Aegon Asset Management currently manages £107bn on behalf of insurers, of which £87bn is in fixed income strategies.

The attraction of the business has grown partly due to its strong performance. The manager's Absolute Return Bond, for instance, has delivered positive returns for clients in 84% of all calendar quarters since it was launched in 2011.

More recently, it has been focused on innovating in its fixed income strategies, with a strong emphasis on sustainability and climate transition. Its Sustainable Sovereign Bond Fund is backed by research to align sustainability factors and UN Sustainable Development Goals within sovereign bond portfolios, which was showcased at the COP26 global climate conference in Glasgow in 2021.

Meanwhile, Aegon's Global Short-Dated Climate Transition Fund uses climate transition research to direct investments to companies that have robust, credible plans to transition towards a low carbon economy and has grown to over £500m.

All of this is backed by its proprietary ESG research framework, which it uses to determine the potential materiality of ESG issues and the impact on an issuer's fundamentals.

Last year it helped clients navigate through the challenges of a stressed bond market in the UK following the meltdown in LDI market dynamics.