DoubleLine Funds Prospectus August 1, 2023, as supplemented October 31, 2023 |
Share Classes | |||||||||||||||
Fixed Income | I | N | R6 | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Total Return Bond Fund | DBLTX | DLTNX | DDTRX | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Core Fixed Income Fund | DBLFX | DLFNX | DDCFX | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Emerging Markets Fixed Income Fund | DBLEX | DLENX | – | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Low Duration Bond Fund | DBLSX | DLSNX | DDLDX | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Floating Rate Fund | DBFRX | DLFRX | – | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Flexible Income Fund | DFLEX | DLINX | DFFLX | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Low Duration Emerging Markets Fixed Income Fund | DBLLX | DELNX | – | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Long Duration Total Return Bond Fund | DBLDX | DLLDX | – | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Global Bond Fund | DBLGX | DLGBX | – | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Infrastructure Income Fund | BILDX | BILTX | – | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Income Fund | DBLIX | DBLNX | – | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Emerging Markets Local Currency Bond Fund | DBELX | DLELX | – | ||||||||||||
Global Asset Allocation | |||||||||||||||
DoubleLine Multi-Asset Trend Fund | DBMOX | DLMOX | – | ||||||||||||
Non-Traditional | |||||||||||||||
DoubleLine Strategic Commodity Fund | DBCMX | DLCMX | – | ||||||||||||
Equities | |||||||||||||||
DoubleLine Shiller Enhanced CAPE® | DSEEX | DSENX | DDCPX | ||||||||||||
DoubleLine Shiller Enhanced International CAPE® | DSEUX | DLEUX | – |
Please read this document carefully before investing, and keep it for future reference.
Neither the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, nor any state securities commission has approved or disapproved these securities or determined if this Prospectus is truthful or complete. Any representation to the contrary is a criminal offense.
This Prospectus tells you about the DoubleLine mutual funds (the “Funds”, and each, a “Fund”) listed on the Prospectus cover. Each Fund is a series of DoubleLine Funds Trust, a Delaware statutory trust (the “Trust”). Each Fund offers shares in a number of different classes. Most of the Funds provide investment programs investing principally in debt obligations and are referred to in this Prospectus as “fixed income funds.” The remaining Funds are DoubleLine Multi-Asset Trend Fund, DoubleLine Strategic Commodity Fund, DoubleLine Shiller Enhanced CAPE® and DoubleLine Shiller Enhanced International CAPE®.
Fund Summary
DoubleLine Total Return Bond Fund
Investment Objective
The Fund’s investment objective is to seek to maximize total return.
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Fund. You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries (defined below), including when purchasing Class I and Class R6 shares through a broker or other financial intermediary acting as an agent on your behalf. Such commissions and other fees, if any, are not charged by the Fund and are not reflected in the fee table or expense example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | Class R6 | |||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of the offering price) | None | None | None | |||
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of the original purchase price) | None | None | None | |||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Reinvested Dividends | None | None | None | |||
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of shares redeemed within 90 days of purchase) | None | None | None | |||
Fee for Redemption by Wire | $15 | $15 | $15 | |||
Exchange Fee | None | None | None | |||
Account Fee | None | None | None |
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | Class R6 | |||||||||
Management Fees | 0.40% | 0.40% | 0.40% | |||||||||
Distribution and/or Service (12b-1) Fees | None | 0.25% | None | |||||||||
Other Expenses (includes sub-transfer agent accounting or administrative services expenses) | 0.09% | 0.09% | 0.04% | |||||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses | 0.49% | 0.74% | 0.44% |
Example
This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds.
This example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all your shares at the end of those periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same. Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions, your costs would be:
Class I | Class N | Class R6 | ||||
1 Year | $50 | $76 | $45 | |||
3 Years | $157 | $237 | $141 | |||
5 Years | $274 | $411 | $246 | |||
10 Years | $616 | $918 | $555 |
-2-
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund incurs transaction costs when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the Fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 37% of the average value of its portfolio.
Principal Investment Strategies
Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest more than 50% of its net assets in residential and commercial mortgage-backed securities and U.S. Treasury obligations rated at the time of investment Aa3 or higher by Moody’s Investors Service, Inc. (“Moody’s”) or AA- or higher by S&P Global Ratings (“S&P”) or the equivalent by any other nationally recognized statistical rating organization or unrated securities that are determined by DoubleLine Capital LP (the “Adviser” or “DoubleLine Capital”) to be of comparable quality. These investments may include mortgage-backed securities of any maturity or type, including those guaranteed by, or secured by collateral that is guaranteed by, the United States Government, its agencies, instrumentalities or sponsored corporations, and privately issued mortgage-backed securities. These investments also include, among others, government mortgage pass-through securities, collateralized mortgage obligations, multiclass pass-through securities, private mortgage pass-through securities, stripped mortgage securities (interest-only and principal-only securities) and inverse floaters. The Fund’s investments in derivatives and other synthetic instruments that provide exposures comparable, in the judgment of the Adviser, to any of the foregoing instruments described in this paragraph will be counted toward satisfaction of the Fund’s 50% policy (using, where determined appropriate in the Adviser’s discretion, an instrument’s notional amount).
Since the Fund’s inception, the Fund has historically invested substantially all of its assets in mortgage-backed securities; short term investments, such as notes issued by U.S. Government agencies and shares of money market funds; and other asset-backed obligations, collateralized loan obligations, obligations of the U.S. Government and its agencies, instrumentalities and sponsored corporations, and futures contracts. The Fund may invest in other instruments as part of its principal investment strategies, but it has not historically done so to a significant extent and there can be no assurance it will do so in the future.
In managing the Fund’s portfolio, the portfolio managers typically use a controlled risk approach. The techniques of this approach attempt to control the principal risk components of the fixed income markets and may include, among other factors, consideration of the Adviser’s view of the following: the potential relative performance of various market sectors, security selection available within a given sector, the risk/reward equation for different asset classes, liquidity conditions in various market sectors, the shape of the yield curve and projections for changes in the yield curve, potential fluctuations in the overall level of interest rates, and current fiscal policy.
Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in bonds. “Bonds” include bonds, debt securities, and other fixed income instruments issued by governmental or private-sector entities. If the Fund changes this investment policy, it will notify shareholders at least 60 days in advance of the change.
The Fund may invest in bonds of any credit quality, including those that are at the time of investment unrated or rated BB+ or lower by S&P or Ba1 or lower by Moody’s or the equivalent by any other nationally recognized statistical rating organization. Bonds and fixed income instruments rated below investment grade, or such instruments that are unrated and determined by the Adviser to be of comparable quality, are high yield, high risk bonds, commonly known as “junk bonds.” The Fund may invest up to 331⁄3% of its net assets in junk bonds, bank loans and assignments rated below investment grade or unrated but determined by the Adviser to be of comparable quality, and credit default swaps of companies in the high yield universe. The Adviser does not consider the term “junk bonds” to include any mortgage-backed securities or any other asset-backed securities, regardless of their credit rating or credit quality, and accordingly may invest without limit in such investments. The Fund may invest a portion of its assets in inverse floater securities and interest-only and principal-only securities.
The Adviser monitors the duration of the Fund’s portfolio securities to seek to assess and, in its discretion, adjust the Fund’s exposure to interest rate risk. The Adviser may seek to manage the dollar-weighted average effective duration of the Fund’s portfolio through the use of derivative instruments and other investments (including, among others, inverse floaters, futures contracts, U.S. Treasury swaps, interest rate swaps, total return swaps and options, including options on swap agreements). The Fund incurs costs in implementing duration management strategies, and there can be no assurance that the Fund will engage in duration management strategies or that any duration management strategy employed by the Fund will be successful. In managing the Fund’s investments, under normal market conditions, the portfolio managers intend to seek to
-3-
construct an investment portfolio with a dollar-weighted average effective duration of no less than one year and no more than eight years. Duration is a measure of the expected life of a fixed income instrument that is used to determine the sensitivity of a security’s price to changes in interest rates. Effective duration is a measure of the Fund’s portfolio duration adjusted for the anticipated effect of interest rate changes on bond and mortgage prepayment rates as determined by the Adviser. The effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio may vary materially from its target range, from time to time, and there is no assurance that the effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio will always be within its target range.
The Fund may enter into derivatives transactions and other instruments of any kind for hedging purposes or otherwise to gain, or reduce, long or short exposure to one or more asset classes or issuers. The Fund may use derivatives transactions with the purpose or effect of creating investment leverage. For example, the Fund may use futures contracts and options on futures contracts, in order to gain efficient long or short investment exposures as an alternative to cash investments or to hedge against portfolio exposures; interest rate swaps, to gain indirect long or short exposures to interest rates, issuers, or currencies, or to hedge against portfolio exposures; and total return swaps and credit derivatives (such as credit default swaps), put and call options, and exchange-traded and structured notes, to take indirect long or short positions on indexes, securities, currencies, or other indicators of value, or to hedge against portfolio exposures. The Fund may also engage in short sales or take short positions, either to adjust its duration or for other investment purposes.
Portfolio securities may be sold at any time. By way of example, sales may occur when the Fund’s portfolio managers determine to take advantage of what the portfolio managers consider to be a better investment opportunity, when the portfolio managers believe the portfolio securities no longer represent relatively attractive investment opportunities, when the portfolio managers perceive deterioration in the credit fundamentals of the issuer, or when the portfolio managers believe it would be appropriate to do so in order to readjust the duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio.
Principal Risks
The value of the Fund’s shares will vary as its portfolio investments increase or decrease in value. Therefore, the value of your investment in the Fund could go down as well as up. You can lose money by investing in the Fund. The Fund’s principal risks are listed below in alphabetical order, not in order of importance. The significance of any specific risk to an investment in the Fund will vary over time, depending on the composition of the Fund’s portfolio, market conditions, and other factors. You should read all of the risk information presented below carefully, because any one or more of these risks may result in losses to the Fund.
