Unitranche priced at SOFR+5–7%

Unitranche loans are a single private credit loan that replaces a stacked senior-and-junior debt package, and in early 2026 their pricing moved back up. PitchBook reported some private credit loans were clearing 50 to 100 basis points wider than late-2025 levels. (pitchbook.com) The clearest examples came in March. WWEX Group’s $4.815 billion unitranche backing Thoma Bravo’s buyout priced at SOFR plus 575 basis points, and Nexthink’s $750 million package for Vista Equity Partners priced at SOFR plus 550. (pitchbook.com) That is a turn from 2025, when competition pushed average unitranche spreads down toward SOFR plus 500 or below. In LCD’s first-quarter 2025 survey, 45% of respondents said a typical unitranche loan was already pricing at SOFR plus 500-549, and 43% expected sub-500 spreads six months later. (pitchbook.com) A unitranche used to mean one credit agreement with hidden first-out and last-out economics allocated among lenders after closing. Proskauer said the market has shifted toward a single senior term loan, often paired with a super-priority revolver, instead of formally split senior and subordinated tranches. (proskauer.com) That structural change moves more of the risk decision to the front end. If lenders are not relying on internal tranching to sort returns later, the spread, leverage and covenant package have to do more of the work at signing. (proskauer.com) (pitchbook.com) The backdrop is a private credit market that got bigger and more competitive, then started to reprice. Chambers and Partners said banks pushed back into syndicated lending in 2024 and 2025, while Houlihan Lokey’s January 2026 newsletter said direct-lending issuance hit a record $327 billion in 2025 even as unitranche yields kept compressing. (practiceguides.chambers.com) (www2.hl.com) By December 2025, Houlihan Lokey said private credit unitranche all-in yields had fallen to 9.33%, down 109 basis points over the year and 308 basis points from the July 2023 peak. That left lenders with less cushion just as 2026 underwriting started to look less borrower-friendly. (www2.hl.com) (pitchbook.com) Credit performance is part of the reason terms matter. Proskauer’s Private Credit Default Index showed a 2.67% overall default rate in the fourth quarter of 2024 across 825 U.S. senior-secured and unitranche loans totaling $152.8 billion, with the $25 million to $49.9 million EBITDA band at 4.7%. (proskauer.com) The result is a market where “unitranche” still sounds like one simple loan to the borrower, but the real negotiation sits in the inputs: spread, leverage, covenants and cash-pay burden. In 2026, those inputs are getting more expensive again. (proskauer.com) (pitchbook.com)