Liontrust Assessment of Value Report - Flipbook - Page 101
Global Fixed Income team
The Co-Heads of the Global Fixed Income team are Phil
Milburn and Donald Phillips, who joined Liontrust to set
up the team in early 2018. They were joined by Emma
Veitch on 12 July 2022 with Sharmin Rahman moving to
Liontrust to join the team on 1 August 2022. Before joining
Liontrust, Phil had spent over 20 years at Kames Capital,
launching one of the market’s first strategic bond funds in
2003 and developing a leading high-yield franchise. Phil
graduated from the University of Edinburgh in 1996 with
a first-class MA in Economics. Donald had worked with
Phil at Kames Capital for three years from 2005 to 2008,
before moving to Baillie Gifford where he managed
investments prior to joining Liontrust. Donald had been
co-managing the European high-yield strategy at Baillie
Gifford since 2010. More recently, he had been involved
in the portfolio construction of a US high-yield fund.
Sharmin joined from AXA Investment Managers where
she had been a Senior Portfolio Manager and Analyst in
the European High Yield team since July 2012, having
14 years’ experience in total. Sharmin had assisted with
the management of portfolios with more than €2 billion in
assets. Emma returned to the fund management industry
at the start of 2022 after a career break to raise her
family and work in volunteer roles. Emma’s previous role
in asset management was as Senior Investment Analyst
of UK companies at Aegon Asset Management from
October 1993 to July 2000. Her volunteer roles included
being Orchestra Manager of the Edinburgh Symphony
Orchestra.
Investment process
The process is designed to take advantage of
inefficiencies in fixed income markets through a thorough
understanding of the economic environment and detailed
bottom-up stock analysis. The process uses the same
framework to garner a thorough understanding of the
economic environment and for bottom-up stock analysis:
fundamentals, valuations and technical (FVT). These three
factors are examined regardless of whether the managers
are considering a duration position or an investment in a
speculative grade rated company. In judging whether a
company is attractive long-term investment, the managers
analyse the following factors, which they call PRISM.
• Protections: operational and contractual, such as
structure and covenants
• Risks: credit, business and market
• Interest cover: leverage and other key ratios
• Sustainability: of cash flows and environmental, social
and governance (ESG) factors
• Motivations: of management and shareholders
Fund
• Liontrust Strategic Bond Fund
Liontrust Assessment of Value Report - 101