The principal risks affecting the Fund that can cause a decline in value are:
• |
active management risk: the risk that the Fund will fail to meet its investment objective and that the Fund’s investment performance will depend, at least in part, on how its assets are allocated and reallocated among asset classes, sectors, underlying funds and/or investments and that such allocation will focus on asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or investments that perform poorly or underperform other asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or available investments. Any given investment strategy may fail to produce the intended results, and the Fund’s portfolio may underperform other comparable funds because of portfolio management decisions related to, among other things, the selection of investments, portfolio construction, risk assessments, and/or the outlook on market trends and opportunities. |
• |
asset-backed securities investment risk: the risk that borrowers may default on the obligations that underlie the asset-backed security and that, during periods of falling interest rates, asset-backed securities may be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate, and the risk that the impairment of the value of the collateral underlying a security in which the Fund invests (due, for example, to non-payment of loans) will result in a reduction in the value of the security. |
• |
counterparty risk: the risk that the Fund will be subject to credit risk with respect to the counterparties to the derivative contracts and other instruments entered into by the Fund; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; that the Fund will be unable to enforce contractual remedies if its counterparty defaults; that if a counterparty (or an affiliate of a counterparty) becomes bankrupt, the Fund may experience significant delays in obtaining any recovery or may obtain limited or no recovery in a bankruptcy or other insolvency proceeding. To the extent that the Fund enters into multiple transactions with a single or a small set of counterparties, it will be subject to increased counterparty risk. |
-4-
• |
debt securities risks: |
¡ |
credit risk: the risk that an issuer, counterparty or other obligor to the Fund will fail to pay its obligations to the Fund when they are due, which may reduce the Fund’s income and/or reduce, in whole or in part, the value of the Fund’s investment. Actual or perceived changes in the financial condition of an obligor, changes in economic, social or political conditions that affect a particular type of security, instrument, or obligor, and changes in economic, social or political conditions generally can increase the risk of default by an obligor, which can affect a security’s or other instrument’s credit quality or value and an obligor’s ability to honor its obligations when due. The values of lower-quality debt securities (commonly known as “junk bonds”), including floating rate loans, tend to be particularly sensitive to these changes. The values of securities or instruments also may decline for a number of other reasons that relate directly to the obligor, such as management performance, financial leverage, and reduced demand for the obligor’s goods and services, as well as the historical and prospective earnings of the obligor and the value of its assets. |
¡ |
extension risk: the risk that if interest rates rise, repayments of principal on certain debt securities, including, but not limited to, floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, may occur at a slower rate than expected and the expected maturity of those securities could lengthen as a result. Securities that are subject to extension risk generally have a greater potential for loss when prevailing interest rates rise, which could cause their values to fall sharply. |
¡ |
interest rate risk: the risk that debt instruments will change in value because of changes in interest rates. The value of an instrument with a longer duration (whether positive or negative) will be more sensitive to changes in interest rates than a similar instrument with a shorter duration. Bonds and other debt instruments typically have a positive duration. The value of a debt instrument with positive duration will generally decline if interest rates increase. Certain other investments, such as inverse floaters and certain derivative instruments, may have a negative duration. The value of instruments with a negative duration will generally decline if interest rates decrease. Inverse floaters, interest-only and principal-only securities are especially sensitive to interest rate changes, which can affect not only their prices but can also change the income flows and repayment assumptions about those investments. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. The risks associated with rising interest rates are heightened under current market conditions given that the U.S. Federal Reserve has begun to raise interest rates from historically low levels and may continue to do so. Further, in market environments where interest rates are rising, issuers may be less willing or able to make principal and interest payments on fixed-income investments when due. |
¡ |
prepayment risk: the risk that the issuer of a debt security, including floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, repays all or a portion of the principal prior to the security’s maturity. In times of declining interest rates, there is a greater likelihood that the Fund’s higher yielding securities will be pre-paid with the Fund being unable to reinvest the proceeds in an investment with as great a yield. Prepayments can therefore result in lower yields to shareholders of the Fund. |
¡ |
LIBOR phase out/transition risk: the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) was the offered rate for wholesale, unsecured funding available to major international banks. The terms of many investments, financings or other transactions to which the Fund may be a party have been historically tied to LIBOR. LIBOR has historically been a significant factor in relation to payment obligations under a derivative investment and has also been used in other ways that affect the Fund’s investment performance. In connection with the global transition away from LIBOR led by regulators and market participants, LIBOR is no longer published on a representative basis. The transition from LIBOR and the terms of any replacement rate(s), including, for example, the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (“SOFR”) or another rate based on SOFR, may adversely affect transactions that used LIBOR as a reference rate, financial institutions that engaged in such transactions, and the financial markets generally. There are significant differences between LIBOR and SOFR, such as LIBOR being an unsecured lending rate while SOFR is a secured lending rate. As such, the potential effect of the transition away from LIBOR on the Fund or the financial instruments in which the Fund invests cannot yet be fully determined, but the transition may adversely affect the Fund’s performance. |
• |
defaulted securities risk: the significant risk of the uncertainty of repayment of defaulted securities (e.g., a security on which a principal or interest payment is not made when due) and obligations of distressed issuers (including insolvent issuers or issuers in payment or covenant default, in workout or restructuring or in bankruptcy or similar proceedings). Such investments entail high risk and have speculative characteristics. |
-5-
• |
derivatives risk: the risk that an investment in derivatives will not perform as anticipated by the Adviser, may not be available at the time or price desired, cannot be closed out at a favorable time or price, will increase the Fund’s transaction costs, or will increase the Fund’s volatility; that derivatives may create investment leverage; that, when a derivative is used as a substitute for or alternative to a direct cash investment, the transaction may not provide a return that corresponds precisely or at all with that of the cash investment; that the positions may be improperly executed or constructed; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; or that, when used for hedging purposes, derivatives will not provide the anticipated protection, causing the Fund to lose money on both the derivatives transaction and the exposure the Fund sought to hedge. |
Please also see “debt securities risks — LIBOR phase out/transition risk” herein for more information.
• |
financial services risk: the risk that an investment in issuers in the financial services sector or transactions with one or more counterparties in the financial services sector may be adversely affected by, among other things: (i) changes in governmental regulation, which may limit both the amounts and the types of loans and other financial commitments financial services companies can make, the interest rates and fees they can charge, the scope of their activities, the prices they can charge and the amount of capital they must maintain; (ii) fluctuations, including as a result of interest rate changes or increased competition, in the availability and cost of capital funds on which the profitability of financial services companies is largely dependent; (iii) deterioration of the credit markets; (iv) credit losses resulting from financial difficulties of borrowers, especially when financial services companies are exposed to non-diversified or concentrated loan portfolios; (v) financial losses associated with investment activities, especially when financial services companies are exposed to financial leverage; (vi) the risk that any financial services company experiences substantial declines in the valuations of its assets, takes action to raise capital, or ceases operations; (vii) the risk that a market shock or other unexpected market, economic, political, regulatory, or other event might lead to a sudden decline in the values of most or all companies in the financial services sector; (viii) events leading to limited liquidity, defaults, non-performance or other adverse developments that affect financial institutions or the financial services industry generally, or concerns or rumors about any events of these kinds or other similar risks, leading to market-wide liquidity problems; and (ix) the interconnectedness or interdependence among financial services companies, including the risk that the financial distress or failure of one financial services company may materially and adversely affect a number of other financial services companies. |
• |
high yield risk: the risk that debt instruments rated below investment grade or debt instruments that are unrated and of comparable or lesser quality are predominantly speculative. These instruments, commonly known as “junk bonds,” have a higher degree of default risk and may be less liquid than higher-rated bonds. These instruments may be subject to greater price volatility due to such factors as specific corporate developments, interest rate sensitivity, negative perceptions of high yield investments generally, and less secondary market liquidity. |
• |
inflation-indexed bond risk: the risk that such bonds will change in value in response to actual or anticipated changes in inflation rates in a manner unanticipated by the Fund’s portfolio management team or investors generally. Inflation-indexed bonds are subject to debt securities risks. |
• |
leveraging risk: the risk that certain investments by the Fund involving leverage may have the effect of increasing the volatility of the value of the Fund’s portfolio, and the risk of loss in excess of invested capital. |
• |
liquidity risk: the risk that the Fund may be unable to sell a portfolio investment at a desirable time or at the value the Fund has placed on the investment. Illiquidity may be the result of, for example, low trading volume, lack of a market maker, or contractual or legal restrictions that limit or prevent the Fund from selling securities or closing derivative positions. During periods of substantial market disruption, a large portion of the Fund’s assets could potentially experience significant levels of illiquidity. The values of illiquid investments are often more volatile than the values of more liquid investments. It may be more difficult for the Fund to determine a fair value of an illiquid investment than that of a more liquid comparable investment. |
• |
loan risk: the risk that (i) if the Fund holds a loan through another financial intermediary, or relies on a financial intermediary to administer the loan, its receipt of principal and interest on the loan may be subject to the credit risk of that financial intermediary; (ii) any collateral securing a loan may be insufficient or unavailable to the Fund, because, for example, the value of the collateral securing a loan can decline, be insufficient to meet the obligations of the borrower, or be difficult to liquidate, and the Fund’s rights to collateral may be limited by bankruptcy or insolvency laws; (iii) investments in highly leveraged loans or loans of stressed, distressed, or defaulted issuers may be subject to significant credit and liquidity risk; (iv) a bankruptcy or other court proceeding could delay or limit the ability of the Fund to collect the principal and interest payments on that borrower’s loans or adversely affect the Fund’s rights in collateral |
-6-
relating to a loan; (v) there may be limited public information available regarding the loan and the relevant borrower(s); (vi) the use of a particular interest rate benchmark may limit the Fund’s ability to achieve a net return to shareholders that consistently approximates the average published Prime Rate of U.S. banks; (vii) the prices of certain floating rate loans that include a feature that prevents their interest rates from adjusting if market interest rates are below a specified minimum level may appreciate less than other instruments in response to changes in interest rates should interest rates rise but remain below the applicable minimum level; (viii) if a borrower fails to comply with various restrictive covenants that may be found in loan agreements, the borrower may default in payment of the loan; (ix) if the Fund invests in loans that contain fewer or less restrictive constraints on the borrower than certain other types of loans (“covenant-lite” loans), it may have fewer rights against the borrowers of such loans, including fewer protections against the possibility of default and fewer remedies in the event of default; (x) the loan is unsecured; (xi) there is a limited secondary market; (xii) transactions in loans may settle on a delayed basis, and the Fund may not receive the proceeds from the sale of a loan for a substantial period of time after the sale, which may result in sale proceeds related to the sale of loans not being available to make additional investments or to meet the Fund’s redemption obligations until potentially a substantial period after the sale of the loans; and (xiii) loans may be difficult to value and may be illiquid, which may adversely affect an investment in the Fund. The Fund may invest in loans directly or indirectly by investing in shares of the DoubleLine Floating Rate Fund and in either case will be subject to the risks described above. |
