Armen Panossian
The Navigator
Judgement in the fog, money, risk and the call others cannot make.
Armen Panossian embodies The Navigator in the truest credit-markets sense, piloting through volatility by triangulating bottom-up fundamentals with macro awareness rather than surrendering to either extreme. His insistence on cycle-aware patience, catching falling knives only after rigorous analysis, marks a leader who reads shifting currents without being swept by them.
“On both sides of shaking it up, and from a CLO investor standpoint, the CLOs have floating rate features to them. So those investors said, wow, my return just went up magically. Thank you very much, Fed. But when quantitative easing turned into quantitative tightening, that's when the shift occurred.”
“Absolutely. Well, and they're bringing a Formula One race to Las Vegas for the first time in November. And so from just a business standpoint, seeing the impact that media can have on a brand like Formula One that was underpenetrated in the US, I think there are lessons to be learned from a business standpoint by focusing On content that…”
“So private equity firms were taking advantage of the tightening market conditions by taking on floating rate debt. And they decided not to hedge with enough frequency. About a third of the debt, based on our estimation, about a third of the debt that's floating rate out there has been hedged in some former fashion affixed.”
“Yeah, I mean, I think oak tree benefits from having really great clients and history and long history. And, you know, Howard started investing in high-yield bonds in the 70s. Howard and Bruce and Sheldonstone and their other partners began working together in 1985 and in 1988 in distress debt.”
Masters in Business: “Armen Panossian on Credit in a Time of Rising Rates”
LISTEN AT THE SOURCE ↗THE RECORD IS CHECKABLE