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Seminars

New Frontiers in High Yield Bonds

Date: 02-09-2004
Start Time: 5:30pm
End Time: 7:00pm
Speaker: Martin Fridson, CEO - FridsonVision LLC
Location: 412 Schapiro CEPSR, Davis Auditorium

ABSTRACT

Following a spectacular recovery in 2003, the high yield bond market faces the possible challenges of upward pressure on interest rates and downward pressure on new-issue credit quality. Portfolio managers have an increasingly sophisticated array of tools at their disposal, from credit derivatives to quantitative methods that integrate the analysis of default risk and equity prices. Other important changes in the landscape include growing participation by hedge funds and stepped-up demands by institutional clients for performance and transparency in management.

BIO

Martin Fridson
Chartered Financial Analyst
CEO, FridsonVision LLC

Martin Fridson is "perhaps the most well-known figure in the high yield world," according to Investment Dealers' Digest. Over a 25-year span with brokerage firms including Salomon Brothers, Morgan Stanley, and Merrill Lynch, he became known for his innovative work in credit analysis and investment strategy. For nine consecutive years through 2002, participants in the Institutional Investor All-America research survey ranked Fridson number-one in his category. The magazine's editors dubbed him "the dean of the high yield bond market." In 2003, he launched the first independent research business focusing on high yield bond strategy.

The Financial Management Association International named Fridson the Financial Executive of the Year in 2002. In 2000, he became the youngest person ever inducted into the Fixed Income Analysts Society Hall of Fame. According to Barron's, "No one brings more insight or a better reputation for integrity to the junk-bond market than Marty Fridson." The New York Times called him "one of Wall Street's most thoughtful and perceptive analysts" and Grant's Interest Rate Observer labeled him "indispensable." Investment manager Michael McAdams described Fridson as "a hybrid of Stephen Hawking and Studs Terkel." Pensions & Investments called his satirical writing on financial markets "worthy of Jonathan Swift."

Fridson received his B.A. cum laude in history from Harvard College and his M.B.A. from Harvard Business School. He has been a guest lecturer at the graduate business schools of Babson, Columbia, Dartmouth, Duke, Fordham, Georgetown, Harvard, MIT, New York University, Notre Dame, Rutgers and Wharton, as well as the Amsterdam Institute of Finance. In January 1990, Institutional Investor selected Martin Fridson for its list of "The Next Generation of Financial Leaders." The New York Society of Security Analysts, in July 1994, called Fridson "one of our best known members." In 1997, Worth Magazine included Fridson's Investment Illusions among the 22 books published since 1841 constituting its investor's core library. Library Journal named Fridson's It Was A Very Good Year one of the best business books of 1998. Ross Perot wrote that Fridson's 2000 book, How to Be a Billionaire, "offers fascinating insight into the subject of building wealth." In 2000, The Green Magazine called Fridson's Financial Statement Analysis "one of the most useful investment books ever." Fridson contributes the feature, "On the Fritz," to Credit magazine and authors a monthly commentary on the high yield bond market for wsj.com, an online version of the Wall Street Journal.