Ares Commercial Real Estate Corp ACRE

The following description of the business of Ares Commercial Real Estate Corporation ("ACRE") should be read in conjunction with the information included elsewhere in this annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2025. We refer to ACRE together with our consolidated subsidiaries as "we," "us," "Company," or "our," unless we specifically state otherwise or the context indicates otherwise. We refer to our manager, Ares Commercial Real Estate Management LLC, as our "Manager" or "ACREM," and the parent company of our Manager, Ares Management Corporation, together with its consolidated subsidiaries, as "Ares Management."

We are a specialty finance company primarily engaged in directly originating and investing in commercial real estate ("CRE") loans and related investments. We are externally managed by Ares Commercial Real Estate Management LLC ("ACREM" or our "Manager"), a subsidiary of Ares Management Corporation (NYSE: ARES) ("Ares Management"), a publicly traded, leading global alternative investment manager, pursuant to the terms of the Amended and Restated Management Agreement dated July 26, 2022, between us and our Manager (the "Management Agreement"). From the commencement of our operations in late 2011, we have been primarily focused on directly originating and managing a diversified portfolio of CRE debt-related investments for our own account.