Loomis Sayles Bridges Public and Private Credit with New Interval Fund

BOSTON, MA – June 01, 2026

Loomis, Sayles & Company, in collaboration with its affiliate Natixis Investment Managers, has launched a new fund designed to navigate the increasingly intertwined worlds of public and private credit. The Loomis Sayles Credit Income Opportunities Fund enters a booming market for alternative income strategies, leveraging an interval fund structure to offer a broader range of investors access to less liquid, potentially higher-yielding assets.

The fund’s debut reflects a significant strategic response to a fundamental shift in capital markets, where the lines between publicly traded debt and private loans are blurring. It aims to package the firm's extensive credit expertise into a vehicle accessible to both institutional and retail clients seeking to diversify their income sources.

Riding the Wave of Credit Convergence

The fund’s launch comes at a pivotal moment for credit markets. A structural shift, characterized by traditional banks stepping back from certain types of lending, has fueled explosive growth in private credit. This has blurred the lines between publicly traded debt and private loans, creating a more complex but opportunity-rich environment. The new fund is engineered to capitalize on this convergence.

"The convergence of public and private credit along with the paramount importance of careful credit research is creating compelling opportunities for experienced, research-driven investors,” said Matt Eagan, CFA, Head of Full Discretion and Portfolio Manager at Loomis, Sayles & Company. The strategy aims to provide a single, flexible vehicle that can invest across a company's entire capital structure, from senior loans and high-yield bonds to private placements and asset-backed securities. This approach, according to the firm, is critical for maximizing returns and mitigating default risk in a market defined by greater dispersion.

The Interval Fund Boom: Access Meets Scrutiny

The fund is structured as an "interval fund," a type of closed-end fund that has surged in popularity. The interval fund market has ballooned to over $100 billion in assets, nearly quadrupling in the last five years as managers rush to meet investor demand for alternative income and diversification. These vehicles offer a key advantage: they can hold illiquid assets, such as private credit, that are unsuitable for traditional daily-redeemable mutual funds. This "democratizes" access to strategies once reserved for large institutions.

However, this access comes with trade-offs and has attracted significant regulatory attention. Interval funds provide only periodic liquidity, with Loomis Sayles’ fund planning to offer to repurchase between 5% and 25% of its shares quarterly. If shareholder requests exceed the offer, tenders may be fulfilled on a pro-rata basis, meaning investors may not be able to sell all the shares they wish. The SEC has increased its scrutiny of the sector, focusing on valuation practices for hard-to-price assets, fee structures, and investor disclosures. Industry watchdogs have also cautioned that these funds often carry higher fees and more complexity than their traditional counterparts.

A Crowded Field and a Bet on Expertise

Loomis Sayles and Natixis are entering a competitive arena. Major asset managers, including Cliffwater, PIMCO, and Apollo, have already established a strong presence in the credit-focused interval fund space. To stand out, the firm is banking on its deep expertise and long-term track record. The new fund is managed by Loomis Sayles’ Full Discretion Team, a group with a 40-year history and over $85 billion in assets under management.

The team is known for its "deep-value, equity-like approach to credit selection," a research-intensive philosophy that will now be applied across both liquid and illiquid markets. "This new fund reflects our commitment to clients, bringing our team’s four decades of credit expertise into a single, flexible vehicle," Eagan stated in the announcement. Natixis, which is distributing the fund, sees it as a timely solution for building more resilient portfolios.

"By offering access to both public and private credit within the Loomis Sayles Credit Income Opportunities Fund, investors can tap a broader opportunity set and pursue more resilient portfolio construction, particularly amid recent disruptions in the private credit and semi-liquid space," said Matt Garzone, Senior Vice President of Private Placements at Natixis Investment Managers.

Navigating a Complex Opportunity Set

The fund is designed for long-term investors and is intended to complement a core fixed-income allocation rather than replace it. Its mandate allows for investment across a wide array of credit instruments, including corporate bonds, senior loans, structured credit like collateralized loan obligations (CLOs), and direct private credit investments.

This broad flexibility requires a sophisticated level of analysis, a task the firm is tackling through collaboration between its Full Discretion, Private Credit, and Structured Finance teams. The strategy underscores a belief that in today's market, evaluating opportunities across a company’s entire capital structure is essential to finding value and managing risk. By combining the potential for higher yields from private markets with the relative liquidity and transparency of public markets, the fund aims to deliver high total returns through both income and capital appreciation. The offering will be available in both institutional and retail share classes, signaling an ambition to capture a wide swath of the investor landscape seeking to enhance portfolio yield in an evolving financial world.