Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity

About Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity

Welcome to Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity, a podcast focused on the asset-based lending industry. Join Andrew Pace, Chief Client Experience Officer at Asset Compliant Solutions, as he interviews experts, shares insights, and explores strategies for managing risk, optimizing portfolio performance, and seizing opportunities in an ever-evolving financial landscape. From regulatory changes to technological advances, each episode provides actionable takeaways and deep dives into industry trends. Whether you’re a lender, servicer, or recovery expert, this podcast offers valuable perspectives to enhance your approach and improve outcomes.

Publisher

Asset Compliant Solutions

Category

business · business

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

29 Apr 2025

Latest episode

13 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

35 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   13 Oct 2026

   Their Reality, Our Result: Flexibility, Data Discipline, and Scaling an Independent Lender

   In this episode of Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity, Andrew Pace sits down with Don Hansen, CEO at Regents Capital Corporation, to explore how an independent lender keeps its flexibility while scaling into an institutional platform. Don founded Regents in 2013 around a simple idea: customers bring their business reality, and Regents' job is to turn it into the right result. That approach, together with a generalist model that can finance a technology company one day and a pickle manufacturer the next, carried Regents to approximately $229 million in 2025 originations and a $133 million inaugural asset-backed securitization this year. Don walks through the sequence behind that growth. Regents spent roughly its first decade building a direct end-user business. It then secured a significant warehouse facility and strengthened credit, servicing, and accounting before entering the vendor market, because vendor finance requires making every credit, funding, and documentation call in-house. He also explains how a proprietary scoring model handles the clear approvals and clear declines, so his credit team can focus on the deals where judgment actually changes the outcome. The conversation also covers one of the biggest operational decisions in the company's history, which was bringing servicing back in-house after outsourcing it. Don is candid that the third-party arrangement had Regents spending more time auditing its provider than doing the work, and that a securitization demands every data point on demand. He makes the case that data management becomes a ceiling for independents who don't get it right, and that the $100 to $150 million range is where many of them stall. Andrew and Don close on culture. They cover Regents' "go and take it" value, above-average employee tenure, a senior team led largely by women, and the Radical Candor framework Don uses to hold people accountable without losing them. For lenders weighing whether to stay at their current size or build an enterprise, it is a practical look at what the harder path requires. Key Topics Discussed: The "turn your reality into results" philosophy and why flexibility is an independent's core advantage How a generalist approach across industries, geographies, and equipment types naturally balances portfolio concentration Using the strength of a credit to decide how much structural flexibility a deal can carry Building a direct end-user business first, then entering the vendor market once every decision could be made in-house The drivers behind approximately $229 million in 2025 originations Operating as a finance company first and a data-driven technology company second How a proprietary credit scoring model frees underwriters for the deals that need judgment Why Regents brought servicing back in-house and completed a system conversion during a record growth year Data readiness as a prerequisite for rating agencies, investors, and securitization The $100 to $150 million threshold and what it takes to scale past it Corporate values, employee tenure, and women in senior leadership Applying Radical Candor to accountability, and priorities heading into 2027 Notable Takeaways: On data as a growth limit: "If you don't have your data house in order, your ability to shape it, command it, report it, analyze it, it will become your ceiling." On credit scoring: "The scoring model optimizes, you know, the A's and eliminates the F's, so that what I'm doing is taking the skills of my credit team and applying them appropriately, right?" On entering the vendor market: "To properly support vendor-oriented financing, you need to make every decision related to the transaction, right? You can't be third party, you can't have other credit decisions, funding decisions, documentation. We need to be able to make every single call because that's the demands of the vendor marketplace." On scaling past $100 million: "Once you're on the other side of it, it's a flywheel, so getting from 100 to 200 was significant effort, but I think getting from 200 to 500 is not gonna be the same because I've built the infrastructure with our team to accommodate the scale." On technology: "I've always seen technology as a way of eliminating friction in the process." On culture: "The opportunity in the marketplace is there for us. Let's go and take it. The opportunity for growth within this company is there for us. We've got to go and take it." Subscribe to Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity for more industry insights and field-tested strategies. For more information, visit Asset Compliant Solutions (https://acs-cam.com/podcast/).

2. 

   29 Sept 2026

   Underwriting the Gap: Equity Positions, Syndication, and Building a National Broker Network