• |
market risk: the risk that markets will perform poorly or that the returns from the securities in which the Fund invests will underperform returns from the general securities markets or other types of investments. Markets may, in response to governmental actions or intervention or general market conditions, including real or perceived adverse political, economic or market conditions, tariffs and trade disruptions, inflation, recession, changes in interest or currency rates, lack of liquidity in the bond markets or adverse investor sentiment, or other external factors, experience periods of high volatility and reduced liquidity. During those periods, the Fund may experience high levels of shareholder redemptions, and may have to sell securities at times when the Fund would otherwise not do so, and potentially at unfavorable prices. Certain securities may be difficult to value during such periods. Market risk involves the risk that the value of the Fund’s investment portfolio will change, potentially frequently and in large amounts, as the prices of its investments go up or down. During periods of severe market stress, it is possible that the market for some or all of a Fund’s investments may become highly illiquid. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. Please see “debt securities risks — interest rate risk” herein for more information. |
• |
mortgage-backed securities risk: the risk that borrowers may default on their mortgage obligations or the guarantees underlying the mortgage-backed securities will default or otherwise fail and that, during periods of falling interest rates, mortgage-backed securities will be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate. During periods of rising interest rates, the average life of a mortgage-backed security may extend, which may lock in a below-market interest rate, increase the security’s duration, and reduce the value of the security. Enforcing rights against the underlying assets or collateral may be difficult, or the underlying assets or collateral may be insufficient if the issuer defaults. The values of certain types of mortgage-backed securities, such as inverse floaters and interest-only and principal-only securities, may be extremely sensitive to changes in interest rates and prepayment rates. The Fund may invest in mortgage-backed securities that are subordinate in their right to receive payment of interest and repayment of principal to other classes of the issuer’s securities. |
• |
operational and information security risks: an investment in the Fund, like any fund, can involve operational risks arising from factors such as processing errors, human errors, inadequate or failed internal or external processes, failures in systems and technology, changes in personnel and errors caused by third-party service providers. The occurrence of any of these failures, errors or breaches could result in investment losses to the Fund, a loss of information, regulatory scrutiny, reputational damage or other events, any of which could have a material adverse effect on the Fund. While the Fund seeks to minimize such events through controls and oversight, there may still be failures that could cause losses to the Fund. |
• |
real estate sector risk: the risk that real estate-related investments may decline in value as a result of factors affecting the real estate sector, such as the supply of real property in certain markets, changes in zoning laws, delays in completion of construction, changes in real estate values, changes in property taxes, levels of occupancy, and local, regional, and general market conditions. Along with the risks common to different types of real estate-related investments, real estate investment trusts (“REITs”), no matter the type, involve additional risk factors, including poor performance by the REIT’s manager, adverse changes to the tax laws, and the possible failure by the REIT to qualify for the favorable tax treatment available to REITs under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, or the exemption from registration under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended. REITs are not diversified and are heavily dependent on cash flow earned on the property interests they hold. |
-7-
• |
restricted securities risk: the risk that the Fund may be prevented or limited by law or the terms of an agreement from selling a security (a “restricted security”). To the extent that the Fund is permitted to sell a restricted security, there can be no assurance that a trading market will exist at any particular time, and the Fund may be unable to dispose of the security promptly at reasonable prices or at all. The Fund may have to bear the expense of registering the securities for resale and the risk of substantial delays in effecting the registration. Also, restricted securities may be difficult to value because market quotations may not be readily available, and the values of restricted securities may have significant volatility. |
• |
securities or sector selection risk: the risk that the securities held by the Fund will underperform securities held in other funds investing in similar asset classes or comparable benchmarks because of the portfolio managers’ choice of securities or sectors for investment. To the extent the Fund allocates a higher percentage of its investment portfolio to a particular sector or related sectors, the Fund will be more susceptible to events or factors affecting companies in that sector or related sectors. For example, the values of securities of companies in the same or related sectors may be negatively affected by the common characteristics they share, the common business risks to which they are subject, common regulatory burdens, or regulatory changes that affect them similarly. Such characteristics, risks, burdens or changes include, but are not limited to, changes in governmental regulation, inflation or deflation, rising or falling interest rates, competition from new entrants, and other economic, market, political or other developments specific to that sector or related sectors. |
• |
structured products and structured notes risk: the risk that an investment in a structured product, which includes, among other things, collateralized debt obligations, mortgage-backed securities, other types of asset-backed securities and certain types of structured notes, may decline in value due to changes in the underlying instruments, indexes, interest rates or other factors on which the product is based (“reference measure”). Depending on the reference measure used and the use of multipliers or deflators (if any), changes in interest rates and movement of the reference measure may cause significant price and cash flow fluctuations. Application of a multiplier is comparable to the use of financial leverage, a speculative technique. Holders of structured products indirectly bear risks associated with the reference measure, are subject to counterparty risk and typically do not have direct rights against the reference measure. Structured products are generally privately offered and sold, and thus, are not registered under the securities laws and may be thinly traded or have a limited trading market and may have the effect of increasing the Fund’s illiquidity, reducing the Fund’s income and the value of the investment. At a particular point in time, the Fund may be unable to find qualified buyers for these securities. Investments in structured notes involve risks including interest rate risk, credit risk and market risk. |
• |
U.S. Government securities risk: the risk that debt securities issued or guaranteed by certain U.S. Government agencies, instrumentalities, and sponsored enterprises are not supported by the full faith and credit of the U.S. Government, and so investments in their securities or obligations issued by them involve credit risk greater than investments in other types of U.S. Government securities. |
• |
valuation risk: the risk that the Fund will not value its investments in a manner that accurately reflects their market values or that the Fund will not be able to sell any investment at a price equal to the valuation ascribed to that investment for purposes of calculating the Fund’s net asset value (“NAV”). The valuation of the Fund’s investments involves subjective judgment. Certain securities in which the Fund may invest may be more difficult to value accurately, especially during periods of market disruptions or extreme market volatility. Incorrect valuations of the Fund’s portfolio holdings could result in the Fund’s shareholder transactions being effected at an NAV that does not accurately reflect the underlying value of the Fund’s portfolio, resulting in the dilution of shareholder interests. |
Please see “Additional Information About Principal Investment Strategies and Principal Risks — Principal Risks” for a more detailed description of the principal risks of investing in the Fund.
-8-
Performance
The following performance information provides some indication of the risks of investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows the performance of the Fund’s Class I shares for each full calendar year since the Fund’s inception. The table below shows how the average annual total returns of the Fund’s shares for the periods shown compare to those of a broad-based securities market index. The Fund’s past performance (before and after taxes) is not necessarily an indication of how the Fund will perform in the future. Absent any applicable fee waivers and/ or expense limitations (which applied to the Fund from inception through July 24, 2012), performance would have been lower. Updated information on the Fund’s investment results can be obtained at no charge by calling 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311) or by visiting the Fund’s website at www.doubleline.com.
Class I Shares
During the periods shown above, the highest and lowest quarterly returns earned by the Fund’s Class I shares were:
Highest: | 3.41% | Quarter ended 6/30/2020 | ||
Lowest: | -4.83% | Quarter ended 3/31/2022 |
The year-to-date total return for the Fund’s Class I shares as of June 30, 2023 was 2.49%.
Average Annual Total Returns (for the periods ended December 31, 2022)
Total Return Bond Fund | One Year | Five Years | Ten Years |
Since Inception (April 6, 2010) |
||||||||||||
Class I | ||||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-12.56% | -0.35% | 1.30% | 3.69% | ||||||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions |
-13.84% | -1.76% | -0.33% | 1.79% | ||||||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares |
-7.40% | -0.80% | 0.31% | 2.11% | ||||||||||||
Class N | ||||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-12.77% | -0.58% | 1.05% | 3.43% | ||||||||||||
Class R61 | ||||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-12.41% | -0.29% | 1.33% | 3.71% | ||||||||||||
Bloomberg U.S.
Aggregate Bond Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) |
-13.01% | 0.02% | 1.06% | 2.17% |
1 |
Class R6 shares were not available for purchase until July 31, 2019. The performance shown for Class R6 shares prior to that date is that of the Class I shares of the Fund, another class of the Fund that is invested in the same portfolio of securities as Class R6 shares. Annual returns of Class R6 shares would have differed from that shown for the period prior to July 31, 2019 only to the extent that Class R6 shares and Class I shares have different expenses. |
-9-
The Fund’s after-tax returns as shown in the above table are calculated using the historical highest applicable individual federal marginal income tax rates for the period and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Your actual after-tax returns depend on your tax situation and may differ from those shown. If you own shares of the Fund in a tax-advantaged account, such as a 401(k) plan or an individual retirement account, after-tax returns shown are not relevant to your investment. The “Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares” may be higher than other return figures because when a capital loss occurs upon the redemption of shares of the Fund, a tax deduction is provided that may benefit the investor. After-tax returns are for Class I shares only. After-tax returns for other classes may vary. The Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate Bond Index represents securities that are SEC-registered, taxable, and dollar denominated. This index covers the U.S. investment-grade fixed rate bond market, with index components for government and corporate securities, mortgage pass-through securities, and asset-backed securities. These major sectors are subdivided into more specific indices that are calculated and reported on a regular basis. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.
Investment Adviser
DoubleLine Capital is the investment adviser to the Fund.
Portfolio Managers
The portfolio managers for the Fund are:
Name |
Experience with the Fund |
Primary Title with the Investment Adviser | ||
Jeffrey E. Gundlach | Since the Fund’s inception in April 2010 | Chief Executive Officer | ||
Andrew Hsu | Since July 2019 | Portfolio Manager | ||
Ken Shinoda | Since July 2020 | Portfolio Manager |
Purchase and Sale of Shares
You may purchase or redeem Class I, Class N and Class R6 shares on any business day when the New York Stock Exchange opens for regular trading. You may purchase or redeem shares by written request via mail (DoubleLine Funds, c/o U.S. Bank Global Fund Services, P.O. Box 701, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0701), by wire transfer, by telephone at 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311), or through authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers (“financial intermediaries”). Telephone transactions will be permitted unless you decline this privilege on your initial purchase application. The minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts for different types of accounts are shown below, although the Fund may reduce or waive the minimums in some cases.
Minimum Initial Investment: | Subsequent Investment: |
|||||||||||
Regular Accounts |
IRAs/HSAs |
All Accounts and Investment Plans |
||||||||||
Class I Shares | $ | 100,000 | $ | 5,000 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class N Shares | $ | 2,000 | $ | 500 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class R6 Shares | None | * | N/A | N/A |
* |
See eligibility limitations below. |
The minimum investment may be modified for certain financial intermediaries that submit trades on behalf of underlying investors. Certain financial intermediaries also may have their own investment minimums, which may differ from the Fund’s minimums, and may be waived at the intermediaries’ discretion. The Fund reserves the right to change or waive the minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts without prior notice or to waive the minimum investment amounts for certain intermediaries or individual investors in its discretion.
