Abacus Finance Group, LLC, a New York-based direct lending company that provides cash-flow senior financing for private equity-sponsored, lower-middle market companies, announced the following promotions:

• Eric Petersen from Vice President to Senior Vice President,

• Rafal Rydzewski from Associate to Senior Associate,

• Joseph Lee from Analyst to Associate, and

• Afsheen Ali from Administrative Officer to Director of Administration.

Mr. Petersen joined Abacus Finance in 2013 as an Associate, and works as part of the investment team in structuring, underwriting and executing new investments. He also performs various portfolio monitoring and valuation roles. Previously, he was an Associate with BNP Paribas Merchant Banking Group and held both operational and M&A execution roles within GE Energy. Prior to transitioning to the private sector, he spent over 10 years as a Naval Officer and F/A-18 Fighter Pilot. Mr. Petersen earned an MS in Quantitative and Computational Finance from the Georgia Institute of Technology, an MBA from the University of Southern California, and a BS in English from the U.S. Naval Academy.

Mr. Rydzewski joined Abacus Finance in 2014 as an Analyst, and works as part of the investment team in structuring, underwriting and executing new investments. Previously, he was an Analyst at the BNP Paribas Merchant Banking Group, and he began his career with    the PricewaterhouseCoopers Global Structuring team as an Associate. Mr. Rydzewski, who is CFA Charterholder, earned a BS in Financial Economics, graduating magna cum laude from Binghamton University.

Mr. Lee joined Abacus Finance in 2014 as an Analyst, and works as part of the investment team in structuring, underwriting and executing new investments. He also performs various portfolio monitoring and valuation roles. Previously, he was an Analyst at GE Capital and began his career at General Electric in its financial management program. Mr. Lee earned a BS in Accountancy and Finance from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
 
Ms. Ali joined Abacus Finance at founding in 2011 as Administrative Officer and manages both the core operational functions as well as directing the marketing activities of the firm. Her responsibilities include providing administrative and operational support to the Abacus investment team, business development, client service and event management. She drives the firm’s marketing efforts, directly managing both online and offline customer and client engagement. Previously, she served as Office Manager at Amalgamated Capital and as Service Officer at KeyBanc Capital Markets. Ms. Ali earned a BA in Advertising and Marketing from Rider University.

“These four colleagues have become critical members of a team that has helped our firm complete more than 50 transactions since our launch in 2011, putting us past the $1.5 billion mark in total financings,” said Tim Clifford, Co-Founder and CEO of Abacus. “When we set out to build a sponsor-focused leveraged lending business for the lower-middle market,” added Sean McKeever, Managing Director, COO and Co-founder of Abacus, “we knew the demand was there but never expected success to come as quickly as it did. In addition to an exclusive focus on financing smaller buyouts, among the principal factors contributing to our growth and reputation as a go-to partner is that we lead virtually all of our transactions, the quality of the investment team we have attracted, the co-investments we have made, and our Total Partnership Approach TM – a passionate commitment to serving our clients and delivering on what we promise.”