The A$13 billion (US$12.9 billion) multimanager ipac hired Morgan Stanley to run A$738 million in global corporate bonds; Kapstream Capital to manage A$228 million in absolute return; Old Mutual to handle A$114 million in global sovereign bonds; and Antares to run A$90 million in inflation-linked bonds.
Funding came from terminating global fixed-interest mandates from BlackRock and AllianceBernstein as part of a restructuring of ipac’s A$2.8 billion fixed-income portfolio to gain more control over risks in debt markets.
The multimanager now allocates to three sectors: government bonds, which includes Australian and global sovereign debt and domestic inflation-linked bonds; multistrategy fixed interest, containing absolute-return and fixed-income strategies; and cash.
Its former sectors were domestic bonds, global bonds, alternative income and cash.
James Murray, senior investment manager at ipac, said the multimanager wanted to clearly demarcate risks in fixed-interest markets, and use these exposures as asset allocation “levers” to better meet return objectives in its diversified funds.
Simon Mumme is editor of Investment magazine, Sydney.
