Pacific Investment Management Co., which runs the world’s biggest bond fund, is buying Abu Dhabi and Qatar debt even as the crisis in nearby Dubai hammers down emerging-market sovereign bond prices.
“We’re coming in and buying,” Michael Gomez, co-head of emerging markets at the fund manager, told Bloomberg.
“In any sell-off, we’ll be accumulating even more. We think they’re cheap.”
Emerging-market bonds fell from their highest levels since records began in 1993 after Dubai World on Nov. 25 asked lenders for a standstill on $26 billion in debt, according to Bloomberg.
Dubai's finance chief Abdul Rahman Al Saleh recently sought to assure markets by stressing his government is working to clean house even if it is not publicly saying so.
“Let me admit, in Dubai we are not good in publicizing what we are doing as much as we are in doing it,” says Al Saleh, according to Reuters.
“Of course, the reaction by the global markets was psychological, and came strongly. However, the reaction is now softening as investors became more informed about what happened.”
Distressed debt funds, meanwhile, are already looking to Dubai for opportunities.
“Iceland is something we have been involved in and there may be something to do in Dubai,” says Mans Larsson, vice president of Canyon Capital Advisors, Reuters reported.
"There are some potentially interesting assets there."
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