, 2023, to shareholders of record as of March 31, 2023.

2022 年全年，AFC Gamma 以股息形式支付了約 90% 的可分配收益。對於 2023 年第一季度，董事會已宣布連續第四次派發 0.56 美元的股息，將於 2023 年 4 月 14 日支付給截至 2023 年 3 月 31 日在冊的股東。

During 2022, the cannabis market faced pressure during to a variety of factors, including the uncertainty of regulatory change, pricing compression, longer lead times to raise equity. During this time, AFC Gamma made the calculated decision to monitor the environment, support our existing borrowers and build liquidity to take advantage of future opportunities without relenting on our stringent diligence criteria. As a result, we have not originated any new cannabis debt investments that met our risk-adjusted return thresholds over the past 9 months.

2022 年期間，大麻市場面臨多種因素的壓力，包括監管變化的不確定性、定價壓縮、更長的籌資準備時間。在此期間，AFC Gamma 做出了有計劃的決定，以監控環境、支持我們現有的借款人並建立流動性以利用未來的機會，同時不放鬆我們嚴格的盡職標準。因此，在過去 9 個月裡，我們沒有發起任何符合我們風險調整後回報門檻的新大麻債務投資。

We believe that cannabis 3.0 will emerge with well-capitalized and sophisticated opportunistic acquirers who will target purchasing existing cannabis assets at significantly reduced prices to form new competitive multistate operators. We are continually monitoring the formation of capital around the next wave of cannabis investments and look forward to financing these well-funded platforms. In the meantime, we are seeing many operators take a pause on expansion opportunities and/or close nonprofitable business units as they rightsize their current businesses and adjust to rising rates, inflation, construction delays and pricing pressure.

我們認為，大麻 3.0 將出現資本充足且經驗豐富的機會主義收購方，他們將以大幅降低的價格購買現有的大麻資產，以形成新的具有競爭力的多國運營商。我們正在持續監測下一波大麻投資浪潮的資金形成情況，並期待為這些資金充足的平台提供資金。與此同時，我們看到許多運營商暫停擴張機會和/或關閉非盈利業務部門，因為他們調整當前業務並調整利率上升、通貨膨脹、施工延誤和定價壓力。

Although we believe our cannabis portfolio has been carefully constructed, we are not immune to the effects that the broader market pressures present. Industry-wide cannabis pressures have resulted in AFC Gamma taking higher credit reserves. We believe that our focus on targeting operators and limited license states have set us up to mitigate certain risks and generate strong risk-adjusted returns. We continue not to have exposure to unlimited license states such as California, Washington, Oregon, Oklahoma or Colorado, and we have limited exposure to Michigan.

儘管我們相信我們的大麻投資組合是經過精心構建的，但我們也不能倖免於更廣泛的市場壓力帶來的影響。全行業的大麻壓力導致 AFC Gamma 獲得更高的信貸儲備。我們相信，我們專注於以運營商和有限許可狀態為目標，這使我們能夠減輕某些風險並產生強勁的風險調整後回報。我們繼續沒有接觸無限許可的州，如加利福尼亞、華盛頓、俄勒岡、俄克拉荷馬或科羅拉多，我們對密歇根的接觸有限。

We actively manage our portfolio, having regular dialogue with many of our borrowers, and we are comfortable with the coverage of our loans on an enterprise value basis. In general, our borrowers have continued to support their business with additional equity infusions. During the quarter, we downgraded one of our larger loans from a category 3 to category 4 under a CECL analysis. While the loan is still performing, given the current environment and uncertainty, we felt that it was prudent to move the asset down to a Category 4 and take additional credit reserves against that. Given the more challenging credit and broader market environment, we have increased our CECL reserve from 1.8% as of September 30, 2022, to 4.97% as of December 31, 2022.

