Fixed-income products becoming global macro hedge funds...

In my monthly column for the Smart Investor magazine I consider the rise of so-called "unconstrained" bond funds, the exemplar of which is co-portfolio managers Bill Gross and Kumar Palghat's Janus product which punts outright bonds, high yield (ie, sub-investment grade debt), listed equities, global currencies and likes to sell derivatives relating to these asset-classes. I argue that the performance of global macro hedge funds, which is what these unconstrained fixed-income products look like, suggests that it is very difficult to be a consistent master of so many different investment topics. In this context, there is much to be said for specialisation: Free (VIEW LINK)