Halister News

(Bloomberg) -- Invesco remains long European credit ahead of today’s ECB meeting as it expects spreads to compress further, according to portfolio manager Lyndon Man.

• Company is overweight financial credit, London-based Man says in interview
• ECB unlikely to give more hints on corporate-sector purchase plan today as program set to start toward end of 2Q; says it will be surprising if central bank announces any details on this
  • Consensus is for ECB to buy from the secondary market; while size of market is big, it could be challenging liquidity-wise
• If ECB decides to buy also in primary space, that would be positive for markets
• Doesn’t expect any meaningful market impact from meeting as Draghi is likely to reiterate March message, keeping his dovish stance intact
• Draghi also expected to stick with March message that lower bound on deposit rates has been reached
• NOTE: Man manages Invesco Euro Bond Fund, which had about EUR800m in assets under management as of end of March; Invesco Euro Bond Fund is part of Atlanta-based Invesco, which managed $771.5b at the end of March, Lyndon says
• NOTE: Fidelity says Draghi unlikely to weaken EUR, will keep March message