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Investments

Fixed Income

Sterling Capital manages institutional assets for a diverse group of clients, including corporate, public, insurance, non-profits, and health care investment pools.

Overview

Our primary goals are long-term, consistent investment performance and exceptional client service. We achieve these goals by maintaining a consistent process for managing risk and a complete focus on developing strong client relationships.

Sterling Capital's Fixed Income team strives to deliver consistent, superior risk-adjusted performance over time through a multi-faceted approach to investing. Based on our team's forecast for the broader economy and specific market sectors, we utilize a variety of strategic and tactical levers that allow us to construct portfolios for any type of market environment.

Due to the asymmetric risk/return profile of bonds, we believe in the importance of quantifying risk prior to assessing the potential return of any investment. We analyze risk on both a stand-alone basis and within the portfolio context and firmly believe that when it comes to risk, “if you cannot measure it, you cannot manage it.”

Fixed Income

Insights

07.02.2025 • Charles Wittmann, CFA®

The Lead - Redefining Value

- Why would several mega-cap stocks that have been classified as 100% growth in the past be classified, even partially, in value?
- FTSE Russell uses an objective style and methodology that splits the Russell 1000® Index into growth and value based primarily on earnings growth, sales growth, and price-to-book measures (the last reconstitution was June 27, 2025).
- We discuss the reasons for these changes and why they occurred.
- We are aware of the changes, and our focus remains committed to the same process and mandate that has stood for decades.

06.20.2025 • Andrew Richman, CTFA

Fed Well-Positioned to Wait

Andy Richman's update on the June Federal Open Market Committee meeting.

06.10.2025 • Charles Wittmann, CFA®

The Lead - Quality on Sale

- Our investment philosophy focuses on quality.
- What has made the last three months unusual is the underperformance of quality stocks in the market downturn this spring.
- We discuss how quality has differentiated properties that tend to outperform in bear markets and over the long term.
- We then discuss how the underperformance of quality in the recent negative return market, when historically it outperforms, resulted in “quality on sale” for active investors with a quality orientation.

05.07.2025 • Charles Wittmann, CFA®

The Lead - Follow the Money

- We believe the inputs that create the ability for a company to pay dividends is of critical importance, especially if the economic environment becomes challenging.
- Starting in the later part of 2024, aggregate Bloomberg estimated earnings for the S&P 500® Index began to moderate then decline.
- While dividend payout ratios have improved, we would note that the rate of the market’s dividend growth has fallen almost 50%, to mid-single digits, since 2022.
- We believe more tempered growth expectations and companies signaling greater caution by moderating their commitment to return cash to shareholders via dividends is our sign to remain vigilant on the fundamental sources that generate dividend growth.

04.03.2025 • Charles Wittmann, CFA®

The Lead - Resilient Quality

- Economic sectors associated with value stocks, such as industrials and financials, have seen their quality measurements improve.
- With slowing economic growth and persistent inflation leading to “stagflation” concerns, what type of equity investments tend to shine?
- We show how quality companies that pay dividends and repurchase their shares have differentiated themselves in similar periods.

03.28.2025 • James Kerin, CFA®

Introduction to Collateralized Loan Obligations

Collateralized loan obligations (CLOs) are actively-managed securitized pools of leveraged loans, providing floating-rate exposure to corporate credit risk.

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