我們積極管理我們的投資組合，與我們的許多藉款人定期對話，我們對基於企業價值的貸款範圍感到滿意。總的來說，我們的借款人繼續通過額外的股權注入來支持他們的業務。在本季度，我們根據 CECL 分析將一筆較大的貸款從第 3 類降級為第 4 類。雖然貸款仍在發揮作用，但鑑於當前的環境和不確定性，我們認為將資產下調至第 4 類並為此提取額外的信貸儲備是謹慎的做法。鑑於更具挑戰性的信貸和更廣闊的市場環境，我們已將 CECL 準備金從 2022 年 9 月 30 日的 1.8% 增加到 2022 年 12 月 31 日的 4.97%。

With our strong liquidity position in the state of the cannabis market, we have made the decision to expand our investment strategy to include investing in compelling first lien and second lien commercial real estate financing opportunities. In the current interest rate environment, banks have reduced their traditional real estate lending activity, which has created a void in the market for lenders such as AFC gamma to invest in deals with enhanced yields and strong risk-adjusted returns.

憑藉我們在大麻市場的強勁流動性狀況，我們決定擴大我們的投資戰略，包括投資引人注目的第一留置權和第二留置權商業房地產融資機會。在當前的利率環境下，銀行減少了傳統的房地產貸款活動，這在市場上為 AFC gamma 等貸方投資於收益率更高、風險調整後回報強勁的交易創造了一個空白。

To that end, we are focused on opportunistically investing in commercial real estate bridge loans, construction loans, direct loans, leveraging our management team's core competency in commercial real estate lending and construction. We have expanded our origination efforts to source both cannabis and noncannabis commercial real estate loans and view the opportunity in noncannabis real estate lending as sizable. We continue to believe that the origination environment in commercial real estate lending will be more opportunistic as real estate values adjust and new capital is needed to finance growth.

為此，我們專注於機會主義投資商業房地產過橋貸款、建築貸款、直接貸款，利用我們管理團隊在商業房地產貸款和建設方面的核心競爭力。我們擴大了我們的發起努力，以採購大麻和非大麻商業房地產貸款，並認為非大麻房地產貸款的機會相當大。我們仍然認為，隨著房地產價值調整和需要新資本為增長融資，商業房地產貸款的發起環境將更加機會主義。

For example, per the Mortgage Bankers Association, $331.2 billion of the $2.8 trillion, which is 12% of the outstanding commercial and multifamily mortgages held by nonbank lenders will mature in 2023. That's a 33% increase from the $249 billion that matured in 2022. With banks pulling back, we expect that number could be even higher, which should provide additional opportunities for alternative lenders such as the AFC Gamma to finance.

例如，根據抵押貸款銀行家協會的數據，2.8 萬億美元中的 3312 億美元（佔非銀行貸方持有的未償還商業和多戶抵押貸款的 12%）將在 2023 年到期。這比 2022 年到期的 2490 億美元增加了 33%。隨著銀行撤資，我們預計這個數字可能會更高，這應該會為 AFC Gamma 等替代貸款機構提供更多融資機會。

As a result of our current portfolio's earnings power, we have the ability to be patient while delivering a consistent dividend to our shareholders. We believe that our available capital will allow us to take advantage of the opportunities that may be coming in this volatile commercial real estate market. Overall, while transaction activity has been slower than usual, we are evaluating noncannabis commercial real estate investments that are attractive for both risk and returns.

由於我們目前投資組合的盈利能力，我們有能力在向股東提供穩定的股息的同時保持耐心。我們相信，我們的可用資金將使我們能夠利用這個動蕩的商業房地產市場中可能出現的機會。總體而言，雖然交易活動比平時慢，但我們正在評估對風險和回報都具有吸引力的非大麻商業房地產投資。

The pipeline that we have developed in commercial real estate has been forming over the course of the past 9 months. We've implemented various processes and procedures internally to source and evaluate these deals. We have a number of noncannabis deals that we're evaluating, and we anticipate closing our first commercial real estate loan, non-cannabis commercial real estate loan in the next 90 days.

