Led by Alyssa Irving, portfolio manager and head of structured finance research, Wellington, has been expanding its scope in the insurance sector, with the fundamentals of security selection and economic research, added to with new initiatives like ESG analysis.

At present Wellington manages $51bn in securitised credit including $12bn in dedicated securitised mandates that Irving manages on behalf of insurance and bank clients.

Her development of a collateralised loan obligation (CLO) collateral-manager-focused approach has led to expansion into the space and valuable yield pick-ups for insurers in a low rate environment, which is reflected in the growth of the company's CLO debt ownership on behalf of clients. In 2020, this increased by 60% to $16bn across the platform.

Wellington's research resources include 41 fixed income credit analysts and 55 equity analysts who have assisted it to look into individual securities as well as macro factors like climate change.

The latter has been particularly championed by Irving, who has been incorporating ESG into Wellington's securitised credit research process which has seen it team up with Woodwell Climate Research Centre in scoping out projects and tools to supplement its climate research.

"Wellington has remained at the forefront of advising on how to evolve structured finance portfolios in the face of the biggest emerging trends: inflation, NAIC capital charge changes, pandemic effects on commercial real estate, and LIBOR sunset" says Irving.