Opinion
April 2021 | Issue 233
We say it
Creditflux salutes women in credit
The credit industry is blessed with many strong women and for this issue of Creditflux we’re exclusively hearing their voices across our news, analysis and columns.
Women are under-represented in decision-making roles in finance (a report by Waterman Stern this year found women make up just 14% of the workforce in European leveraged finance). More needs to be done to ensure credit firms give them — and minorities — the opportunities they deserve. After all, diverse teams generate a broader and better range of ideas.
We’d like to thank our regular female columnists, and the women who have taken over from their male colleagues for this issue.
And we salute all women in credit who have beaten the odds to become role models for a new generation.
Michelle D’souza & Tanvi Gupta
Points up front
Navigating lockdown easel-y with brush in hand
The various periods of lockdown over the past 12 months have provided time for credit professionals to tap into their creative side, and Schroders’ head of securitised credit Michelle Russell-Dowe has taken full advantage.
She has been living on Hilton Head Island and has been inspired to pick up her brush and work on her oil paintings.
“The coast of South Carolina is a low-country coastline,” she says. “We are on the ocean, but we have marshland that changes from water to grass/reeds with the tide. Our tide is eight feet from low to high, and it is amazing to see the change in the land over that period.”
The South Carolina waterfront was certainly the muse for her vivid artwork. But structured credit asset pools, cashflow streams and payment waterfalls no doubt had an influence.
South Carolina: Russell-Dowe’s work shows there’s plenty of liquidity in coastal assets
Brahms for the brain
We often use this column to highlight charitable initiatives undertaken by members of the CLO community, but charity starts at home and we’d like to point you towards an initiative conducted by Richard Burrell, partner of our own Tanvi Gupta.
Burrell has arranged and played Johannes Brahm’s Intermezzo Op.118 (number two Andante Teneramente) in an effort to raise money for the UK’s Mind charity: https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/richardburrell
THEY SAID IT
“State Street is pleased to offer financing of CLOs in loan form”
A spokesperson for State Street confirms the US bank is buying European CLOs as loans, and adds that this will be a growing business line.
Global credit funds & CLO's
April 2021
| Issue 233
Published in London & New York.
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