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    Single-Sector / Specialty

    Single-Sector / Specialty

    For investors looking for targeted exposure, Insight’s single-sector offerings cover several specialisms focused on a variety of risk/return objectives.

    These strategies seek to benefit from our rigorous portfolio construction process, which entails pinpointing relative-value opportunities while precisely targeted risk exposures. They are available in a variety of structures and formats.

    Key facts

    $270.3bn

    fixed income AUM globally1

    161

    fixed income investment specialists2

    20 years

    average experience2

    41

    global credit research professionals2

    Our single-sector capabilities

    We seek to deliver a relatively high level of income and excess total return from actively managing portfolios of tax-exempt and taxable municipal bonds.

    Other potential benefits include historic low default rates due to the strong credit quality of state and local government issuers and diversification against other corporate bond holdings and equities.

    What is Stable Value?

    Our stable value strategies are offered in defined contribution plans and focus on preserving capital, maintaining a stable market value with high liquidity while also seeking compelling fixed income returns.

    They tend to be attractive to investors with short time horizons looking for diversification against more volatile investment strategies, as well as investors approaching retirement who are seeking consistent income.

    Insight’s Stable Value strategies

    Our strategies focus on delivering these characteristics with a high degree of certainty. We aim to deliver steady returns comparable to intermediate-term (3-5 year) bond funds but with volatility comparable to lower-risk money market funds.

    We combine investments in book value contracts (which provide counterparty-guaranteed participant-directed liquidity) with a diversified portfolio of intermediate-term bonds. Our approach focuses on adding value by overweighting spread sectors to generate more income in the portfolio and broadly diversifying underlying issuer risk, thereby minimizing default risk.

    Insight customizes each client portfolio to meet specific needs. We typically segment portfolios into a liquidity (buy and maintain) strategy and a total return strategy (combining active and passive allocations), diversifying risk across many levels—including credit, duration, liquidity, alpha sources and wrap providers.

    Access

    We offer our solution in defined contribution plans and through multiple vehicles. Our experienced team follows a consistent approach that focuses on high credit quality assets to preserve value, broad portfolio diversification and liquidity management.

    Emerging market economies now collectively contribute more to global growth than developed economies.

    At Insight, we have designed a range of emerging market debt (EMD) capabilities that offer investors exposure across corporates, local rates and local currencies. We also manage strategies with tools to target long, short and relative value alpha opportunities.

    Our strategies

    Access the opportunity set according to your risk/return preferences, exploiting attractive beta and alpha opportunities rather than relying on structural beta alone to drive returns, a feature which is typical of traditional benchmark-driven strategies.

    • EM Corporate debt: investment grade, high yield and unconstrained
    • Total Return EMD: Tactically allocates between corporates, sovereigns and local currency.
    • Absolute Return EMD: Invests opportunistically regardless of index weight

    Insight's buy and maintain strategy offers clients structural exposure to credit markets, without the perceived limitations of an index-tracking approach. They invest only in companies with what they consider solid, stand-alone fundamentals and insist on sound financial reporting and ready access to management. Investment is for the long term and they avoid unnecessary or excessive turnover, thereby offering clients a means to lock in market exposure and limit transactions costs. While buy and maintain mandates do not explicitly target alpha generation, we believe that enhanced returns can be achieved via modest secondary turnover from reinvestment of cashflows from coupons, maturities, sales or tenders. This gradual refreshment process ensures that the portfolio reflects our most current credit views; avoiding the potential issue of stagnation in a typical ‘buy and hold’ approach and offering the potential for enhanced returns.

    Insight's convertible bond strategy seeks to generate returns predominantly through long investments in convertible bonds (and equity-linked securities) paired with short investments in the corresponding equities. Insight believes that the defensive characteristics of convertible bonds, combined with robust credit due diligence and return-seeking equity analysis can help to deliver strong risk-adjusted returns through this approach.

    Our structured credit strategies aim to help you unlock a ‘complexity premium’ and higher cashflow certainty from secured investments.

    Our team has managed global structured credit strategies for well over a decade across ‘core’, ‘alternative’ and ‘esoteric’ markets, including private lending, helping you exploit opportunities in new and untapped areas.

    We also partner with institutional investors such as insurance companies to create customized solutions.

    Meet some of the team

    Insight’s global team of over 161 fixed income investment specialists with have long experience in delivering innovative alpha generation solutions2.

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    Daniel Rabasco, CFA

    Head of Municipal Bonds

    Daniel Rabasco, CFA

    Head of Municipal Bonds

    Dan joined Insight in September 2021 following the transition of Mellon Investments’ fixed income strategies to Insight. He has worked in the investment industry since 1987. Dan is the head of municipal bonds, overseeing and guiding the investment management process for the firm’s tax-exempt strategies. Previously, he was the chief investment officer for tax-exempt bond and prior to that position, Dan was the head of trading for tax-exempt bonds, responsible for managing the municipal bond trading desk. Before joining Mellon Investments, Dan directed the municipal bond group at Fleet where he was responsible for managing mutual fund, common trust fund and high net worth client assets.

    Previously, he was a portfolio manager at Evergreen Investments, where he managed national and state-specific mutual funds. His other responsibilities included hospital and high yield credit analysis. Dan began his career as a municipal analyst at Liberty Insurance Company.

    He holds a BA from Boston College and an MBA from Suffolk University. Dan has served as a member of the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board's Investor Advisory Group (2004-2008). He is a CFA charterholder and is a member of the CFA Institute.

