// definition
BDC
Business Development Company
Short definition
A US financing company investing in debt and equity of generally small or mid-sized businesses. BDCs can be publicly traded or non-traded. Liquidity, leverage and repurchase terms depend on the structure.
risk atlas
Knowledge map
Intuition
A listed BDC gives its portfolio a market price. A non-traded BDC may offer capped periodic repurchases; investors face different exit conditions.
Formula
Listed BDC premium or discount = market price / NAV per share - 1Why it matters now
Software exposure requires separating recorded loan values, share prices and investors’ ability to exit.
Related analyses
- Private credit’s test of patienceNon-accrual loans, accounting bases and bank funding of credit vehicles.
- Private credit: software debt faces the AI testBIS exposures, OTF accounts and educational scenarios.
- Private credit: one asset, two pricesPrice discovery, listed BDCs and unlisted funds.
- Private credit, default and gatingDefaults, capped redemptions and regulator vigilance.
- Zombie funds and private valuationsPrivate marks, hard exits and the illusion of stability.
Related guides
- Analysing private creditValuation, liquidity, leverage, covenants and breaking points.
- How to read a 10-KCredit risk, debt, maturities and risk factors.
- Analysing 13F filingsPublic exposures of institutional managers.
Related datasets
- debt-risk.jsonDebt Risk Radar snapshot with provenance.
- risk-diff.json1, 7 and 30-day diff of signals, sources and models.
- evidence-graph.jsonClaims, evidence and their sources as a graph.
- catalog.jsonMachine-readable catalogue of l0g surfaces.
Signals using it
- MethodologyDebt, interest burden, current stress and structural vulnerability.
- Risk DiffRecent change in risk and source freshness.
- Black Box RecorderHashed frames to replay a point-in-time state.
Primary sources
- SEC: publicly traded BDCsVehicle structure and differences between BDCs.
- SEC EDGARBDC filings, 10-K, 10-Q, 8-K and institutional disclosures.
- Financial Stability Board & OFRNon-bank intermediation, financial stability and monitors.
- International Monetary FundGlobal Financial Stability Report and funding stress.
- Bank for International SettlementsGlobal credit, NBFI and market vulnerabilities.