-10-
Eligibility for Class R6 Shares. Only authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers who have an agreement with the Fund’s distributor to make Class R6 shares available to their clients who are Class R6 eligible plans or other eligible investors are authorized to accept, on behalf of the Fund, purchase and exchange orders and redemption requests for Class R6 shares placed by or on behalf of Class R6 eligible plans or other eligible investors. In addition, Class R6 shares may also be purchased directly from the Fund’s transfer agent by a Class R6 eligible plan if such shares are held in an omnibus account opened in the plan’s name directly with the Fund’s transfer agent.
Tax Information
The Fund’s distributions generally are taxable to you as ordinary income or capital gains, unless you are investing through a tax-advantaged arrangement, such as a 401(k) plan or individual retirement account. If you invest through such tax-advantaged arrangements, you may be taxed later upon withdrawal from those arrangements.
Payments to Broker-Dealers and Other Financial Intermediaries
If you purchase shares of the Fund through a broker-dealer or other financial intermediary (such as a bank), the Fund, the Adviser, and the Fund’s distributor or any of their affiliates may pay the financial intermediary for the sale of Fund shares and related services. These payments may create a conflict of interest by influencing the financial intermediary and your salesperson to recommend the Fund over another investment. Ask your individual salesperson or visit your financial intermediary’s website for more information.
-11-
Fund Summary
DoubleLine Core Fixed Income Fund
Investment Objective
The Fund’s investment objective is to seek to maximize current income and total return.
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Fund. You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries (defined below), including when purchasing Class I and Class R6 shares through a broker or other financial intermediary acting as an agent on your behalf. Such commissions and other fees, if any, are not charged by the Fund and are not reflected in the fee table or expense example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | Class R6 | |||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of the offering price) | None | None | None | |||
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of the original purchase price) | None | None | None | |||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Reinvested Dividends | None | None | None | |||
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of shares redeemed within 90 days of purchase) | None | None | None | |||
Fee for Redemption by Wire | $15 | $15 | $15 | |||
Exchange Fee | None | None | None | |||
Account Fee | None | None | None |
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | Class R6 | |||||||||
Management Fees | 0.40% | 0.40% | 0.40% | |||||||||
Distribution and/or Service (12b-1) Fees | None | 0.25% | None | |||||||||
Other Expenses (includes sub-transfer agent accounting or administrative services expenses) | 0.07% | 0.07% | 0.04% | |||||||||
Acquired Fund Fees and Expenses1 | 0.04% | 0.04% | 0.04% | |||||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses Before Fee Waiver and/or Expense Reimbursement | 0.51% | 0.76% | 0.48% | |||||||||
Fee Waiver and/or Expense Reimbursement1 |
-0.03% | -0.03% | -0.03% | |||||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses After Fee Waiver and/or Expense Reimbursement1 |
0.48% | 0.73% | 0.45% |
1 |
“Acquired Fund Fees and Expenses” are expenses indirectly incurred by the Fund as a result of its investments in one or more underlying funds, including exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”) and money market funds. Because these costs are indirect, the Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses in this fee table will not correlate to the expense ratio in the Fund’s financial statements, since financial statements only include direct costs of the Fund and not the indirect costs of investing in the underlying funds. When the Fund invests in other investment vehicles sponsored or advised by DoubleLine Capital LP (the “Adviser” or “DoubleLine Capital”) or a related party of the Adviser (“other DoubleLine funds”), the Adviser has contractually agreed to waive its advisory fee in an amount equal to the advisory fees paid by the other DoubleLine funds in respect of Fund assets so invested. The Adviser waived advisory fees in the amount of 0.03% pursuant to this waiver agreement in respect of investments made in other DoubleLine funds during the Fund’s most recent fiscal year. The effects of this waiver agreement are reflected in the last two rows of the table above. This waiver agreement will apply until at least August 1, 2024, except that it may be terminated at any time with the consent of the Board of Trustees. |
-12-
Example
This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds.
This example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all your shares at the end of those periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same. Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions, your costs would be:
Class I | Class N | Class R6 | ||||
1 Year | $49 | $75 | $46 | |||
3 Years | $161 | $240 | $151 | |||
5 Years | $282 | $419 | $266 | |||
10 Years | $638 | $939 | $601 |
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund incurs transaction costs when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the Fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 119% of the average value of its portfolio.
Principal Investment Strategies
Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in fixed income instruments. These fixed income instruments include but are not limited to securities issued or guaranteed by the United States Government, its agencies, instrumentalities or sponsored corporations; corporate obligations; mortgage-backed securities of any kind, including commercial and residential mortgage-backed securities; asset-backed securities; foreign securities (corporate and government, including foreign hybrid securities); emerging market securities (corporate and government); fixed and floating rate loans of any kind (including, among others, bank loans, assignments, participations, subordinated loans, debtor-in-possession loans, exit facilities, delayed funding loans and revolving credit facilities); and other securities bearing fixed or variable interest rates of any maturity. If the Fund changes this investment policy, it will notify shareholders at least 60 days in advance of the change.
The Fund may invest in fixed income instruments of any credit quality, including those that are at the time of investment unrated or rated BB+ or lower by S&P Global Ratings or Ba1 or lower by Moody’s Investors Service, Inc. or the equivalent by any other nationally recognized statistical rating organization. Corporate bonds and certain other fixed income instruments rated below investment grade, or such instruments that are unrated and determined by the Adviser to be of comparable quality, are high yield, high risk bonds, commonly known as “junk bonds.” The Fund may invest up to 331⁄3% of its net assets in junk bonds, bank loans and assignments rated below investment grade or unrated but determined by the Adviser to be of comparable quality, and credit default swaps of companies in the high yield universe. The Adviser does not consider the term “junk bonds” to include any mortgage-backed securities or any other asset-backed securities, regardless of their credit rating or credit quality, and accordingly may invest without limit in such investments.
The Fund may invest up to 5% of its net assets in defaulted corporate securities. The Fund might do so, for example, where the portfolio managers believe the restructured enterprise valuations or liquidation valuations may exceed current market values. The Fund may invest a portion of its assets in inverse floaters and interest-only and principal-only securities.
The Fund may also invest a portion of its assets in fixed income instruments (including hybrid securities) issued or guaranteed by companies, financial institutions and government entities in emerging market countries. An “emerging market country” is a country that, at the time the Fund invests in the related fixed income instruments, is classified as an emerging or developing economy by any supranational organization such as an institution in the World Bank Group or the United Nations, or an agency thereof, or is considered an emerging market country for purposes of constructing a major emerging market securities index.
The Fund may pursue its investment objective and obtain exposures to some or all of the asset classes described above by investing in other investment companies, including, for example, other open-end or closed-end investment companies and ETFs, including investment companies sponsored or managed by the Adviser or its related parties. The amount of the Fund’s investment in certain investment companies may be limited by law or by tax considerations.
-13-
In managing the Fund’s portfolio, the portfolio managers typically use a controlled risk approach. The techniques of this approach attempt to control the principal risk components of the fixed income markets and may include, among other factors, consideration of the Adviser’s view of the following: the potential relative performance of various market sectors, security selection available within a given sector, the risk/reward equation for different asset classes, liquidity conditions in various market sectors, the shape of the yield curve and projections for changes in the yield curve, potential fluctuations in the overall level of interest rates, and current fiscal policy.
The portfolio managers utilize active asset allocation in managing the Fund’s investments.
The Adviser monitors the duration of the Fund’s portfolio securities to seek to assess and, in its discretion, adjust the Fund’s exposure to interest rate risk. In managing the Fund’s investments, under normal market conditions, the portfolio managers intend to seek to construct an investment portfolio with a dollar-weighted average effective duration of no less than two years and no more than eight years. Duration is a measure of the expected life of a fixed income instrument that is used to determine the sensitivity of a security’s price to changes in interest rates. Effective duration is a measure of the Fund’s portfolio duration adjusted for the anticipated effect of interest rate changes on bond and mortgage prepayment rates as determined by the Adviser. The effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio may vary materially from its target range, from time to time, and there is no assurance that the effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio will always be within its target range.
The Fund may enter into derivatives transactions and other instruments of any kind for hedging purposes or otherwise to gain, or reduce, long or short exposure to one or more asset classes or issuers. The Fund may use derivatives transactions with the purpose or effect of creating investment leverage. For example, the Fund may use futures contracts and options on futures contracts, in order to gain efficient long or short investment exposures as an alternative to cash investments or to hedge against portfolio exposures; interest rate swaps, to gain indirect long or short exposures to interest rates, issuers, or currencies, or to hedge against portfolio exposures; and total return swaps and credit derivatives (such as credit default swaps), put and call options, and exchange-traded and structured notes, to take indirect long or short positions on indexes, securities, currencies, or other indicators of value, or to hedge against portfolio exposures. The Fund may also engage in short sales or take short positions, either to adjust its duration or for other investment purposes.
Portfolio securities may be sold at any time. By way of example, sales may occur when the Fund’s portfolio managers determine to take advantage of what the portfolio managers consider to be a better investment opportunity, when the portfolio managers believe the portfolio securities no longer represent relatively attractive investment opportunities, when the portfolio managers perceive deterioration in the credit fundamentals of the issuer, or when the individual security has reached the portfolio managers’ sell target.
Principal Risks
The value of the Fund’s shares will vary as its portfolio investments increase or decrease in value. Therefore, the value of your investment in the Fund could go down as well as up. You can lose money by investing in the Fund. The Fund’s principal risks are listed below in alphabetical order, not in order of importance. The significance of any specific risk to an investment in the Fund will vary over time, depending on the composition of the Fund’s portfolio, market conditions, and other factors. You should read all of the risk information presented below carefully, because any one or more of these risks may result in losses to the Fund.