在過去的 9 個月中，我們在商業房地產領域開發的管道一直在形成。我們在內部實施了各種流程和程序來尋找和評估這些交易。我們正在評估許多非大麻交易，我們預計將在未來 90 天內完成我們的第一筆商業房地產貸款，即非大麻商業房地產貸款。

Last quarter, I noted that our Board has formed a special committee of independent and disinterested members to lead the company's thinking around a potential early internalization of our external manager. Ultimately, the special committee determined that this was not the right time in the market to move forward with an internalization. Looking ahead, I'm excited about our market positioning, portfolio composition and our opportunity set. We believe that AFC Gamma is well positioned to navigate the current market environment and opportunistically invest our capital in deals with strong risk-adjusted returns. I will now turn the call over to Brett to review our financial results.

上個季度，我注意到我們的董事會已經成立了一個由獨立和無私利益的成員組成的特別委員會，以引導公司圍繞我們外部經理的潛在早期內部化進行思考。最終，特別委員會確定現在不是市場推進內部化的合適時機。展望未來，我對我們的市場定位、投資組合構成和機會集感到興奮。我們相信，AFC Gamma 處於有利地位，可以應對當前的市場環境，併機會主義地將我們的資本投資於風險調整後回報強勁的交易。我現在將電話轉給布雷特來審查我們的財務業績。

Thank you, Leon. We are pleased to report strong results in the fourth quarter and fiscal 2022. Beginning with our quarterly results. For the fourth quarter ended December 31, 2022, we had GAAP net income of $2.9 million or earnings of $0.14 per basic weighted average common share. For the 3 months ended December 31, 2022, we generated net interest income of $19.7 million and distributable earnings of $12.6 million or $0.62 per basic weighted average common share. We ended the fourth quarter of 2022 with total assets of $519 million.

謝謝你，萊昂。我們很高興地報告第四季度和 2022 財年的強勁業績。從我們的季度業績開始。截至 2022 年 12 月 31 日的第四季度，我們的 GAAP 淨收入為 290 萬美元，即每股基本加權平均普通股收益為 0.14 美元。截至 2022 年 12 月 31 日的三個月，我們產生了 1970 萬美元的淨利息收入和 1260 萬美元的可分配收益或每股基本加權平均普通股 0.62 美元。截至 2022 年第四季度，我們的總資產為 5.19 億美元。

On an annual basis, for the year ended December 31, 2022, we earned GAAP net income of $35.9 million or earnings of $1.80 per basic weighted average common share. In 2022, we generated net interest income of $74.7 million and distributable earnings of $49.9 million or $2.51 per basic weighted average common share.

按年度計算，截至 2022 年 12 月 31 日止年度，我們獲得 GAAP 淨收入 3590 萬美元或每股基本加權平均普通股收益 1.80 美元。 2022 年，我們產生了 7470 萬美元的淨利息收入和 4990 萬美元的可分配收益或每股基本加權平均普通股 2.51 美元。

We ended the fourth quarter of 2022 with $401.2 million of principal outstanding spread across 12 borrowers. As of March 1, 2023, AFC Gamma's portfolio consisted of $421.4 million of current commitments with $389 million funded across 13 loans. The weighted average portfolio yield to maturity, which is measured for each loan over the life of such loan was approximately 21% as of December 31, 2022, and March 1, 2023. As previously mentioned, we believe providing distributable earnings is helpful to stockholders in assessing the overall performance of AFC Gamma's business.

截至 2022 年第四季度末，我們在 12 個借款人中的未償還本金利差為 4.012 億美元。截至 2023 年 3 月 1 日，AFC Gamma 的投資組合包括 4.214 億美元的當前承諾，其中 3.89 億美元來自 13 筆貸款。截至 2022 年 12 月 31 日和 2023 年 3 月 1 日，每筆貸款在此類貸款期限內衡量的加權平均投資組合到期收益率約為 21%。如前所述，我們認為提供可分配收益有助於股東在評估 AFC Gamma 業務的整體績效時。

Distributable earnings represents the net income computed in accordance with GAAP, excluding noncash items such as stock compensation expense, any unrealized gains or losses, provision for current expected credit losses, also known as CECL, taxable REIT subsidiary income or loss, and other noncash items recorded in net income or loss for the period.

