Meet NAVigator Podcast host Chuck Jaffe
Jane King interviews financial journalist Chuck Jaffe, host of AICA’s NAVigator Podcast. Jaffe discusses the genesis and purpose of the podcast, saying its aim is to enlighten the public about closed-end funds and spotlight the investment industry professionals who work with them. He says podcast discussions are never scripted and seek to provide a useful mix of educational and timely fund performance information.
Muni discounts keep defying gravity; sizing up fixed-income risk and more
John Cole Scott, president of Closed-End Fund Advisors -- and the chairman of the Active Investment Company Alliance -- returns to The NAVigator noting that the discounts on muni funds have continued to get wider.
Angel Oak’s McBurnette on opportunities in housing, mortgages
Colin McBurnette, senior portfolio manager at the Angel Oak Funds, says that while high-rate and high-inflationary conditions have made a lot of investors worry about the housing market, those conditions -- along with wide spreads and low housing stocks creating an imbalance in the supply-and-demand dynamic -- have created real opportunities in the space.
Oppenheimer’s Penn: BDCs have adjusted to higher default risks
Mitchel Penn, managing director of equity research at Oppenheimer and Co., says that higher interest rates and stubborn inflation have impacted business development companies in terms of both defaults and leverage, but he notes that BDC executives have taken steps to minimize the impacts.
Four classic closed-end funds that remain relevant and vibrant today
Veteran money manager David Tepper, president of Tepper Capital Management, looks at four of the oldest closed-end funds -- Adams Diversified Equity, Central Securities, General American Investors and Tri-Continental -- that he has owned for decades, but which remain relevant and effective today, and which are trading at attractive discounts now.
40 closed-end funds, a million ways to build a portfolio
John Cole Scott, president, Closed-End Fund Advisors -- chairman of the Active Investment Company Alliance -- discusses portfolio construction and the many factors that go into a diversified safe and solid separately managed account with closed-end funds and business-development companies as the primary focus.
NAVigator bonus: Discounts are at widest levels in years, hunker down and buy
In a bonus episode of The NAVigator, John Cole Scott, president of Closed-End Fund Advisors and the chairman of the Active Investment Company Alliance, discusses the historic level of deep discounts he is seeing in closed-end funds, and how that translates to buying opportunities now.
Liberty Street’s Munafo says opportunity is knocking for private shares
Christian Munafo, chief investment officer at Liberty Street Advisors -- which runs the Private Shares Fund -- says that the perceived higher risks in challenging environments like the one we are facing today often lead to attractive opportunities...
Nuveen’s Caraher: High-rates-for-longer puts emphasis on credit selection
Scott Caraher, head of senior loans at Nuveen -- manager of the Nuveen Floating Rate Income fund -- says that the higher-than-expected increase in rates that has driven up borrowing costs has made credit selection 'more important today than it has ever been.'
Economic conditions have given private credit lenders more power
Chris Oberbeck, chairman and chief executive at Saratoga Investment Corp., says that the balance of power in the lender-borrower relationship has shifted dramatically in the last 12 to 24 months, with banks now pulling back which is leaving private lenders with better terms and more power to insist on superior deals.
Abrdn’s Duitz says private infrastructure values ‘make no sense’ right now
Josh Duitz, head of global income at Abrdn -- manager of the Aberdeen Global Infrastructure Income Fund -- says that private infrastructure investments have attracted so much money that valuations have gotten off-kilter, creating an 'illiquidity premium' that 'makes no sense.'