The principal risks affecting the Fund that can cause a decline in value are:
• |
active management risk: the risk that the Fund will fail to meet its investment objective and that the Fund’s investment performance will depend, at least in part, on how its assets are allocated and reallocated among asset classes, sectors, underlying funds and/or investments and that such allocation will focus on asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or investments that perform poorly or underperform other asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or available investments. Any given investment strategy may fail to produce the intended results, and the Fund’s portfolio may underperform other comparable funds because of portfolio management decisions related to, among other things, the selection of investments, portfolio construction, risk assessments, and/or the outlook on market trends and opportunities. |
• |
asset-backed securities investment risk: the risk that borrowers may default on the obligations that underlie the asset-backed security and that, during periods of falling interest rates, asset-backed securities may be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate, and the risk that the impairment of the value of the collateral underlying a security in which the Fund invests (due, for example, to non-payment of loans) will result in a reduction in the value of the security. |
-14-
• |
counterparty risk: the risk that the Fund will be subject to credit risk with respect to the counterparties to the derivative contracts and other instruments entered into by the Fund; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; that the Fund will be unable to enforce contractual remedies if its counterparty defaults; that if a counterparty (or an affiliate of a counterparty) becomes bankrupt, the Fund may experience significant delays in obtaining any recovery or may obtain limited or no recovery in a bankruptcy or other insolvency proceeding. To the extent that the Fund enters into multiple transactions with a single or a small set of counterparties, it will be subject to increased counterparty risk. |
• |
debt securities risks: |
¡ |
credit risk: the risk that an issuer, counterparty or other obligor to the Fund will fail to pay its obligations to the Fund when they are due, which may reduce the Fund’s income and/or reduce, in whole or in part, the value of the Fund’s investment. Actual or perceived changes in the financial condition of an obligor, changes in economic, social or political conditions that affect a particular type of security, instrument, or obligor, and changes in economic, social or political conditions generally can increase the risk of default by an obligor, which can affect a security’s or other instrument’s credit quality or value and an obligor’s ability to honor its obligations when due. The values of lower-quality debt securities (commonly known as “junk bonds”), including floating rate loans, tend to be particularly sensitive to these changes. The values of securities or instruments also may decline for a number of other reasons that relate directly to the obligor, such as management performance, financial leverage, and reduced demand for the obligor’s goods and services, as well as the historical and prospective earnings of the obligor and the value of its assets. |
¡ |
extension risk: the risk that if interest rates rise, repayments of principal on certain debt securities, including, but not limited to, floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, may occur at a slower rate than expected and the expected maturity of those securities could lengthen as a result. Securities that are subject to extension risk generally have a greater potential for loss when prevailing interest rates rise, which could cause their values to fall sharply. |
¡ |
interest rate risk: the risk that debt instruments will change in value because of changes in interest rates. The value of an instrument with a longer duration (whether positive or negative) will be more sensitive to changes in interest rates than a similar instrument with a shorter duration. Bonds and other debt instruments typically have a positive duration. The value of a debt instrument with positive duration will generally decline if interest rates increase. Certain other investments, such as inverse floaters and certain derivative instruments, may have a negative duration. The value of instruments with a negative duration will generally decline if interest rates decrease. Inverse floaters, interest-only and principal-only securities are especially sensitive to interest rate changes, which can affect not only their prices but can also change the income flows and repayment assumptions about those investments. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. The risks associated with rising interest rates are heightened under current market conditions given that the U.S. Federal Reserve has begun to raise interest rates from historically low levels and may continue to do so. Further, in market environments where interest rates are rising, issuers may be less willing or able to make principal and interest payments on fixed-income investments when due. |
¡ |
prepayment risk: the risk that the issuer of a debt security, including floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, repays all or a portion of the principal prior to the security’s maturity. In times of declining interest rates, there is a greater likelihood that the Fund’s higher yielding securities will be pre-paid with the Fund being unable to reinvest the proceeds in an investment with as great a yield. Prepayments can therefore result in lower yields to shareholders of the Fund. |
¡ |
LIBOR phase out/transition risk: the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) was the offered rate for wholesale, unsecured funding available to major international banks. The terms of many investments, financings or other transactions to which the Fund may be a party have been historically tied to LIBOR. LIBOR has historically been a significant factor in relation to payment obligations under a derivative investment and has also been used in other ways that affect the Fund’s investment performance. In connection with the global transition away from LIBOR led by regulators and market participants, LIBOR is no longer published on a representative basis. The transition from LIBOR and the terms of any replacement rate(s), including, for example, the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (“SOFR”) or another rate based on SOFR, may adversely affect transactions that used LIBOR as a reference rate, financial institutions that engaged in such transactions, and the financial markets generally. There are significant differences between LIBOR and SOFR, such as LIBOR being an unsecured lending rate while SOFR is a secured lending rate. As such, the potential effect of the transition away from LIBOR on the Fund or the financial instruments in which the Fund invests cannot yet be fully determined, but the transition may adversely affect the Fund’s performance. |
-15-
• |
defaulted securities risk: the significant risk of the uncertainty of repayment of defaulted securities (e.g., a security on which a principal or interest payment is not made when due) and obligations of distressed issuers (including insolvent issuers or issuers in payment or covenant default, in workout or restructuring or in bankruptcy or similar proceedings). Such investments entail high risk and have speculative characteristics. |
• |
derivatives risk: the risk that an investment in derivatives will not perform as anticipated by the Adviser, may not be available at the time or price desired, cannot be closed out at a favorable time or price, will increase the Fund’s transaction costs, or will increase the Fund’s volatility; that derivatives may create investment leverage; that, when a derivative is used as a substitute for or alternative to a direct cash investment, the transaction may not provide a return that corresponds precisely or at all with that of the cash investment; that the positions may be improperly executed or constructed; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; or that, when used for hedging purposes, derivatives will not provide the anticipated protection, causing the Fund to lose money on both the derivatives transaction and the exposure the Fund sought to hedge. |
Please also see “debt securities risks — LIBOR phase out/transition risk” herein for more information.
• |
emerging market country risk: the risk that investing in emerging markets, as compared to foreign developed markets, increases the likelihood that the Fund will lose money, due to more limited information about the issuer and/or the security; higher brokerage costs; different accounting, auditing and financial reporting standards; less developed legal systems and thinner trading markets; the possibility of currency blockages or transfer restrictions; an emerging market country’s dependence on revenue from particular commodities or international aid; and expropriation, nationalization or other adverse political or economic developments. |
• |
financial services risk: the risk that an investment in issuers in the financial services sector or transactions with one or more counterparties in the financial services sector may be adversely affected by, among other things: (i) changes in governmental regulation, which may limit both the amounts and the types of loans and other financial commitments financial services companies can make, the interest rates and fees they can charge, the scope of their activities, the prices they can charge and the amount of capital they must maintain; (ii) fluctuations, including as a result of interest rate changes or increased competition, in the availability and cost of capital funds on which the profitability of financial services companies is largely dependent; (iii) deterioration of the credit markets; (iv) credit losses resulting from financial difficulties of borrowers, especially when financial services companies are exposed to non-diversified or concentrated loan portfolios; (v) financial losses associated with investment activities, especially when financial services companies are exposed to financial leverage; (vi) the risk that any financial services company experiences substantial declines in the valuations of its assets, takes action to raise capital, or ceases operations; (vii) the risk that a market shock or other unexpected market, economic, political, regulatory, or other event might lead to a sudden decline in the values of most or all companies in the financial services sector; (viii) events leading to limited liquidity, defaults, non-performance or other adverse developments that affect financial institutions or the financial services industry generally, or concerns or rumors about any events of these kinds or other similar risks, leading to market-wide liquidity problems; and (ix) the interconnectedness or interdependence among financial services companies, including the risk that the financial distress or failure of one financial services company may materially and adversely affect a number of other financial services companies. |
• |
foreign currency risk: the risk that fluctuations in exchange rates may adversely affect the value of the Fund’s investments denominated in foreign currencies. |
• |
foreign investing risk: the risk that investments in foreign securities or in issuers with significant exposure to foreign markets, as compared to investments in U.S. securities or in issuers with predominantly domestic market exposure, may be more vulnerable to economic, political, and social instability and subject to less government supervision, less protective custody practices, lack of transparency, inadequate regulatory and accounting standards, delayed or infrequent settlement of transactions, and foreign taxes. If the Fund buys securities denominated in a foreign currency, receives income in foreign currencies, or holds foreign currencies from time to time, the value of the Fund’s assets, as measured in U.S. dollars, can be affected unfavorably by changes in exchange rates relative to the U.S. dollar or other foreign currencies. Foreign markets are also subject to the risk that a foreign government could restrict foreign exchange transactions or otherwise implement unfavorable currency regulations. In addition, foreign securities may be subject to currency exchange rates or regulations, the imposition of economic sanctions, tariffs or other government restrictions, higher transaction and other costs, reduced liquidity, and delays in settlement. |
• |
high yield risk: the risk that debt instruments rated below investment grade or debt instruments that are unrated and of comparable or lesser quality are predominantly speculative. These instruments, commonly known as “junk bonds,” have a higher degree of default risk and may be less liquid than higher-rated bonds. These instruments may be subject to greater |
-16-
price volatility due to such factors as specific corporate developments, interest rate sensitivity, negative perceptions of high yield investments generally, and less secondary market liquidity. |
• |
inflation-indexed bond risk: the risk that such bonds will change in value in response to actual or anticipated changes in inflation rates in a manner unanticipated by the Fund’s portfolio management team or investors generally. Inflation-indexed bonds are subject to debt securities risks. |
• |
investment company and exchange-traded fund risk: the risk that an investment company or other pooled investment vehicle, including any ETFs or money market funds, in which the Fund invests will not achieve its investment objective or execute its investment strategies effectively or that significant purchase or redemption activity by shareholders of such an investment company might negatively affect the value of its shares. The Fund must pay its pro rata portion of an investment company’s fees and expenses. To the extent the Adviser determines to invest Fund assets in other investment companies, the Adviser will have an incentive to invest in other DoubleLine funds over investment companies sponsored or managed by others and to maintain such investments once made due to its own financial interest in those products and other business considerations. |
• |
leveraging risk: the risk that certain investments by the Fund involving leverage may have the effect of increasing the volatility of the value of the Fund’s portfolio, and the risk of loss in excess of invested capital. |
• |
