comparable quality, each at the time of purchase. The Fund considers “split-rated” securities, i.e., when two or more NRSROs assign different ratings for the same security, to be of investment grade if at least one of the ratings of the security is comparable to or higher than the ratings disclosed above.
The Fund may invest up to 25% of its net assets in foreign securities.
The Fund may purchase mortgage-backed and asset-backed securities such as collateralized mortgage obligations (“CMOs”), collateralized loan obligations (“CLOs”), commercial mortgage-backed securities (“CMBS”); convertible securities; preferred stocks; trust preferreds; credit default swaps (“CDS”) and collateralized debt obligations (“CDOs”) of any rating and debt securities issued by the U.S. government or its related agencies, debt securities issued by states or local governments and their agencies, authorities and other instrumentalities, U.S. dollar-denominated debt securities issued by developed foreign governments and corporations. The Fund may invest its assets in illiquid or thinly traded securities. The Fund also may invest in privately issued debt securities of domestic preferred stock, convertible debt securities, American Depositary Receipts (“ADRs”) and real estate investment trusts (“REITs”), including securities that are subject to resale restrictions such as those contained in Rule 144A promulgated under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended.
The Sub-Adviser normally invests the Fund’s assets across different groups of industries/sectors but may invest a significant percentage of the Fund’s assets in issuers in a single sector. The components of the Fund are likely to change over time.
The Fund is a non-diversified investment company.
Fundamental Research Process.
The Sub-Adviser’s fundamental research process combines a bottom-up issuer analysis and top-down market assessment. A bottom-up issuer analysis relies upon the Sub-Adviser’s fundamental research analysis of individual issuers. A top-down market assessment provides a framework for portfolio risk positioning and sector allocations. Once this is determined, the Sub-Adviser looks for companies that it believes have sustainable competitive positions, strong management teams and the ability to repay or refinance its debt obligations. The Sub-Adviser performs a credit analysis on each potential issuer and a relative value analysis for each potential investment. When selecting investments, the Sub-Adviser may invest in instruments that it believes have the potential for capital appreciation.
Individual investment selection is based on the Sub-Adviser’s fundamental research process. An investment is generally sold when the Sub-Adviser believes that the issue has realized its price appreciation target, the issue no longer offers relative value, or an adverse change in corporate or sector fundamentals has occurred.
Principal Risks
As with any mutual fund, the value of the Fund’s investments, and therefore the value of your shares, may go up or down and you could lose money. There is no guarantee that the Fund will achieve its investment goal. An investment in the Fund is not a deposit of a bank and is not insured or guaranteed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or any other government agency. Italicized terms refer to separate Principal Risks that are each defined in the Principal Risks section below.
While the Fund may be subject to various risk exposures at any given time depending on market conditions and other factors impacting holdings and investment strategies, the Fund under normal circumstances is subject to the following principal risks:
•Debt Securities Risk: Debt securities and other debt instruments are subject to many risks, including interest rate risk and credit risk, which may affect their value. The market value of a fixed-income security may decline due to general market conditions that are not specifically related to a particular company. The fixed-income securities market can be susceptible to increases in volatility and decreases in liquidity. Federal Reserve policy in response to market conditions may adversely affect the value, volatility and liquidity of debt securities.
•Credit Risk: An issuer or guarantor of a debt instrument might be unable or unwilling to meet its financial obligations and might not make interest or principal payments on an instrument when those payments are due (“default”). The risk of a default is higher for debt instruments that are non-investment grade and lower for debt instruments that are of higher quality. Defaults may potentially reduce the Fund’s income or ability to recover amounts due and may reduce the value of the debt instrument, sometimes dramatically.
•Convertible Securities Risk: Convertible securities are generally subject to the risks of stocks when the underlying stock price is high relative to the conversion price (because the conversion feature is more valuable) and to the risks of debt securities when the underlying stock price is low relative to the conversion price (because the conversion feature is less valuable). Convertible securities are also generally subject to credit risk, as they tend to be of lower credit quality, and interest rate risk, though they generally are not as sensitive to interest rate changes as conventional debt securities. A convertible security’s value also tends to increase and decrease with the underlying stock and typically has less potential for gain or loss than the underlying stock.