This week, we start out with good news and get better from there! First, our initial analysis suggests that the proposed Volcker Rule acknowledges that CLO debt securities are not ownership interests – and this should reduce CLO risk from the Kirschner case. (But there still are big Kirschner fish to fry.) Second, CLO managers and equity have been bedeviled by LIBOR basis; we demonstrate mathematically that SOFR basis is not a big deal. Finally, there’s big buzz around direct lending, and we start demystifying this mysterious asset class.