Spac pricing hints at Sound Point's growth ambitions in loan market
Sound Point Acquisition Corp has priced a $225 million IPO, signalling that credit asset manager Sound Point Capital Management is looking to expand its platform

Ucits at a glance: 2022 opens shakily but with a familiar lead
Ucits funds moved slowly into 2022 as 59% made negative returns in January

Packaging company Schur is painful for European CLOs
The dramatic fall in loans taken out by Austrian flexible plastic packaging manufacturer Schur Flexibles has shocked CLO managers. The firm is hiring PJT Partners and Allen & Overy ahead of a potential restructuring

Fund performance: Groundhog Day as 2021 leaders start strong
CLO funds once again claim the most top performing spots as seven out of 10 funds belong to the category

Banks join fight against slow loan settlement in mini-win for CLOs
Several developments are in the works to tackle painfully slow loan settlement times in Europe, with Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, Clifford Chance and the Loan Market Association among the firms looking to drive change

"Boardrooms are being hustled by activist shareholders using ESG data to drive economic value"
Pledges have been made and the Race to Zero has begun. Firms need to put their plans in place

Värde promotes three credit specialists to partner
Värde Partners has promoted Jim Dunbar, Aneek Mamik and Carlos Sanz Esteve to partner

A fresh approach to loss distribution
Considering how cash balances change over time, loss distribution models can look very different to conventional thinking. So is your CLO’s pricing based on incorrect assumptions?  

"In 2022, being slow will not be such a bad thing"
St David losing its place as the UK’s smallest city would be a travesty. Replacing Libor might be worse

Brookfield hires industry veteran as public securities CIO
Brookfield Asset Management has hired a long-serving credit and equity market professional as chief investment officer for its public securities group

Everyone’s ramping

Alcentra makes leadership changes as European CLO head Rainbow goes part-time
Alcentra has announced changes to its leadership team with co-chief investment officer of liquid credit Graham Rainbow deciding to take on a part-time role at the firm

Intriva adds to asset management build up with senior hire
Intriva Capital, a mid-market lender and alternative investment firm, has hired a senior asset manager from HIG Capital

"In some ways, CLOs resemble a quirky, cottage industry more than a trillion-dollar market"
CLO volumes outstanding have passed $1 trillion, but index omission and private placements are holding us back

Liquidations emerge as speed bump to $1 trillion CLO market
CLOs are now a $1 trillion global industry, but liquidations are picking up and could hamper growth — as well as providing welcome relief to an engine that’s running somewhat hot. CLOs are now a $1 trillion global industry, but liquidations are picking up and could hamper growth — as well as providing welcome relief to an engine that’s running somewhat hot.

Ucits at a glance: mid market fund leaps into top four
The majority of Ucits funds end Q2 on a high note as 76% of those in our database recorded positive performance in June

Fund performance: Déjà vu as April leaders dominate
CLO funds stayed in the top flight for another month as they took over the top 10 credit hedge fund return table in May, when 87% of all funds listed made positive returns

Credit fundraising: managers take care of infrastructure with new partnerships
Credit managers were busy launching new partnerships to support growth in infrastructure and CLOs. There were 13 announcements in the month paving the way for upcoming funds, platforms, and joint ventures

It's all relative: CDX HY touches record tights but junior US CLO tranches leak wider
Credit spreads are marching tighter, but someone forgot to tell the CLO market. European and US CDS spreads have moved in step with each other for the most part with investment grade and high yield tightening 4-6% in the last week, whereas CLOs have been losing ground

Tech firm tempts credit investors with supply chain finance offer
Novicap, a fintech company focused on invoice financing, is looking to debt capital market participants — such as credit and structured credit funds, asset managers, pension companies and insurers — as it seeks to raise third-party funding for its credit platform

Elfa adds to ESG fact sheet range in standardisation drive
The European Leveraged Finance Association (Elfa) will shortly publish sector-specific fact sheets for the transport and healthcare industries, sources say, bringing its total of ESG fact sheets to 12

Fund performance: CLO funds outperform as two hit over 100% 12-months return
CLO funds swatted away the competition in April on their way to dominating our top 10 credit hedge fund return table after an upbeat month

Woah, we’re halfway there
Judging by the 2020 vintage, European CLO overlap is 50%. But varied approaches to holding bonds and the many loans managers turn down mean there are ways for issuers to outperform

Fund performance: Lightning strikes twice as range of credit funds deliver
What seemed like a chance occurrence in February has struck again in March, as seven categories make our top 10 best performing hedge funds

Credit fundraising: three massive European direct lending funds notch up €17.6 bn
Fundraising figures continued upwards in April as just over $24 billion was raised for credit funds, alongside $3.2 worth of allocations to credit managers. Nine funds held final closes including the largest European direct lending fund raised to date