Pimco launches retail fund range in the UK

Pimco is bringing two of its giant institutional funds into the UK retail space for the first time with the launch of a new product range.

The Pimco Select range will be launched via Aegon’s investment platform, and later added to the other major fund supermarkets.

The first two products to be added to the Select range are the £3.3bn Global Bond fund, managed by Scott Mather, and the £392m UK Corporate Bond fund, managed by Luke Spajic.

Joe McDevitt, managing director and head of Pimco’s UK business, says: “The insurance and unit-linked markets are the largest and fastest growing segments of the pooled funds market in the UK and the launch of Pimco Select marks an important development for us in extending our investment management expertise directly to the UK retail sector.”

Gian Luca Giurlani, product and distribution manager, says the group expects to make the range available across other large retail platforms in the future.

“It is our intention to access the whole retail market via the main platforms,” he says.

The funds launched as part of the Pimco Select fund range will mirror those available on the firm’s existing Dublin-based Global Investor Series (GIS) platform.

The institutional share class of the GIS Global Bond fund has delivered an annualised return of 6.15% since launch in March 1998, while its GIS UK Corporate Bond fund has returned 6.38% since inception in September 2007.

Giurlani says Pimco intends to add other funds to the Select retail range in due course.