Why did KKR buy KFN?

I am sure a lot of you saw that KKR bought KFN. I, for one, hadn't even heard of KFN before, so listening in on the call from yesterday was pretty interesting. For those of you that are interested, check out the conference call . It's 15 minutes of presentation and 30 minutes of analyst Q&A (this is the interesting part).

The most interesting part seems to be the deal rationale. I have paraphrased an analyst question below:
"When buying KFN, you are just buying assets. You aren't buying a business. Why are you paying a premium for assets?"

Management basically responds that these are 'very special assets.'

Keep in mind that KFN has zero employees and is managed entirely by KKR folks. In light of that, the 35% premium does look odd. Below is an excerpt from Dan Primack's Term Sheet [great daily e-mail to sign up for if you are a student interested in keeping track of big deals, with an emphasis on PE/VC] this morning:

"What isn't so clearly laid out is why they are doing this deal now and why they are paying what appears to be a large premium to get it done fast. KKR said on the call that it is looking forward to transferring KFN’s cash flow over to KKR instead so it can redeploy that cash into higher yielding investments. That may be true but it doesn't explain why this is happening now as posed to next year. "

Primack makes what seems like a weak (in my opinion) hypothesis: "To make a long story sort the vast majority of KFN’s debt holding seem to be floating. That means as rates go up in 2014, which they probably will given the recent acceleration in the economy, the value of those assets will increase. So, this is sort of a bet on rates. At least that’s how I see it…"

I am wondering what the rest of you monkeys (especially anyone who has worked in PE or with sponsors) think.

Best,
TS

[Deck is attached]