   In this episode of Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity, Andrew Pace sits down with Brett Rondeau, Executive Vice President of Sales and Syndication at Universal Finance Corp., to explore how a construction-focused equity lender builds its syndication desk, broker network, and underwriting approach around customers who fall outside the traditional lending box. Universal began as a New England lender with a set rate and a set term. That meant it regularly turned away deals it liked, or quoted strong customers a price they had no reason to accept. When Brett joined in June 2019, the goal was to build a syndication desk that could place those deals with other lenders, earn a fee, and give customers a better experience. After talking with roughly 40 lenders, the team now works consistently with three or four, and over the past year or so has moved further into true discounting with those repeat partners. Brett brings the same approach to the broker side, where a uniform, repeatable process replaced a model in which the answer a broker got depended on which underwriter picked up the phone. He describes how the desk grew from one person to a small team, with about 65 percent growth in the first full year after adding a second person, and how industry associations, events, and work with the philanthropy committee have built the trust that keeps brokers coming back. The center of the conversation is underwriting. Universal takes an equity position in nearly every deal, through a down payment or additional collateral. It will consider credit down to a 550 FICO and applies common sense judgment instead of hard age or mileage cutoffs. Brett explains how that structure lets customers put equipment they already own to work in place of cash, and how deep knowledge of construction equipment values, including what a repossessed piece actually brings after remarketing costs, keeps the underwriting disciplined. He also covers hiring and developing younger sales talent, the technology that gave a small team time back, and a closing round of Boston sports debates. Key Topics Discussed: Building a syndication desk at a lender that originally lent only in New England Vetting lenders and narrowing to a small group of repeatable partners Moving from one-off syndications to a discount model Weighing loss leaders against the value of trust, speed, and rapport Creating a uniform process for the broker desk and growing it from one person to a team How AACFB, NEFA, and industry events build credibility with brokers Full Steam Ahead for Kids and the Chris Walker Education Fund Equity lending, additional collateral, and reducing down payments Common sense underwriting without hard age or mileage limits Why construction equipment specialization improves valuation and remarketing outcomes Hiring and developing younger sales talent in a collaborative culture Salesforce, pre-underwriting tools, and taking servicing back in house Notable Takeaways: On loss leaders: "Every deal takes time, right? So is there something that we can get out of that deal if it's not money? If it's going to be a loss leader, are you getting trust? Are you showing speed? Are you developing rapport? If you can get one of those things out of it, I don't look at it as kind of a loss at all." On the gap in the market: "But that kind of CD range, I feel like there's a large fall off between certain independents that will lend, I don't know, up to whatever in certain rate ranges, and then there's a large drop off, and I think we kind of fit that gap a little bit." On down payments: "With just being able to take an additional piece of collateral, we can save them that down payment. They might not have that down payment, right? So you either forego that purchase or you can utilize equipment that you own outright." On the real value of a repossessed unit: "You can go in Kelly Blue Book and plug it in, it's going to tell you that it's worth this, but there's a cost to getting a piece, there's a cost to remarketing it, there's a cost to moving it to the yard, storage fees, all that stuff. And then what do you have, and how quick do you have to move it?" On hiring for a different model: "We're not a credit-based model, right? We're an equity position-based model. So to get somebody thinking that way is a little bit tough." Subscribe to Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity for more industry insights and field-tested strategies. For more information, visit Asset Compliant Solutions (https://acs-cam.com/podcast/).

3. 

   15 Sept 2026

   Modernization Without Losing Identity: Discipline, Culture, and the Modern CFO Role

   In this episode of Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity, Andrew Pace sits down with Kareem Jernigan, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at LAI Fleet, to explore how a 68 year old fleet management company is modernizing its entire technology platform without losing the culture and service model that built its reputation. For a company built on relationships and a workforce with decades of tenure, replacing a 40 year old legacy system is not just an IT project, it is an identity question. Kareem Jernigan, EVP and CFO at LAI Fleet, has spent the last three years leading exactly that kind of transformation, retiring a homegrown, end to end system that handles everything from prospecting to securitization in favor of a modern platform, without disrupting the culture that has kept employees at the company for 20, 30, even 50 years. Kareem came to LAI Fleet in July 2020, stepping into an organization with an average employee tenure of 24 years and a leadership team, including a president with nearly four decades on the job, that had built the business on personal relationships and deep institutional knowledge. A CPA with an MBA from the University of Houston and a background in oil and gas before joining LAI Fleet, Kareem also served in the United States Marine Corps, an experience he credits with shaping his approach to discipline and accountability. Kareem and talk through what it takes to de-risk a technology transition of this scale, how LAI Fleet has approached digitizing paper heavy processes without losing what makes the business unique, and how the company earns credibility with a long tenured, relationship driven workforce during periods of change. They also get into how LAI Fleet competes as a privately held, mid-market focused company against larger, efficiency driven competitors, and how Kareem manages residual risk across a fleet of tens of thousands of vehicles. The conversation offers a candid look at what it actually takes to modernize decades of institutional process, how financial discipline holds up under real volatility, from COVID to supply chain disruption to rising rates, and what the expanding role of the modern CFO looks like in practice. Key Topics Discussed: Replacing a 40 year old legacy system without losing company identity The technical debt that builds up in long running proprietary systems What going paperless actually means in vehicle leasing and fleet management Earning credibility as an external executive in a relationship driven organization Aligning incentives to support a major technology transformation Rebuilding the bench while managing retirements and institutional knowledge transfer The expanding scope of the modern CFO role Financial discipline and credit risk management through market volatility Competing as a privately held company in an underserved small and mid-size fleet market LAI Fleet's account executive as fleet manager service model Managing residual risk and vehicle liquidity in fleet leasing Defining personal and organizational success through succession Notable Takeaways: On modernizing the legacy system: "It's not going to change who we are. This will allow us to become more of who we are." On process discipline: "Anywhere there's a lot of friction, it's not being done well." On discipline as a personal quality: "I think discipline is a personal quality and it's an inside-out job. It's something that comes from the individual that you project into and onto an organization." On serving an underserved market: "Less hassle, lower costs, more profit." On financial discipline through volatility: "Slow and steady wins the race." On systems and discipline: "We don't rise to the level of our goals, we fall to the level of our systems." On defining success: "If my successor can step in and I can hand the baton to them and they can push the ball forward, that's how I'm defining success." Subscribe to Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity for more industry insights and field-tested strategies. For more information, visit Asset Compliant Solutions (https://acs-cam.com/podcast/).

Who has been a guest on Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity

Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.

• Mike Peplinski
• Dominick Cevet
• Greg Meyer

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5.0 / 5

1 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 31 / 100

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Quality

62

Social presence

0

YouTube

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