US-headquartered asset manager, Capital Group, last week announced the appointment of Scott Steele to the newly created role of head of Fixed Income Business Development for Asia and Europe.
From his base in London, Steele will be responsible for building the firm’s fixed income distribution strategy and will deliver the firm’s product development roadmap to better serve institutional and intermediary clients in both regions, a release shared with media explained. He reports to Alexandra Haggards, head of Product and Investment Services for Asia and Europe.
With an international career spanning over three decades in the financial industry, Scott brings to the firm experience from the Hong Kong, Singapore, New York and London, where he most recently served as global head of Fixed Income for Janus Henderson Investors. He has held a number of other leadership positions at PIMCO and BMO Mutual Funds.
“His responsibilities will be balanced across both regions”, a spokesperson for Capital Group told FinanceAsia.
“We see tremendous potential to reach more investors in Asia and support them to achieve their long-term investment goals. Amid ongoing volatility, the role that fixed income can play in a balanced portfolio has never been more important,” the contact explained.
Over the past five years, Capital Group has doubled its fixed income assets under management (AUM) to account for over 20 percent of its total $2.2 trillion AUM as of 30 June 2022, Haggard explained in the release.
“[Steele] will be vital in helping our clients build more resilient and diversified portfolios as we expand our fixed income capabilities and bring our active strategies to more investors across Asia and Europe,” she added.
The company spokesperson told FA that the firm sees four key roles for fixed income within a balanced portfolio: to provide income; preserve capital; diversify away from equities; and offer inflation protection – “although different strategies will be skewed towards different parts of that spectrum,” she explained.
“Over the long term, we consider these four roles as our true north star of fixed income investing,” the contact added.
Capital Group has 31 offices globally. In Asia, it has a presence in Hong Kong, Melbourne, Mumbai, Shanghai, Singapore, Sydney and Tokyo.
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