liquidity risk: the risk that the Fund may be unable to sell a portfolio investment at a desirable time or at the value the Fund has placed on the investment. Illiquidity may be the result of, for example, low trading volume, lack of a market maker, or contractual or legal restrictions that limit or prevent the Fund from selling securities or closing derivative positions. During periods of substantial market disruption, a large portion of the Fund’s assets could potentially experience significant levels of illiquidity. The values of illiquid investments are often more volatile than the values of more liquid investments. It may be more difficult for the Fund to determine a fair value of an illiquid investment than that of a more liquid comparable investment. |
• |
loan risk: the risk that (i) if the Fund holds a loan through another financial intermediary, or relies on a financial intermediary to administer the loan, its receipt of principal and interest on the loan may be subject to the credit risk of that financial intermediary; (ii) any collateral securing a loan may be insufficient or unavailable to the Fund, because, for example, the value of the collateral securing a loan can decline, be insufficient to meet the obligations of the borrower, or be difficult to liquidate, and the Fund’s rights to collateral may be limited by bankruptcy or insolvency laws; (iii) investments in highly leveraged loans or loans of stressed, distressed, or defaulted issuers may be subject to significant credit and liquidity risk; (iv) a bankruptcy or other court proceeding could delay or limit the ability of the Fund to collect the principal and interest payments on that borrower’s loans or adversely affect the Fund’s rights in collateral relating to a loan; (v) there may be limited public information available regarding the loan and the relevant borrower(s); (vi) the use of a particular interest rate benchmark may limit the Fund’s ability to achieve a net return to shareholders that consistently approximates the average published Prime Rate of U.S. banks; (vii) the prices of certain floating rate loans that include a feature that prevents their interest rates from adjusting if market interest rates are below a specified minimum level may appreciate less than other instruments in response to changes in interest rates should interest rates rise but remain below the applicable minimum level; (viii) if a borrower fails to comply with various restrictive covenants that may be found in loan agreements, the borrower may default in payment of the loan; (ix) if the Fund invests in loans that contain fewer or less restrictive constraints on the borrower than certain other types of loans (“covenant-lite” loans), it may have fewer rights against the borrowers of such loans, including fewer protections against the possibility of default and fewer remedies in the event of default; (x) the loan is unsecured; (xi) there is a limited secondary market; (xii) transactions in loans may settle on a delayed basis, and the Fund may not receive the proceeds from the sale of a loan for a substantial period of time after the sale, which may result in sale proceeds related to the sale of loans not being available to make additional investments or to meet the Fund’s redemption obligations until potentially a substantial period after the sale of the loans; and (xiii) loans may be difficult to value and may be illiquid, which may adversely affect an investment in the Fund. The Fund may invest in loans directly or indirectly by investing in shares of the DoubleLine Floating Rate Fund and in either case will be subject to the risks described above. |
• |
market risk: the risk that markets will perform poorly or that the returns from the securities in which the Fund invests will underperform returns from the general securities markets or other types of investments. Markets may, in response to governmental actions or intervention or general market conditions, including real or perceived adverse political, economic or market conditions, tariffs and trade disruptions, inflation, recession, changes in interest or currency rates, lack of liquidity in the bond markets or adverse investor sentiment, or other external factors, experience periods of high volatility and reduced liquidity. During those periods, the Fund may experience high levels of shareholder redemptions, and may have to sell securities at times when the Fund would otherwise not do so, and potentially at unfavorable prices. Certain |
-17-
securities may be difficult to value during such periods. Market risk involves the risk that the value of the Fund’s investment portfolio will change, potentially frequently and in large amounts, as the prices of its investments go up or down. During periods of severe market stress, it is possible that the market for some or all of a Fund’s investments may become highly illiquid. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. Please see “debt securities risks — interest rate risk” herein for more information. |
• |
mortgage-backed securities risk: the risk that borrowers may default on their mortgage obligations or the guarantees underlying the mortgage-backed securities will default or otherwise fail and that, during periods of falling interest rates, mortgage-backed securities will be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate. During periods of rising interest rates, the average life of a mortgage-backed security may extend, which may lock in a below-market interest rate, increase the security’s duration, and reduce the value of the security. Enforcing rights against the underlying assets or collateral may be difficult, or the underlying assets or collateral may be insufficient if the issuer defaults. The values of certain types of mortgage-backed securities, such as inverse floaters and interest-only and principal-only securities, may be extremely sensitive to changes in interest rates and prepayment rates. The Fund may invest in mortgage-backed securities that are subordinate in their right to receive payment of interest and repayment of principal to other classes of the issuer’s securities. |
• |
operational and information security risks: an investment in the Fund, like any fund, can involve operational risks arising from factors such as processing errors, human errors, inadequate or failed internal or external processes, failures in systems and technology, changes in personnel and errors caused by third-party service providers. The occurrence of any of these failures, errors or breaches could result in investment losses to the Fund, a loss of information, regulatory scrutiny, reputational damage or other events, any of which could have a material adverse effect on the Fund. While the Fund seeks to minimize such events through controls and oversight, there may still be failures that could cause losses to the Fund. |
• |
portfolio turnover risk: the risk that frequent purchases and sales of portfolio securities may result in higher Fund expenses and may result in larger distributions of taxable capital gains to investors as compared to a fund that trades less frequently. |
• |
real estate sector risk: the risk that real estate-related investments may decline in value as a result of factors affecting the real estate sector, such as the supply of real property in certain markets, changes in zoning laws, delays in completion of construction, changes in real estate values, changes in property taxes, levels of occupancy, and local, regional, and general market conditions. Along with the risks common to different types of real estate-related investments, real estate investment trusts (“REITs”), no matter the type, involve additional risk factors, including poor performance by the REIT’s manager, adverse changes to the tax laws, and the possible failure by the REIT to qualify for the favorable tax treatment available to REITs under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, or the exemption from registration under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended. REITs are not diversified and are heavily dependent on cash flow earned on the property interests they hold. |
• |
restricted securities risk: the risk that the Fund may be prevented or limited by law or the terms of an agreement from selling a security (a “restricted security”). To the extent that the Fund is permitted to sell a restricted security, there can be no assurance that a trading market will exist at any particular time, and the Fund may be unable to dispose of the security promptly at reasonable prices or at all. The Fund may have to bear the expense of registering the securities for resale and the risk of substantial delays in effecting the registration. Also, restricted securities may be difficult to value because market quotations may not be readily available, and the values of restricted securities may have significant volatility. |
• |
securities or sector selection risk: the risk that the securities held by the Fund will underperform securities held in other funds investing in similar asset classes or comparable benchmarks because of the portfolio managers’ choice of securities or sectors for investment. To the extent the Fund allocates a higher percentage of its investment portfolio to a particular sector or related sectors, the Fund will be more susceptible to events or factors affecting companies in that sector or related sectors. For example, the values of securities of companies in the same or related sectors may be negatively affected by the common characteristics they share, the common business risks to which they are subject, common regulatory burdens, or regulatory changes that affect them similarly. Such characteristics, risks, burdens or changes include, but are not limited to, changes in governmental regulation, inflation or deflation, rising or falling interest rates, competition from new entrants, and other economic, market, political or other developments specific to that sector or related sectors. |
• |
structured products and structured notes risk: the risk that an investment in a structured product, which includes, among other things, collateralized debt obligations, mortgage-backed securities, other types of asset-backed securities and certain types of structured notes, may decline in value due to changes in the underlying instruments, indexes, interest rates or other |
-18-
factors on which the product is based (“reference measure”). Depending on the reference measure used and the use of multipliers or deflators (if any), changes in interest rates and movement of the reference measure may cause significant price and cash flow fluctuations. Application of a multiplier is comparable to the use of financial leverage, a speculative technique. Holders of structured products indirectly bear risks associated with the reference measure, are subject to counterparty risk and typically do not have direct rights against the reference measure. Structured products are generally privately offered and sold, and thus, are not registered under the securities laws and may be thinly traded or have a limited trading market and may have the effect of increasing the Fund’s illiquidity, reducing the Fund’s income and the value of the investment. At a particular point in time, the Fund may be unable to find qualified buyers for these securities. Investments in structured notes involve risks including interest rate risk, credit risk and market risk. |
• |
U.S. Government securities risk: the risk that debt securities issued or guaranteed by certain U.S. Government agencies, instrumentalities, and sponsored enterprises are not supported by the full faith and credit of the U.S. Government, and so investments in their securities or obligations issued by them involve credit risk greater than investments in other types of U.S. Government securities. |
• |
valuation risk: the risk that the Fund will not value its investments in a manner that accurately reflects their market values or that the Fund will not be able to sell any investment at a price equal to the valuation ascribed to that investment for purposes of calculating the Fund’s net asset value (“NAV”). The valuation of the Fund’s investments involves subjective judgment. Certain securities in which the Fund may invest may be more difficult to value accurately, especially during periods of market disruptions or extreme market volatility. Incorrect valuations of the Fund’s portfolio holdings could result in the Fund’s shareholder transactions being effected at an NAV that does not accurately reflect the underlying value of the Fund’s portfolio, resulting in the dilution of shareholder interests. |
Please see “Additional Information About Principal Investment Strategies and Principal Risks — Principal Risks” for a more detailed description of the principal risks of investing in the Fund.
Performance
The following performance information provides some indication of the risks of investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows the performance of the Fund’s Class I shares for each full calendar year since the Fund’s inception. The table below shows how the average annual total returns of the Fund’s shares for the periods shown compare to those of a broad-based securities market index. The Fund’s past performance (before and after taxes) is not necessarily an indication of how the Fund will perform in the future. Absent any applicable fee waivers and/or expense limitations (which applied to the Fund from inception through July 24, 2012), performance would have been lower. Updated information on the Fund’s investment results can be obtained at no charge by calling 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311) or by visiting the Fund’s website at www.doubleline.com.
Class I Shares
During the periods shown above, the highest and lowest quarterly returns earned by the Fund’s Class I shares were:
Highest: | 5.41% | Quarter ended 6/30/2020 | ||
Lowest: | -5.50% | Quarter ended 6/30/2022 |
The year-to-date total return for the Fund’s Class I shares as of June 30, 2023 was 2.95%.
-19-
Average Annual Total Returns (for the periods ended December 31, 2022)
Core Fixed Income Fund | One Year | Five Years | Ten Years |
Since Inception (June 1, 2010) |
||||||||||||
Class I | ||||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-12.76% | -0.17% | 1.39% | 3.20% | ||||||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions |
-14.09% | -1.52% | -0.07% | 1.64% | ||||||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares |
-7.53% | -0.64% | 0.45% | 1.86% | ||||||||||||
Class N |
| |||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-13.07% | -0.43% | 1.13% | 2.95% | ||||||||||||
Class R61 | ||||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-12.82% | -0.15% | 1.40% | 3.21% | ||||||||||||
Bloomberg U.S.
