Ares Management Corporation operates as an alternative asset manager. Its Direct Lending Group segment provides financing solutions to small-to-medium sized companies. The company's Private Equity Group segment specializes in growth capital, middle market, mezzanine, distressed and growth buyouts. The firm seeks to invest in healthcare, services, energy, industrials and consumer. The firm seeks to takes majority, minority and shared-control investments …
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Competitive advantage assessment
Key strengths
High Return on EquityReturn on equity ranks highly vs peers (score 0.72).
Consistent Fee StructureFee margin stability is solid (score 0.76).
Key risks
Fee Margin PressureFee margin quality is below peers (score 0.18).
High Compensation CostsCompensation costs relative to peers are high (score 0.18).
The dashed ring is the peer median. Defense scores are percentile ranks
against peers, so 50 is roughly the typical company in this group.
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Ares Management Corporation ranks #86 of 173
scored companies in Asset Management by moat score — the top 50%.
The widest moat in the group is Sound Point Meridian Capital Inc (SPMC)
at 77/100.
Moat scores for companies ranked near ARES in Asset Management
How ARES scores on the Asset Management Specialized defenses
Fee Revenue Quality
Score 41
· 20% of the moat score
Fee revenue quality is the ability to charge above the industry's falling average and keep charging it.
Client Retention & Revenue Stickiness
Score 64
· 18% of the moat score
Assets under management leave far more easily than they arrive, and the fee leaves with them.
Compensation Discipline
Score 36
· 18% of the moat score
Compensation is the largest expense in asset management and the one that decides whether a good year ever reaches shareholders.
Capital Efficiency
Score 66
· 20% of the moat score
Asset managers are asset-light: with little capital employed, a healthy business should earn a very high return on equity, and a merely average one is a real warning.
Earnings Quality & Cash Conversion
Score 59
· 14% of the moat score
Reported profits here can be flattered by performance fees, seed-capital gains and consolidated fund accounting, none of which recur reliably.
Balance Sheet Strength
Score 18
· 10% of the moat score
Because the business needs so little capital, an asset manager carrying meaningful debt has usually borrowed to buy another manager or to fund distributions.
Ares Management Corporation (ARES) scores 49 out of 100 on the StatsAlpha Moat Map, which rates its competitive advantage as developing. It ranks #86 of 173 scored companies in Asset Management, the top 50%. The score is a weighted composite of 6 competitive defenses, each measured against industry peers of 174 companies in Asset Management. Its strongest defense is Capital Efficiency (66/100) and its weakest is Balance Sheet Strength (18/100).
How does Ares Management Corporation compare with other Asset Management companies?
Ares Management Corporation ranks #86 of 173 scored companies in Asset Management by moat score. The widest moat in Asset Management is Sound Point Meridian Capital Inc (SPMC) at 77/100. The companies ranked closest are Blackstone Inc. (BX) at 50 just above it and 240905 (PTA) at 49 just below it.
How is the moat score calculated?
Each company is scored with an industry-specific template — Asset Management Specialized in this case, chosen because the defenses that matter to a bank are not the ones that matter to a software company. Every defense combines several financial signals, and each signal is measured as a percentile against a peer group of 174 companies in Asset Management. The defenses are then weighted to produce the overall score out of 100.
Why is Ares Management Corporation scored with the Asset Management Specialized template?
An asset manager owns almost nothing. It charges a fee on someone else's money, pays much of that fee out in compensation, and keeps the remainder — so its economics turn on the fee rate it can defend, whether client money stays, and how much revenue survives the bonus pool. The Asset Management template scores those questions rather than the balance sheet, which in this industry is largely beside the point.
Which competitive defenses are measured for Ares Management Corporation?
The Asset Management Specialized template measures 6 defenses, and ARES scores: Fee Revenue Quality (41), Client Retention & Revenue Stickiness (64), Compensation Discipline (36), Capital Efficiency (66), Earnings Quality & Cash Conversion (59), Balance Sheet Strength (18). Each is scored independently as a percentile against peers, so a company can be strong on one and weak on another — the overall score reflects how those defenses are weighted for this industry.
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