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    Eric Baumhoff, CFA

    Head of Stable Value

    Eric Baumhoff, CFA

    Head of Stable Value

    Eric joined Insight in September 2021 following the transition of Mellon Investments’ fixed income strategies to Insight. He has worked in the investment industry since 1986 and joined Mellon Investments as the Chief Investment Officer of the stable value strategy in 1990. He is now responsible for overseeing Insight’s Stable Value Team, including the portfolio management and client service teams. He is also responsible for all related investment management activities. He is the architect of the yield enhanced and liquidity strategies implemented within our stable value portfolios.

    Previously, he was an analyst and trader in the treasury/global funding group at Wells Fargo. Eric received a BA from the University of California at Santa Cruz and an MS from MIT Sloan School of Management. He is a CFA charterholder and is a member of the CFA Institute.

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    Federico Garcia Zamora

    Head of EMD Macro Strategies, Emerging Market Fixed Income

    Federico Garcia Zamora

    Head of EMD Macro Strategies, Emerging Market Fixed Income

    Federico joined Insight in September 2021 following the transition of Mellon Investments’ fixed income strategies to Insight. At Mellon, Federico was Head of the Emerging Market Debt Team where he was responsible for the management of all emerging market debt  portfolios. He has been in the investment industry since 1998 and joined Mellon Investments in 2012. Previously, Federico was CoPortfolio Manager of the international fixed income, global fixed income and strategic inflation opportunities funds at American Century Investments. Before that, he was a Currency Strategist and Portfolio Manager at Lehman Brothers Asset Management. Federico received an MBA from Columbia Business School, a Masters degree in Finance from Universidad de Buenos Aires and a Licentiate in  Economics from Universidad Nacional del Sur.

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    Shaheer Guirguis, CFA

    Head of Secured Finance

    Shaheer Guirguis, CFA

    Head of Secured Finance

    Shaheer joined the Fixed Income Group at Insight in September 2007 and is the head of the Structured Credit Team, which is responsible for investments in the global structured credit markets, in addition to global asset-based finance activity. Shaheer is lead portfolio manager for the Insight High Grade ABS Fund and the Secured Finance Fund, as well as a number of segregated accounts. In July 2016, Shaheer relocated to New York to oversee the growth in capability within the US structured credit and asset-based finance markets. He began his career at Gulf International Bank (formerly Saudi International Bank) in 2000, where he held various positions, initially as a market risk analyst, then as an investment analyst before his appointment as a fixed income portfolio manager in 2007. Shaheer holds a BSc (Hons) in Economics from the University of Surrey and an MSc in Finance from the University of Durham, as well as being a CFA charterholder®.

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    Erin Spalsbury, CFA

    Head of US Investment Grade

    Erin Spalsbury, CFA

    Head of US Investment Grade

    Erin joined Insight’s Fixed Income Group in August 2019 as a Senior Portfolio Manager responsible for managing credit portfolios, including long duration and customized bond solutions. Erin was promoted to Head of US Investment Grade in 2022. She previously worked at Conning, Inc. as a fixed income portfolio manager, where she managed credit liability-driven portfolios for pension and insurance clients. Prior to Conning, Erin worked at JP Morgan Asset Management as a fixed income portfolio manager, where she managed credit/customized portfolios for a full range of clients with a focus on pensions, and also handled credit trading. Erin holds a BA in Economics/Mathematics from Boston University and is also a CFA charterholder.

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    Robert Bayston, CFA

    Head of US Government and Mortgage Portfolios

    Robert Bayston, CFA

    Head of US Government and Mortgage Portfolios

    Robert joined Insight in September 2021 following the transition of Mellon Investments’ fixed income strategies to Insight. He has been in the investment industry since 1991. Robert is the Head of US Government and Mortgage Portfolios for fixed income. He is responsible for managing portfolios which focus on US interest rates and inflation strategies. In addition to his portfolio management responsibilities, Robert manages an investment team with similar mandates and oversees the US agency MBS research effort. Prior to his current role, he held several positions in fixed income research and trading. Robert received a BS from the University of Virginia's McIntire School of Commerce and an MS in Finance from Boston College. He is a CFA charterholder and is a member of the CFA Institute and the CFA Society Boston.

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    Frank Campana

    Senior Portfolio Manager

    Frank Campana

    Senior Portfolio Manager

    Frank joined Insight in October 2018 as a senior portfolio manager leading the development of the firm’s convertibles capability. Frank has nearly 30 years of experience in financial services. Prior to Insight, he spent over 15 years at Quest Global Advisors during which time he co-managed their convertible hedge fund and their absolute return UCITS fund. He has also managed convertible bond portfolios at Forest Investment Management and ING Barings Furman Selz. Frank holds a BA in Economics from City University of New York.

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    James Doolin

    Senior Portfolio Manager

    James Doolin

    Senior Portfolio Manager

    James joined Insight in October 2018 as a senior portfolio manager leading the development of the firm’s convertibles capability. James has nearly 30 years of experience in financial services. Prior to Insight, he spent over 15 years at Quest Global Advisors during which time he co-managed their convertible hedge fund and their absolute return UCITS fund. He also focussed on convertible securities investment at ING Barings Furman Selz, where he was a portfolio manager for seven years. James holds a BS in Finance and
    Economics from Northeastern University and an MBA from Rider School of Management.

    Further fixed income reading

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