可分配收益表示根據 GAAP 計算的淨收入，不包括非現金項目，例如股票補償費用、任何未實現的收益或損失、當前預期信用損失準備金（也稱為 CECL）、應稅 REIT 子公司收入或損失以及其他非現金項目計入當期淨損益。

As of December 31, 2022, the CECL reserve represents approximately 4.97% of our loans at carrying value compared to approximately 1.8% at September 30, 2022. We currently have 1 borrower, Flower 1 on nonaccrual, which represents 0.9% of our portfolio. AFC Gamma paid a fourth quarter dividend of $0.56 per common share. During 2022, we have paid out dividends of approximately 90% of our distributable earnings. As a reminder, on an annual basis, our dividend policy is to pay between 85% and 100% of distributable earnings over the year.

截至 2022 年 12 月 31 日，CECL 準備金約占我們貸款賬面價值的 4.97%，而 2022 年 9 月 30 日這一比例約為 1.8%。我們目前有 1 個借款人，Flower 1 非應計貸款，占我們投資組合的 0.9%。 AFC Gamma 支付了每股普通股 0.56 美元的第四季度股息。 2022 年期間，我們已支付了約 90% 的可分配收益的股息。提醒一下，我們的股息政策是每年支付 85% 至 100% 的可分配收益。

For the first quarter of 2023, the Board of Directors declared a fourth consecutive $0.56 dividend, which will be paid on April 14, 2023, to shareholders of record as of March 31, 2023. Next, let's take a look at our balance sheet, which remains strong. As of December 31, 2022, we had cash and cash equivalents of $140.4 million, and our liquidity position as of March 1, 2023, is generally in line with our December balance. Currently, the majority of our cash is earning approximately 4% to 4.5%. As of December 31, 2022, our total stockholders' equity was $339.1 million, and our book value per share was $16.65. With that, I will now turn it back over to the operator to start the Q&A. Operator.

對於 2023 年第一季度，董事會宣布連續第四次派發 0.56 美元的股息，將於 2023 年 4 月 14 日支付給截至 2023 年 3 月 31 日在冊的股東。接下來，讓我們來看看我們的資產負債表，這仍然很強大。截至 2022 年 12 月 31 日，我們的現金和現金等價物為 1.404 億美元，截至 2023 年 3 月 1 日，我們的流動性狀況與我們 12 月的餘額基本一致。目前，我們大部分現金的收益率約為 4% 至 4.5%。截至 2022 年 12 月 31 日，我們的股東權益總額為 3.391 億美元，每股賬面價值為 16.65 美元。有了這個，我現在將把它交還給接線員以開始問答。操作員。

(Operator Instructions). Our first question comes from Gaurav Mehta from Hutton Group.

（操作員說明）。我們的第一個問題來自 Hutton Group 的 Gaurav Mehta。

I wanted to ask you on the CRE lending that you guys talked about. Can you maybe provide some color on what kind of real estate assets would you be targeting under noncannabis real estate lending? And how big do you expect that book to become?

我想問你們關於你們談到的 CRE 貸款的問題。你能否提供一些顏色，說明你將在非大麻房地產貸款下瞄準什麼樣的房地產資產？你希望這本書有多大？

So I think we have taken -- given our expertise we've taken a modest approach, we're looking at all different asset types. We've already do industrial construction in the cannabis area and have some experience in the noncannabis area as well. We've owned a variety of properties between all of our affiliates here. And so I think we're looking at the commercial real estate in general. I would think we're targeting the multifamily construction. We're obviously taking a look at some of the commercial real estate realizing the state that it's in. So you have to have very tight loan to values there. And of course, we have a lot of expertise in industrial. So that's an industrial and easy part for us to transition to.

