BlueBay Asset Management is planning to launch products next year that will expand its fixed income specialism within alternative credit.
The London-based bond specialist has hired a Sid Chhabra to a newly created role as head of structured credit and collaterised loan obligations. Chhabra has spent 15 years in the structured finance sector including at JP Morgan and more recently in a similar position at Anchorage Capital Europe.
The hire follows shortly after the appointment of Stephen Thariyan as co-head of developed markets and after Erich Gerth, BlueBay’s chief executive, told Funds Europe that recruitment would also happen in the firm’s responsible investment business.
BlueBay’s hiring spree will continue as the firm, which is owned by Royal Bank of Canada and has $60 billion (€51.7 billion) of assets under management, builds a team around Chhabra.
Structured credits and asset-backed securities will be used in the firm’s current multi-asset credit portfolios – but the firm said it will also develop new stand-alone traditional and alternative strategies and launch them towards the end of 2019.
BlueBay has a team that has managed leveraged loans for 15 years. Chhabra will work with them while reporting to Thariyan and Mark Dowding, the other co-head of developed markets.
Gerth said the planned strategies will reinforce the firm’s position at the “convergence point of alternative and traditional asset managers”.
He said: “Sid has extensive experience in securitised assets, both as an investor and a structurer, and is highly regarded in the industry; therefore he is ideally positioned to grow BlueBay’s business in this area.”
Aviva Investors recently found evidence of demand for alternative forms of income which included structured finance.
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