Aggregate Bond Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) |
-13.01% | 0.02% | 1.06% | 1.99% |
1 |
Class R6 shares were not available for purchase until July 31, 2019. The performance shown for Class R6 shares prior to that date is that of the Class I shares of the Fund, another class of the Fund that is invested in the same portfolio of securities as Class R6 shares. Annual returns of Class R6 shares would have differed from that shown for the period prior to July 31, 2019 only to the extent that Class R6 shares and Class I shares have different expenses. |
The Fund’s after-tax returns as shown in the above table are calculated using the historical highest applicable individual federal marginal income tax rates for the period and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Your actual after-tax returns depend on your tax situation and may differ from those shown. If you own shares of the Fund in a tax-advantaged account, such as a 401(k) plan or an individual retirement account, after-tax returns shown are not relevant to your investment. The “Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares” may be higher than other return figures because when a capital loss occurs upon the redemption of shares of the Fund, a tax deduction is provided that may benefit the investor. After-tax returns are for Class I shares only. After-tax returns for other classes may vary. The Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate Bond Index represents securities that are SEC-registered, taxable, and dollar denominated. This index covers the U.S. investment-grade fixed rate bond market, with index components for government and corporate securities, mortgage pass-through securities, and asset-backed securities. These major sectors are subdivided into more specific indices that are calculated and reported on a regular basis. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.
Investment Adviser
DoubleLine Capital is the investment adviser to the Fund.
Portfolio Managers
The portfolio managers for the Fund are:
Name |
Experience with the Fund |
Primary Title with the Investment Adviser | ||
Jeffrey E. Gundlach | Since the Fund’s inception in June 2010 | Chief Executive Officer | ||
Jeffrey J. Sherman | Since September 2016 | Deputy Chief Investment Officer |
Purchase and Sale of Shares
You may purchase or redeem Class I, Class N and Class R6 shares on any business day when the New York Stock Exchange opens for regular trading. You may purchase or redeem shares by written request via mail (DoubleLine Funds, c/o U.S. Bank Global Fund Services, P.O. Box 701, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0701), by wire transfer, by telephone at 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311), or through authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers (“financial intermediaries”). Telephone transactions will be permitted unless you decline this privilege on your initial purchase application. The minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts for different types of accounts are shown below, although the Fund may reduce or waive the minimums in some cases.
-20-
Minimum Initial Investment: | Subsequent Investment: |
|||||||||||
Regular Accounts |
IRAs/HSAs |
All Accounts and Investment Plans |
||||||||||
Class I Shares | $ | 100,000 | $ | 5,000 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class N Shares | $ | 2,000 | $ | 500 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class R6 Shares | None | * | N/A | N/A |
* |
See eligibility limitations below. |
The minimum investment may be modified for certain financial intermediaries that submit trades on behalf of underlying investors. Certain financial intermediaries also may have their own investment minimums, which may differ from the Fund’s minimums, and may be waived at the intermediaries’ discretion. The Fund reserves the right to change or waive the minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts without prior notice or to waive the minimum investment amounts for certain intermediaries or individual investors in its discretion.
Eligibility for Class R6 Shares. Only authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers who have an agreement with the Fund’s distributor to make Class R6 shares available to their clients who are Class R6 eligible plans or other eligible investors are authorized to accept, on behalf of the Fund, purchase and exchange orders and redemption requests for Class R6 shares placed by or on behalf of Class R6 eligible plans or other eligible investors. In addition, Class R6 shares may also be purchased directly from the Fund’s transfer agent by a Class R6 eligible plan if such shares are held in an omnibus account opened in the plan’s name directly with the Fund’s transfer agent.
Tax Information
The Fund’s distributions generally are taxable to you as ordinary income or capital gains, unless you are investing through a tax-advantaged arrangement, such as a 401(k) plan or individual retirement account. If you invest through such tax-advantaged arrangements, you may be taxed later upon withdrawal from those arrangements.
Payments to Broker-Dealers and Other Financial Intermediaries
If you purchase shares of the Fund through a broker-dealer or other financial intermediary (such as a bank), the Fund, the Adviser, and the Fund’s distributor or any of their affiliates may pay the financial intermediary for the sale of Fund shares and related services. These payments may create a conflict of interest by influencing the financial intermediary and your salesperson to recommend the Fund over another investment. Ask your individual salesperson or visit your financial intermediary’s website for more information.
-21-
Fund Summary
DoubleLine Emerging Markets Fixed Income Fund
Investment Objective
The Fund’s investment objective is to seek high total return from current income and capital appreciation.
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Fund. You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries (defined below), including when purchasing Class I shares through a broker or other financial intermediary acting as an agent on your behalf. Such commissions and other fees, if any, are not charged by the Fund and are not reflected in the fee table or expense example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of the offering price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of the original purchase price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Reinvested Dividends | None | None | ||
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of shares redeemed within 90 days of purchase) | None | None | ||
Fee for Redemption by Wire | $15 | $15 | ||
Exchange Fee | None | None | ||
Account Fee | None | None |
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||||||
Management Fees | 0.75% | 0.75% | ||||||
Distribution and/or Service (12b-1) Fees | None | 0.25% | ||||||
Other Expenses (includes sub-transfer agent accounting or administrative services expenses) | 0.15% | 0.15% | ||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses | 0.90% | 1.15% |
Example
This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds.
This example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all your shares at the end of those periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same. Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions, your costs would be:
Class I | Class N | |||
1 Year | $92 | $117 | ||
3 Years | $287 | $365 | ||
5 Years | $498 | $633 | ||
10 Years | $1,108 | $1,398 |
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund incurs transaction costs when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the Fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 34% of the average value of its portfolio.
-22-
Principal Investment Strategies
Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in fixed income instruments. These fixed income instruments include but are not limited to securities (including hybrid securities) issued or guaranteed by companies, financial institutions and government entities in emerging market countries and other securities bearing fixed or variable interest rates of any maturity. If the Fund changes this investment policy, it will notify shareholders at least 60 days in advance of the change. The Fund will generally invest in at least four emerging market countries.
An “emerging market country” is a country that, at the time the Fund invests in the related fixed income instruments, is classified as an emerging or developing economy by any supranational organization such as an institution in the World Bank Group or the United Nations, or an agency thereof, or is considered an emerging market country for purposes of constructing a major emerging market securities index.
The Fund may invest, without limitation, in fixed income instruments of any credit quality, including those that at the time of investment are unrated or rated BB+ or lower by S&P Global Ratings or Ba1 or lower by Moody’s Investors Service, Inc. or the equivalent by any other nationally recognized statistical rating organization. Corporate bonds and certain other fixed income instruments rated below investment grade, or such instruments that are unrated and determined by DoubleLine Capital LP (the “Adviser” or “DoubleLine Capital”) to be of comparable quality, are high yield, high risk bonds, commonly known as “junk bonds.” The Fund may invest in hybrid securities relating to emerging market countries.
The Fund may invest up to 20% of its net assets in defaulted corporate securities. The Fund might do so, for example, where the portfolio managers believe the restructured enterprise valuations or liquidation valuations may exceed current market values. In addition, the Fund may invest in defaulted sovereign investments, including, for example, where the portfolio managers believe the expected debt sustainability of the country is not reflected in current market valuations. The Fund may invest in derivatives and other instruments, such as options, swaps (including credit default swaps), futures, structured investments, foreign currency futures and forward contracts. These practices may be used to hedge the Fund’s portfolio as well as for investment purposes; however, such practices sometimes may reduce returns or increase volatility.
The Fund may invest in fixed and floating rate loans of any kind (including, among others, bank loans, assignments, participations, subordinated loans, debtor-in-possession loans, exit facilities, delayed funding loans and revolving credit facilities) and other securities bearing fixed or variable interest rates of any maturity.
In allocating investments among various emerging market countries, the portfolio managers attempt to analyze internal political, market and economic factors. These factors may include:
• |
public finances; |
• |
monetary policy; |
• |
external accounts; |
• |
financial markets; |
• |
foreign investment regulations; |
• |
stability of exchange rate policy; and |
• |
labor conditions. |
The Adviser monitors the duration of the Fund’s portfolio securities to seek to assess and, in its discretion, adjust the Fund’s exposure to interest rate risk. In managing the Fund’s investments, under normal market conditions, the portfolio managers intend to seek to construct an investment portfolio with a dollar-weighted average effective duration of no less than two years and no more than eight years. Duration is a measure of the expected life of a fixed income instrument that is used to determine the sensitivity of a security’s price to changes in interest rates. Effective duration is a measure of the Fund’s portfolio duration adjusted for the anticipated effect of interest rate changes on bond and mortgage prepayment rates as determined by the Adviser. The effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio may vary materially from its target range, from time to time, and there is no assurance that the effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio will always be within its target range.
-23-
The Fund may invest without limit in investments denominated in any currency, including securities denominated in the local currencies of an emerging market, but currently expects to invest a substantial amount of its assets in investments denominated in the U.S. dollar.
The Fund may pursue its investment objective and obtain exposures to some or all of the asset classes described above by investing in other investment companies, including, for example, other open-end or closed-end investment companies and exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”), including investment companies sponsored or managed by the Adviser or its related parties. The amount of the Fund’s investment in certain investment companies may be limited by law or by tax considerations.
Portfolio securities may be sold at any time. By way of example, sales may occur when the Fund’s portfolio managers perceive deterioration in the credit fundamentals of the issuer, when the portfolio managers believe there are negative macro geo-political considerations that may affect the issuer, when the portfolio managers determine to take advantage of a better investment opportunity, or when the individual security has reached the portfolio managers’ sell target.
Principal Risks
The value of the Fund’s shares will vary as its portfolio investments increase or decrease in value. Therefore, the value of your investment in the Fund could go down as well as up. You can lose money by investing in the Fund. The Fund’s principal risks are listed below in alphabetical order, not in order of importance. The significance of any specific risk to an investment in the Fund will vary over time, depending on the composition of the Fund’s portfolio, market conditions, and other factors. You should read all of the risk information presented below carefully, because any one or more of these risks may result in losses to the Fund.
