NB Global Floating Rate Income’s accounts for 2014, published today, show a fall in its net asset value – from 100.18p to 97.7p for the Sterling shares (which make up the bulk of the fund although US dollar assets dominate the porttfolio) and from $1.0102 to $0.9862 for the US dollar shares. The total NAV return on the two classes of shares was 1.16% and 1.23% respectively as they paid dividends equivalent to a yield of 3.6% on the closing prices of the two share classes.
In the second half of the year, strong issuance (a consequence of a higher level of M&A activity), waning demand (as investors were put off by falling interest rates) and falling energy prices (which hit issues linked to stocks in that sector) all held back returns. in the wider market, defaults were 3.74% in the US (3.4% of which related to Energy Futures (the former TXU) and 4.9% in Europe – mostly Vivarte and Autobar.
NBLS / NBLU : NB Global Floating Rate reports on weak H2