Lazard launches investment grade convertible bond fund

LONDON, 6 May 2021, Lazard Asset Management (LAM) today announced the launch of the Lazard Global Convertible Investment Grade Bond Fund. The fund, which is the firm’s fifth long only convertible bond offering, is designed to provide long-term capital appreciation by investing in global convertible securities that qualify as investment grade.

The Fund will be managed by the award-winning LAM team¹ behind the £4.9bn² Lazard Global Convertible Fund, which adopts a two-step, bottom-up process, including a rigorous quantitative and qualitative analysis of convertible bonds and a fundamental analysis of the equities underlying them. The team will also apply a top-down macroeconomic view to guide tactical positioning.

The fund will consist primarily of investment grade global convertible bonds and will typically hold 40-65 securities with the objective of outperforming the Refinitiv Global Focus Investment Grade Convertible Index over a rolling five-year horizon. Environmental, social and governance (ESG) considerations will be fully integrated into the investment approach. The proprietary research on each issuer under consideration will include assessment against a sustainability scoring model for discrete ESG issues.

“In a lower-for-longer environment, convertible bonds represent an appealing option for investors wishing to achieve an attractive return, allowing them the potential to participate in equity market upsides, while retaining the relative security of bonds,” said Arnaud Brillois, Managing Director and global convertible bond portfolio manager at LAM. “This new global convertible investment grade fund will adopt our proven model that seeks to deliver long-term capital growth from the world’s strongest issuers, while fully integrating ESG considerations as standard.”

The fund will initially be available to investors in the following countries: the UK and Ireland, Germany and Austria.