TSL Feature Articles

For law students and summer associates interested in finance, secured transactions or commercial law, secured finance offers a practical, business-focused career path at the center of how companies obtain working capital.

For law students and summer associates interested in finance, secured transactions or commercial law, a career as a commercial finance attorney can offer a unique blend of legal analysis, business strategy and deal-making. One of the most specialized areas within commercial finance is representing lenders in asset-based lending (ABL) and factoring transactions

For students and early-career professionals exploring finance or accounting careers, asset-based lending field examination offers a path that is hands-on, analytical and surprisingly varied.

Asset-based lending (ABL) is built on the premise that if a borrower is unable to repay its loan, the cash conversion of the collateral is there. But in a cyber incident, collateral may remain “there” but visibility to the lender’s collateral and its quality disappears. If a borrower can’t ship, can’t invoice, or can’t produce a trustworthy borrowing base for even a few days, collateral proceeds and AR/inventory mix will change significantly, with the resultant impact on the borrowing base leaving the Lender in the dark as to their collateral vis-à-vis their loan exposure.

In this insightful Q&A, we feature three remarkable women credit professionals who have made significant strides in their careers. Betty Hernandez, executive vice president/chief credit officer at SLR Business Credit; Mignon Winston, vice president/underwriting team leader at Great Rock Capital, and Hailee Ledford, vice president of client relations at AmeriFactors, share their experiences, challenges, and successes.

In the last couple of years, the finance industry has been undergoing a profound transformation, which has been driven by technology, globalization, evolving regulation, and shifting cultural expectations. At the center of this change is another powerful movement: the rise of women transitioning into new roles, leadership positions, and specialized domains within finance.

This column highlights the hard work and dedication of SFNet’s Committee volunteers. Here we speak with Boudewijn Smit, partner at NautaDutilh and chair of SFNet’s Emerging Leaders (Young Professionals) Committee.

Editor’s Note: This article originally was published in the January/February issue of The Secured Lender magazine and contains updated information about the SFNet Emerging Leaders Summit.

The most traditional avenue for a distressed company seeking to reorganize existing debts or maximize company value is through a Chapter 11 bankruptcy. However, due to its complexity, a Chapter 11 bankruptcy can be a lengthy, expensive process that is not always palatable for the distressed company’s secured lenders.

PNC Bank, National Association, announced the closing of a $90 million senior secured credit facility for Iconex LLC (Iconex), a portfolio company of Greenwich, CT-based Atlas Holdings. PNC’s facility was provided in conjunction with a $67.5 million term loan and a $30 million delayed draw term loan provided by Cerberus Business Finance.

I've spent 35 years across the table from secured lenders. I've watched some become legends and watched others get fired. The difference was rarely their spreadsheet skills. The best ones have something in common. They think like Stoics.

In this interview, Bruce Gibson, first vice president, senior relationship manager, Ken Kaestner, director and ABL Group head, and Ron Krauskopf,  executive vice president - head of Specialty Commercial Lending, discuss how Provident Bank is scaling its asset-based and specialty lending capabilities to support middle-market borrowers across New Jersey, eastern Pennsylvania, and New York. They highlight growing demand for flexible working capital solutions, the mainstreaming of ABL in a volatile environment, and Provident’s ability to compete with larger institutions while preserving local decision making and relationship continuity. 

The second quarter of 2026 demonstrated the continued resilience of the secured finance market, with 224 deals reported to SFNet's Secured Finance Deal Table. Activity remained broad-based across industries, financing structures and lender types, illustrating the flexibility of asset-based lending, factoring and specialty finance solutions as companies navigated a still-uncertain economic environment.

Asset-based lending is fundamentally focused on capital-intensive and asset-heavy businesses.  Because tariffs impact the sales of goods (as opposed to the provision of services) they will typically have an outsized impact on the borrowers under asset-based credit facilities.  This article will discuss recent tariff-related developments and analyze potential impact on the users and providers of asset-based financing.

The factoring industry entered 2026 with a familiar dynamic, but one that feels increasingly consequential: growth driven not by economic strength, but by constraint elsewhere in the credit system. The Secured Finance Network’s 2025 Year-End Factoring Survey shows an industry that is expanding across nearly every core metric—volume, utilization, revenue, and client demand—even as the broader economy slows and traditional lending channels become more selective.

Oil, Private Credit Stress, and a Renewed Opportunity for Secured Finance

As the secured finance industry moves through 2026, lenders are operating in an environment shaped by two converging forces: renewed geopolitical instability driving energy price volatility, and emerging stress within the rapidly expanded private credit market. Together, these dynamics are reintroducing uncertainty into credit markets—and, in the process, reinforcing the value of collateral‑based lending structures.