所以我認為我們已經採取了——鑑於我們的專業知識，我們採取了一種適度的方法，我們正在研究所有不同的資產類型。我們已經在大麻領域進行了工業建設，並且在非大麻領域也有一些經驗。我們在這裡的所有附屬公司之間擁有各種財產。所以我認為我們正在關註一般的商業房地產。我認為我們的目標是多戶住宅建設。顯然，我們正在研究一些實現其所處狀態的商業房地產。因此，您必須對那裡的價值有非常嚴格的貸款。當然，我們在工業方面擁有豐富的專業知識。所以這是我們過渡到的工業化且容易的部分。

So we're looking at all of them, but we're looking at them in very safe manners. I mean we're not going to be aggressive here. And what percent do I think that's going to end up at the end of the year. My current guess is the portfolio could be more balanced towards 50-50 by the end of this year, this calendar year.

所以我們正在查看所有這些，但我們正在以非常安全的方式查看它們。我的意思是我們不會在這裡變得咄咄逼人。我認為這將在今年年底結束。我目前的猜測是，到今年年底，也就是這個日曆年，投資組合可能會更加平衡，達到 50-50。

Okay. Do you expect capital sources that are available to you guys to change as a result of investing in traditional CRE lending versus, I guess, purely cannabis lending?

好的。您是否希望由於投資傳統的 CRE 貸款而不是純粹的大麻貸款而改變你們可用的資本來源？

Well, that's the good news. The good news is we're going to be able to -- I believe we're going to be able to take a lot more leverage if we have noncannabis assets. I think cannabis lenders are very limited. And in terms of those that want to lend to that industry, and it's much more broad as we move into first lien and second lien assets, primarily in the noncannabis. So we'll be able to bifurcate that asset pool and achieve better sources of leverage.

嗯，這是個好消息。好消息是我們將能夠——我相信如果我們擁有非大麻資產，我們將能夠利用更多的槓桿。我認為大麻貸方非常有限。就那些想藉給該行業的人而言，隨著我們進入第一留置權和第二留置權資產，主要是在非大麻領域，它的範圍要廣得多。因此，我們將能夠將該資產池分開並獲得更好的槓桿來源。

Okay. And lastly, can you provide some color on what kind of yields do you expect to get on the noncannabis lending?

好的。最後，你能否提供一些關於你期望從非大麻貸款中獲得什麼樣的收益率的顏色？

We still have not changed our yield range that we've had for a while, which is somewhere between 12% and 20%. So that's the good news. The good news is -- and you can see that our overall deal actually held up. I never know what it is each quarter until it's calculated at 21% again. So we're very encouraged by the environment and the opportunities of the environment. And so far, we've really been able to maintain strong yields.

我們仍然沒有改變我們已經有一段時間的收益率範圍，該範圍在 12% 到 20% 之間。這是個好消息。好消息是——你可以看到我們的整體交易實際上得到了支持。在再次計算為 21% 之前，我永遠不知道每個季度是多少。因此，我們對環境和環境帶來的機會感到非常鼓舞。到目前為止，我們確實能夠保持強勁的收益率。

Our next question comes from Michael Elias from Cowen.

我們的下一個問題來自 Cowen 的 Michael Elias。

Just to double click on the prior question. Given your expertise in lending to the real estate space, I was just wondering if you could stack rank for us the commercial real estate subsectors based on what you're seeing from a gross yield potential perspective? And then secondly, this is more of a philosophical question for you guys. With your dividend yield around 14%, do you believe that you're getting credit for the dividend? And to the extent you are, do you see an argument to be made for holding the dividend in your current levels and just retaining that capital into the uncertain macro environment?

只需雙擊前面的問題。鑑於您在向房地產領域提供貸款方面的專業知識，我只是想知道您是否可以根據您從總收益潛力的角度看到的內容為我們對商業房地產子行業進行排名？其次，這對你們來說更像是一個哲學問題。您的股息收益率約為 14%，您認為您因股息而獲得榮譽嗎？就您而言，您是否認為有理由將股息保持在當前水平並將該資本保留在不確定的宏觀環境中？

Second question first. Yes, I really don't -- I think this is an appropriate level of dividend. I don't think we're -- we're getting paid for at the same time, we want to make that distribution to shareholders that they deserve. And so I think paying that 85%, 90% area is appropriate. And you can probably see us continue there. Of course, there's going to be a variance of earnings each quarter. But so far, we've been able to earn our dividend each quarter.

