Mercatus Finance, a cash flow lending specialty finance company, announced its official launch. Strategically backed with equity from Arena Investors, Mercatus fills an important void for smaller companies seeking cash flow based loans from $20 million to $75 million. Mercatus also has the flexibility, primarily in conjunction with first lien loans, to consider smaller second lien and subordinated debt and equity investments.

Mercatus provides highly customized credit solutions to lower middle and middle market businesses without the constraints typical of conventional institutional lenders or alternative credit providers. Mercatus targets lending to companies across industries requiring liquidity to support business transitions, organic growth, acquisitions, restructurings, and changes in ownership or control. Mercatus' experienced team will work quickly and creatively with owners and management to craft flexible solutions tailored to the specific opportunity, properly assessing situations that are misperceived by traditional lenders.

Robert Kiesel leads Mercatus as Chief Executive Officer. He comes to Mercatus with deep domain expertise in private credit and a proven track record with over 25 years of creating unique working capital structures to help borrowers finance their liquidity needs, mergers, or dividends to owners. Prior to Mercatus, Kiesel was previously Chief Investment Officer at Pillar Life Insurance and global head of credit at alternative credit advisor GB Capital. He was a partner at Fifth Street Capital and has held various positions at Intermediate Capital Group and ORIX USA.

"Mercatus is thrilled to begin this journey, with support from Arena, as a customer focused lender," explained Kiesel. "Our unique approach to stressed and unstressed situations alike positions us at an exciting and growing place in today's lending market."