Nedgroup Investments, a global asset manager, has announced the launch of its Global Strategic Bond Fund.
The fund will be co-managed by Alexandra Ralph and David Roberts, who have over 50 years of combined industry experience.
Ralph previously worked at Artemis as the manager of the £1.8bn Artemis Strategic Bond Fund and Roberts as head of global bonds at Liontrust and at Aegon Asset Management (formerly Kames Capital) as head of fixed income.
The core, active fund will focus on interest rate and credit risk, within an unlevered core global bond portfolio that emphasises liquidity. The managers will avoid lower-quality bonds that are illiquid.
Nedgroup Investments chief commercial officer Apiramy Jeyarajah explained that the company has onboarded a number of platforms due to adviser demand.
The fund is available on the following platforms:
- Hargreaves Lansdown
- Interactive Investor
- Aviva
- Fundment
- Quilter
- Transact
- Wealthtime /Novia
Jeyarajah added that in the near future the number of platforms giving access to the fund will grow by five.
Also, the fixed income fund “can sit in both accumulation and decumulation products and brings a lot of stability with it”.
Ralph said: “We believe the current market offers the perfect opportunity for bond investors to go back to the core, whereby bonds now constitute the value part of a portfolio. Many leading bond funds have chased growth, but we will restrict equity-like assets such as high yield, EM and subordinated debt as investors will need to broaden their risk approach in this new regime.”
Ralph further explained that a lot of global bond funds tend to be overweight in the UK but this fund has more of a global weighting to it.
Nedgroup Investments managing director Tom Caddick said: “This fund is a rare proposition in the bond market, as it combines a liquid and unlevered core global bond portfolio with a value-oriented approach to interest rate and credit risk. Alex and David are managers I have known and respected for the last 20 years, so it is a thrill to see Nedgroup’s strategy of finding compelling managers and enabling them to launch their own boutique strategies.
“For us, it is testament to our long-term investment-led, entrepreneurial approach to finding excellence, and for our investors it means we can offer them increased choice competitive edge, accessing exceptional fund managers that they would not be able to invest with otherwise.”
Caddick was formerly Santander Asset Management chief investment officer and head of multi manager & fund selection at LV=.
Nedgroup Investments has over $20bn assets under management (AUM) and was set up in South Africa. It has had a presence in the UK for 20 years.
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