Can you give a brief overview of your strategy in terms of what you are trying to achieve for investors, your investment process and the make-up of the investment team?

Alternatives are increasingly in focus for institutional and high net worth investors and an important growth area for AB. We’re committed to building a diverse alternatives platform by expanding our capabilities and attracting top industry talent. Alternatives generally comprise 8% to 10% of our overall assets. 

Within alternatives, we have focused on private credit solutions, which account for $45 billion of our AUM. Over the last decade, private credit has evolved from a niche asset class into what we consider an integral component of a diversified investment portfolio. AB’s suite of private credit strategies, which spans lending to middle market corporations, US and European real estate properties, consumers and small businesses, complements our $284 billion public fixed income platform. Experienced investment teams with institutional-caliber pedigrees and established track records are based across the US and Europe.

How would your strategy work in an investor’s portfolio?

A private credit allocation can play three important roles in an investment portfolio: it increases income potential, diversifies broad public market exposure and can reduce overall volatility. 

We seek to achieve this by spreading capital across three independent investment teams. One is focused exclusively on corporate direct lending to private equity backed companies and private equity funds. Another invests in the commercial real estate market, with separate strategies dedicated to the US and Europe. The third focuses on consumer-oriented specialty finance and hard asset lending, including aviation assets and debt and equity in power projects.

We consider all three essential components of a diversified allocation rather than an “either/or” proposition. By allocating across all three, we believe investors can improve current income reduce risk. We can invest with a variety of vehicles, including open-end and closed-end funds, both drawdown and perpetual.

Can you identify a couple of key investment opportunities for your fund you are playing at the moment in the portfolio? This could be a stock, sector or thematic level.

Average new-issue yields in corporate direct lending strategies have continued to benefit from elevated base rates, slightly offset more recently with tighter spreads. Base rates and asset yields are likely to remain above averages from recent years, and higher asset yields result in higher return potential. 

At AB Private Credit Investors, our $18.6 billion

Just months later, however, abrdn surprised both employers and investors of what was once the UK’s biggest investment company by ousting Bird after a four-year tenure.  In all but name the 57-year-old was pushed out of the active fund manager, even though a statement read at the time that both the board and Bird had jointly agreed it was the “right time to hand over the reins” to someone new.  The existential threat at the heart of Britain’s biggest wealth manager That someone – in the interim at least – is Jason Windsor, the firm’s handsomely paid chief financial officer who, just…

Following an internal review and engagement with the company’s largest shareholders, the board said it was updating its current tender offer plan, as the conditional mechanism brought in in 2020 is about to expire. Scottish Mortgage dominates investment trust share buybacks year-to-date Back then, the company put a conditional tender offer in place, which was dependent on the trust outperforming the TOPIX with compounding total returns of 4.7% per annum to 31 May 2024. The board said it “expected” the trust to meet its performance target and as a result the tender offer will not be…

According to data from Adzuna, a search engine for job advertisements, vacancies stood at 854,248 at the end of May. This marked a 0.01% increase from April (854,171), while annual vacancies fell by 18.7% compared to the same period last year. Core inflation figures ‘final nail in the coffin’ for hopes of June BoE rate cut Cambridge retained its position as the top place in the UK to find a job, with only 0.34 jobseekers competing for one role, while Bradford had the lowest score, with 7.94 jobseekers per role. Meanwhile, monthly salary figures decreased for the first time since…

Montague, the current chief financial officer, will take up the top leadership position on 1 October, subject to regulatory approval. She has been appointed CEO designate from 1 July. She joined the group in August last year and has extensive experience in the UK long-term savings and asset management sector. Brooks Macdonald loses UK distribution head to Ascot Lloyd Prior to Brooks Macdonald Montague was most recently group chief risk officer at Aviva, and group chief financial controller before that. She also held senior leadership positions at Royal London Group and Standard Lif…

This was the seventh consecutive ‘Hold’ call from the BoE and came on the back of inflation finally falling back to its 2% target. Although inflation is now ‘in line’, the data were not reassuring enough to begin slashing rates. Friday Briefing: No white rabbits but where was the British ISA? The day prior to the Monetary Policy Committee meeting, Luke Bartholomew, deputy chief economist at abrdn, said that while the fall of headline inflation back to target was expected, it still came as “extremely welcome news to the Bank of England”. “The big question now is whether underlyin…

Nicki Hinton-Jones, Chief Investment Officer at Timeline, says asset allocation driven by home market bias should be a thing of the past and investors should allocate capital to the areas of opportunity that offer the best returns.

Read the Q&A in the brand new MPS Watchlist, which not only includes this article, but other fantastic content from 8AM Global, Quilter, Quilter Cheviot, Tatton Investment Management and Timeline.