Active Investment Company Alliance

Jason Akus, Senior Investment Director and Head of Healthcare Investing at abrdn, is this week’s guest on the NAVigator Podcast! Akus, who manages abrdn’s four #closedendfunds covering biotech and healthcare, says that the stock market appears to be broadening out and that healthcare and biotech are both likely to be beneficiaries. Healthcare stocks have generally lagged the stock market since the start of 2023, but with the Standard & Poor’s Health Care Index up 11 percent in 2024 — respectable but still trailing the broader S&P 500 by about seven percentage points — there are strong signs of recovery. As the catch-up trade materializes, Akus believes there will be no shortage of potential opportunities ready to benefit investors even if the economy begins to slow. Visit our website to listen to the podcast and learn more: https://lnkd.in/gpjgfpwJ

Meet our members! Liberty Street Advisors is a New York City-based, employee-owned investment advisory firm founded in 2007. Liberty Street provides access to niche investment strategies that aren’t always available to independent financial advisors and retail investors. For instance, the firm advises The Private Shares Fund, a listed closed-end interval fund with the Nasdaq ticker symbols PIIVX (Class I), PRIVX (Class A), and PRLVX (Class L). Liberty Street also supervises sub-advisors for the general management and operations of multiple listed, income-focused mutual funds. Visit our website to learn more about Liberty Street Advisors, Inc. and read a Q&A with Tim Reick, the firm’s Chief Executive Officer: https://lnkd.in/e8WR-N7G

Business development companies are again the subject of this week’s NAVigator Podcast! What’s the latest on #BDCs? Mark Gatto, Co-Founder and Co-Chief Executive Officer at CION Investments — which manages the business development company CION Investment Corp. — discusses the heavy interest and cash flow into #businessdevelopmentcompanies and how that is changing the space and making it important for investors and advisers to “pull back the layers to understand what they are investing in.” Gatto also says that the biggest players in BDCs are becoming “very homogeneous” and avoiding differentiation when they get very large. However, he says that situation also creates opportunities for investors who want to diversify their BDC holdings by investing in middle-market deals, where smaller BDCs can be nimbler and offer different exposure. Visit our website to listen to the podcast and learn more: https://lnkd.in/gqJMqG2A

John Cole Scott, President of Closed-End Fund Advisors and Chairman of the Active Investment Company Alliance, takes the hot seat again in this week’s NAVigator Podcast! In the interview, Scott compares two high-yielding offerings from Ares Management Corporation, breaking down the Ares Dynamic Credit Allocation (ARDC) fund and the CION Ares Diversified Credit I (CADUX) fund. He shows that while both could be viable and attractive options for investors diversifying a portfolio into the alternative credit space, there’s much more to picking between them than big yields, reasonable expense ratios, discounts, and recent results. Visit our website to listen to the podcast and learn more: https://lnkd.in/gn_JCKKm

Looking for real-time insight into business development companies? On this week’s NAVigator Podcast, John Cole Scott, President of Closed-End Fund Advisors and Chairman of the Active Investment Company Alliance, shares takeaways from a recent industry conference focused on #BDCs. In the interview, Scott talks about how #businessdevelopmentcompanies compare to private credit funds, how the market is changing, and how some money managers are using artificial intelligence to get better information on market trends that could help them pick better investments or improve timing on the trades they make. Visit our website to listen to the podcast and learn more: https://lnkd.in/eBu5Vbqb

Meet our members! Kayne Anderson is a leading alternative investment management firm founded in 1984 by Los Angeles businessmen Richard Kayne and John Anderson. The firm pursues cash flow-oriented niche strategies in real estate, credit, infrastructure, energy, and #growthcapital. Kayne bolsters its differentiated investment philosophy by: --> Fielding talented teams with deep sector expertise --> Applying knowledge and sourcing advantages to underfollowed segments of the market --> Sizing its capital (and funds) appropriately to optimize return while minimizing risk Kayne Anderson pursues multiple strategies, with listed and non-listed investment products focused on energy infrastructure and private credit. Visit our website to learn more about Kayne Anderson: https://lnkd.in/dMFsQ6KZ

Roxanna Islam, CFA, CAIA, Head of Sector and Industry Research at VettaFi, is our guest on this week’s NAVigator Podcast! In the interview, she discusses the benefits and flaws of applying rules-based investing to closed-end funds. Islam notes that changes in the industry have forced changes on a rules-guided index of #closedendfunds created by VettaFi, and how that is impacting the holdings and asset allocation of the fund-of-funds that some investors are using instead of building their own portfolio of individual closed-end strategies. Visit our website to listen to the podcast and learn more: https://lnkd.in/gxdmi-Ta

Meet our members! SCG Asset Management LLC, founded in 2020, is an employee-owned investment advisory firm with offices in Chicago, Miami, Nashville, and New York. SCG Asset Management LLC manages The Alternative Strategies Income Fund, a listed closed-end #intervalfund with the Nasdaq ticker symbols LTAFX (Class A), LTCFX (Class B), and LTIFX (Class I). The Fund’s investment objective is to seek attractive risk-adjusted returns with low-to-moderate volatility and low correlation to the broader markets through a concentrated alternative investment approach that emphasizes income generation. Visit our website to learn more about SCG Asset Management LLC and read a Q&A with Ian Merrill, the firm’s President: https://lnkd.in/dg4pwYgG

Rob Shaker, Portfolio Manager at Shaker Financial Services, LLC, talks discount capture, activism in closed-end funds, and more on this week’s NAVigator Podcast! In the interview, Shaker says that economic conditions — the debt-ceiling debate, troubled banks, higher interest rates, and persistent inflation — have created a situation where the market isn’t climbing the proverbial wall of worry, but rather a “Wall of Meh.” However, he adds that there is opportunity in the unimpressive current conditions, noting that long-term investors in #closedendfunds can use lagging investor sentiment to capture discounts as early as the second half of this year, when he expects a “generalized recovery” from today’s worrisome issues. Visit our website to listen to the podcast and learn more: https://lnkd.in/eaDRPAum

Everyone’s talking about interval funds, the #alts phenomenon helping to increase retail investor access to the world of non-traded products. But how much do you really know about them? Interval funds are perpetual, continuously offered, and combine features of both traditional mutual funds and listed closed-end funds. To help investors and advisors learn more about #intervalfunds, AICA has put together a primer describing: -> How they work -> Interval fund strategies -> Interval fund sponsors -> Potential benefits and risks Visit our website today to access our paper on interval funds: https://lnkd.in/dW3EY89F