August 05, 2026
PPM America, Inc. (PPM) is pleased to announce the recent additions of four new loan originators to its commercial real estate team: Dennis Kracik, Justin Lata, Andrew Lockhart and Paul Mroz. These hires bring the total number of loan originators on the team to 13 and are intended to support ongoing record origination volumes, as PPM sees increased demand for commercial mortgages from its clients.
All four additions report to Thomas Fischer, PPM’s head of loan origination. Kracik and Lata both join PPM as managing directors. Kracik has over 30 years of real estate experience, most recently as vice president of real estate finance at Voya Investment Management. He is responsible for developing and managing sponsor relationships, as well as sourcing loan opportunities primarily in the Northeast and New England regions. Lata is a seasoned industry professional with over 20 years of experience and comes to PPM from Manulife/John Hancock where he worked as assistant vice president, regional director. He serves the Midwest and Mid Atlantic regions of the country. Lockhart and Mroz round out the new hires as regional directors, joining the firm from Manulife/John Hancock and Aegon Asset Management, respectively.
“These significant additions augment an already established and robust loan origination team, further extending our capabilities,” said Fischer. “Demand for commercial real estate is on the upswing, and PPM is poised to meet this demand and provide our clients with the best available investment opportunities.”
Andrew Lockhart, Justin Lata, Dennis Kracik and Paul Mroz (from left to right) join PPM America’s seasoned commercial real estate team to augment its loan origination capabilities.
About PPM America
Our mission is to be seen by clients and their advisors as a consistently reliable partner to help them achieve their long-term value goals.
PPM is a US-based institutional asset manager with $94.95 billion in assets under management as of March 31, 2026.* Established in Chicago in 1990, PPM exists to consistently support institutional clients in achieving their long-term value goals. We offer our mentality of hard work, straight talk, full transparency and humility. Our success is supported by a team-based culture that encourages debate, collaboration and consistency. At the center of our belief is the fact that our best ideas to date have and can come from any team member anywhere in our firm. We believe the success of our investment culture is best demonstrated by the strong retention of our clients and investment professionals.
* AUM includes committed but unfunded capital for PPM’s private equity and commercial real estate businesses. AUM includes both securities issued by PPM CLO vehicles held by PPM separately managed account clients and the underlying collateral assets of the CLO vehicles managed by PPM.
Past performance is no guarantee of future results. There can be no assurance that any particular individual will be involved in the management of any portfolio for any period of time, if at all. Furthermore, there can be no assurance that any PPM professionals presented herein will remain with PPM or that past experience or performance of such professionals serves as an indicator of his or her performance. Forward-looking statements are subject to uncertainties that could cause actual developments and results to differ materially from the expectations expressed. The opinions and views expressed herein are not intended to be relied upon as a prediction or forecast of actual future events or performance, guarantee of future results, recommendations or advice. Opinions expressed herein are current as of the date indicated and are subject to change without notice.
