Investment trust insider on RM Secured Direct Lending – James Carthew: A debt fund that passed the Covid test
It is some time since I took a look at RM Secured Direct Lending (RMDL), but recently I managed to catch up with its manager James Robson.
It is safe to say that the debt sectors have not had a good time of it recently. They have been shrinking fast, as funds such as KKV Secured Loan (SQN), ICG Longbow Senior Secured UK Property Debt (LBOW), Hadrian’s Wall (HWSL) and Alcentra European Floating Rate Income (AEFS) decided to wind themselves up, and Pollen Street Secured Lending, renamed Alternative Credit Investments (ACI), is being taken over by Waterfall Asset Management.
Most remaining funds are trading at discounts, and the last new issue in this area was of Riverstone Credit Opportunities Income (RCOI) back in May 2019. That fund is trading on a 29% discount, with the net asset value (NAV) having been fairly flat since launch.
Investors still appear to be favouring a small clutch of funds. Among them are BioPharma Credit (BPCR), CQS New City High Yield (NCYF), City Merchants High Yield (CMHY), Henderson Diversified Income (HDIV) and the two TwentyFour (TFIF and SMIF) funds; most of these held up relatively well last year. James believes that RMDL deserves to be added to this list.
…read more here
NB there is a small error in the text of the original article – it should say IFRS13 not IFRS9. Apologies