先說第二個問題。是的，我真的不——我認為這是適當的股息水平。我不認為我們 - 我們同時獲得報酬，我們希望向股東分配他們應得的分配。所以我認為支付 85%、90% 的區域是合適的。你可能會看到我們在那裡繼續。當然，每個季度的收益都會有所不同。但到目前為止，我們每個季度都能賺取股息。

Looking at the commercial real estate environment, the banks really pulled back 4 to 6 months ago, which to me, creates this amazing opportunity. It does take surprising to me, and it takes the same 2 to 5 months to close a deal that it doesn't cannabis. It just takes a long time. And so though we started to up in the pipeline 9 months ago, it's now you have a number of deals that are finally getting towards the end of not saying they close or not close but they get sort of towards the end of that 2 to 5-month period where they can close.

看看商業地產環境，銀行確實在 4 到 6 個月前撤資，這對我來說創造了這個絕佳的機會。這確實讓我感到驚訝，而且同樣需要 2 到 5 個月才能完成一項不含大麻的交易。只是需要很長時間。因此，儘管我們在 9 個月前開始籌備中，但現在您有許多交易終於接近尾聲，不是說他們關閉或不關閉，而是他們在 2 到 5 的末尾- 他們可以關閉的月份。

When we're looking at it, it's hard to force rank the way you want to force rank because I've done this for 25 years, and I've done this in direct lending for $5 billion of my previous firm. So what we do is I have just a general philosophy as being what I call a capital structure investor, where we have significant equity below us and significant enterprise value below us. We did the same thing in cannabis, where we wanted to make sure there was enough cushion should the markets fall apart, which they did, and we still feel covered. So -- but we needed -- and we needed that cushion.

當我們審視它時，很難按照你想要的方式強制排名，因為我已經這樣做了 25 年，而且我已經為我以前的公司的 50 億美元直接貸款做到了這一點。所以我們所做的是，我只有一個一般的理念，即我所說的資本結構投資者，我們擁有低於我們的大量股權和低於我們的重要企業價值。我們在大麻方面做了同樣的事情，我們想確保在市場崩潰時有足夠的緩衝，而他們確實這樣做了，我們仍然感到受到了保護。所以 - 但我們需要 - 我們需要這種緩衝。

I think the real estate the same way. You can see different real estate investments that people try to minimize the amount of equity and maximize the amount of debt, and I found it a very risky -- we don't want to be taking over properties. We want relationships, and we want to be an institutional lender of the space. So I really looking -- we're looking for those situations where we have significant enterprise value and equity, lower loan to cost, lower loan-to-value. But we're looking across sectors because we have expertise across sectors.

我認為房地產也是如此。你可以看到不同的房地產投資，人們試圖將股權數量降至最低，將債務數量最大化，我發現這是非常冒險的——我們不想接管房產。我們想要關係，我們想成為這個領域的機構貸款人。所以我真的在尋找——我們正在尋找那些我們擁有重要企業價值和股權、較低貸款成本、較低貸款價值的情況。但我們正在跨行業尋找，因為我們擁有跨行業的專業知識。

Thank you. And there are no other questions in the queue. I'd like to turn the call back to Mr. Leon Tannenbaum for closing remarks.

謝謝。隊列中沒有其他問題。我想將電話轉回給 Leon Tannenbaum 先生，請他作結束語。

Thank you, everyone, for listening. We look forward to reporting our first quarter not-too-distant future since this was our year-end results.

謝謝大家的聆聽。我們期待在不久的將來報告我們的第一季度，因為這是我們的年終業績。

Thank you. This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.

謝謝。今天的電話會議到此結束。感謝您的參與。您現在可以斷開連接。