The principal risks affecting the Fund that can cause a decline in value are:
• |
active management risk: the risk that the Fund will fail to meet its investment objective and that the Fund’s investment performance will depend, at least in part, on how its assets are allocated and reallocated among asset classes, sectors, underlying funds and/or investments and that such allocation will focus on asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or investments that perform poorly or underperform other asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or available investments. Any given investment strategy may fail to produce the intended results, and the Fund’s portfolio may underperform other comparable funds because of portfolio management decisions related to, among other things, the selection of investments, portfolio construction, risk assessments, and/or the outlook on market trends and opportunities. |
• |
counterparty risk: the risk that the Fund will be subject to credit risk with respect to the counterparties to the derivative contracts and other instruments entered into by the Fund; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; that the Fund will be unable to enforce contractual remedies if its counterparty defaults; that if a counterparty (or an affiliate of a counterparty) becomes bankrupt, the Fund may experience significant delays in obtaining any recovery or may obtain limited or no recovery in a bankruptcy or other insolvency proceeding. To the extent that the Fund enters into multiple transactions with a single or a small set of counterparties, it will be subject to increased counterparty risk. |
• |
debt securities risks: |
¡ |
credit risk: the risk that an issuer, counterparty or other obligor to the Fund will fail to pay its obligations to the Fund when they are due, which may reduce the Fund’s income and/or reduce, in whole or in part, the value of the Fund’s investment. Actual or perceived changes in the financial condition of an obligor, changes in economic, social or political conditions that affect a particular type of security, instrument, or obligor, and changes in economic, social or political conditions generally can increase the risk of default by an obligor, which can affect a security’s or other instrument’s credit quality or value and an obligor’s ability to honor its obligations when due. The values of lower-quality debt securities (commonly known as “junk bonds”), including floating rate loans, tend to be particularly sensitive to these changes. The values of securities or instruments also may decline for a number of other reasons that relate directly to the obligor, such as management performance, financial leverage, and reduced demand for the obligor’s goods and services, as well as the historical and prospective earnings of the obligor and the value of its assets. |
¡ |
extension risk: the risk that if interest rates rise, repayments of principal on certain debt securities, including, but not limited to, floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, may occur at a slower rate than expected and the expected maturity of those securities could lengthen as a result. Securities that are subject to extension risk generally have a greater potential for loss when prevailing interest rates rise, which could cause their values to fall sharply. |
-24-
¡ |
interest rate risk: the risk that debt instruments will change in value because of changes in interest rates. The value of an instrument with a longer duration (whether positive or negative) will be more sensitive to changes in interest rates than a similar instrument with a shorter duration. Bonds and other debt instruments typically have a positive duration. The value of a debt instrument with positive duration will generally decline if interest rates increase. Certain other investments, such as inverse floaters and certain derivative instruments, may have a negative duration. The value of instruments with a negative duration will generally decline if interest rates decrease. Inverse floaters, interest-only and principal-only securities are especially sensitive to interest rate changes, which can affect not only their prices but can also change the income flows and repayment assumptions about those investments. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. The risks associated with rising interest rates are heightened under current market conditions given that the U.S. Federal Reserve has begun to raise interest rates from historically low levels and may continue to do so. Further, in market environments where interest rates are rising, issuers may be less willing or able to make principal and interest payments on fixed-income investments when due. |
¡ |
prepayment risk: the risk that the issuer of a debt security, including floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, repays all or a portion of the principal prior to the security’s maturity. In times of declining interest rates, there is a greater likelihood that the Fund’s higher yielding securities will be pre-paid with the Fund being unable to reinvest the proceeds in an investment with as great a yield. Prepayments can therefore result in lower yields to shareholders of the Fund. |
¡ |
LIBOR phase out/transition risk: the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) was the offered rate for wholesale, unsecured funding available to major international banks. The terms of many investments, financings or other transactions to which the Fund may be a party have been historically tied to LIBOR. LIBOR has historically been a significant factor in relation to payment obligations under a derivative investment and has also been used in other ways that affect the Fund’s investment performance. In connection with the global transition away from LIBOR led by regulators and market participants, LIBOR is no longer published on a representative basis. The transition from LIBOR and the terms of any replacement rate(s), including, for example, the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (“SOFR”) or another rate based on SOFR, may adversely affect transactions that used LIBOR as a reference rate, financial institutions that engaged in such transactions, and the financial markets generally. There are significant differences between LIBOR and SOFR, such as LIBOR being an unsecured lending rate while SOFR is a secured lending rate. As such, the potential effect of the transition away from LIBOR on the Fund or the financial instruments in which the Fund invests cannot yet be fully determined, but the transition may adversely affect the Fund’s performance. |
• |
defaulted securities risk: the significant risk of the uncertainty of repayment of defaulted securities (e.g., a security on which a principal or interest payment is not made when due) and obligations of distressed issuers (including insolvent issuers or issuers in payment or covenant default, in workout or restructuring or in bankruptcy or similar proceedings). Such investments entail high risk and have speculative characteristics. |
• |
derivatives risk: the risk that an investment in derivatives will not perform as anticipated by the Adviser, may not be available at the time or price desired, cannot be closed out at a favorable time or price, will increase the Fund’s transaction costs, or will increase the Fund’s volatility; that derivatives may create investment leverage; that, when a derivative is used as a substitute for or alternative to a direct cash investment, the transaction may not provide a return that corresponds precisely or at all with that of the cash investment; that the positions may be improperly executed or constructed; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; or that, when used for hedging purposes, derivatives will not provide the anticipated protection, causing the Fund to lose money on both the derivatives transaction and the exposure the Fund sought to hedge. |
Please also see “debt securities risks — LIBOR phase out/transition risk” herein for more information.
• |
emerging market country risk: the risk that investing in emerging markets, as compared to foreign developed markets, increases the likelihood that the Fund will lose money, due to more limited information about the issuer and/or the security; higher brokerage costs; different accounting, auditing and financial reporting standards; less developed legal systems and thinner trading markets; the possibility of currency blockages or transfer restrictions; an emerging market country’s dependence on revenue from particular commodities or international aid; and expropriation, nationalization or other adverse political or economic developments. |
• |
financial services risk: the risk that an investment in issuers in the financial services sector or transactions with one or more counterparties in the financial services sector may be adversely affected by, among other things: (i) changes in governmental regulation, which may limit both the amounts and the types of loans and other financial commitments financial services companies can make, the interest rates and fees they can charge, the scope of their activities, the prices they can charge and |
-25-
the amount of capital they must maintain; (ii) fluctuations, including as a result of interest rate changes or increased competition, in the availability and cost of capital funds on which the profitability of financial services companies is largely dependent; (iii) deterioration of the credit markets; (iv) credit losses resulting from financial difficulties of borrowers, especially when financial services companies are exposed to non-diversified or concentrated loan portfolios; (v) financial losses associated with investment activities, especially when financial services companies are exposed to financial leverage; (vi) the risk that any financial services company experiences substantial declines in the valuations of its assets, takes action to raise capital, or ceases operations; (vii) the risk that a market shock or other unexpected market, economic, political, regulatory, or other event might lead to a sudden decline in the values of most or all companies in the financial services sector; (viii) events leading to limited liquidity, defaults, non-performance or other adverse developments that affect financial institutions or the financial services industry generally, or concerns or rumors about any events of these kinds or other similar risks, leading to market-wide liquidity problems; and (ix) the interconnectedness or interdependence among financial services companies, including the risk that the financial distress or failure of one financial services company may materially and adversely affect a number of other financial services companies. |
• |
foreign currency risk: the risk that fluctuations in exchange rates may adversely affect the value of the Fund’s investments denominated in foreign currencies. |
• |
foreign investing risk: the risk that investments in foreign securities or in issuers with significant exposure to foreign markets, as compared to investments in U.S. securities or in issuers with predominantly domestic market exposure, may be more vulnerable to economic, political, and social instability and subject to less government supervision, less protective custody practices, lack of transparency, inadequate regulatory and accounting standards, delayed or infrequent settlement of transactions, and foreign taxes. If the Fund buys securities denominated in a foreign currency, receives income in foreign currencies, or holds foreign currencies from time to time, the value of the Fund’s assets, as measured in U.S. dollars, can be affected unfavorably by changes in exchange rates relative to the U.S. dollar or other foreign currencies. Foreign markets are also subject to the risk that a foreign government could restrict foreign exchange transactions or otherwise implement unfavorable currency regulations. In addition, foreign securities may be subject to currency exchange rates or regulations, the imposition of economic sanctions, tariffs or other government restrictions, higher transaction and other costs, reduced liquidity, and delays in settlement. |
• |
high yield risk: the risk that debt instruments rated below investment grade or debt instruments that are unrated and of comparable or lesser quality are predominantly speculative. These instruments, commonly known as “junk bonds,” have a higher degree of default risk and may be less liquid than higher-rated bonds. These instruments may be subject to greater price volatility due to such factors as specific corporate developments, interest rate sensitivity, negative perceptions of high yield investments generally, and less secondary market liquidity. |
• |
leveraging risk: the risk that certain investments by the Fund involving leverage may have the effect of increasing the volatility of the value of the Fund’s portfolio, and the risk of loss in excess of invested capital. |
• |
liquidity risk: the risk that the Fund may be unable to sell a portfolio investment at a desirable time or at the value the Fund has placed on the investment. Illiquidity may be the result of, for example, low trading volume, lack of a market maker, or contractual or legal restrictions that limit or prevent the Fund from selling securities or closing derivative positions. During periods of substantial market disruption, a large portion of the Fund’s assets could potentially experience significant levels of illiquidity. The values of illiquid investments are often more volatile than the values of more liquid investments. It may be more difficult for the Fund to determine a fair value of an illiquid investment than that of a more liquid comparable investment. |
• |
market risk: the risk that markets will perform poorly or that the returns from the securities in which the Fund invests will underperform returns from the general securities markets or other types of investments. Markets may, in response to governmental actions or intervention or general market conditions, including real or perceived adverse political, economic or market conditions, tariffs and trade disruptions, inflation, recession, changes in interest or currency rates, lack of liquidity in the bond markets or adverse investor sentiment, or other external factors, experience periods of high volatility and reduced liquidity. During those periods, the Fund may experience high levels of shareholder redemptions, and may have to sell securities at times when the Fund would otherwise not do so, and potentially at unfavorable prices. Certain securities may be difficult to value during such periods. Market risk involves the risk that the value of the Fund’s investment portfolio will change, potentially frequently and in large amounts, as the prices of its investments go up or down. During periods of severe market stress, it is possible that the market for some or all of a Fund’s investments may become highly illiquid. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. Please see “debt securities risks — interest rate risk” herein for more information. |
-26-
• |
operational and information security risks: an investment in the Fund, like any fund, can involve operational risks arising from factors such as processing errors, human errors, inadequate or failed internal or external processes, failures in systems and technology, changes in personnel and errors caused by third-party service providers. The occurrence of any of these failures, errors or breaches could result in investment losses to the Fund, a loss of information, regulatory scrutiny, reputational damage or other events, any of which could have a material adverse effect on the Fund. While the Fund seeks to minimize such events through controls and oversight, there may still be failures that could cause losses to the Fund. |
• |
restricted securities risk: the risk that the Fund may be prevented or limited by law or the terms of an agreement from selling a security (a “restricted security”). To the extent that the Fund is permitted to sell a restricted security, there can be no assurance that a trading market will exist at any particular time, and the Fund may be unable to dispose of the security promptly at reasonable prices or at all. The Fund may have to bear the expense of registering the securities for resale and the risk of substantial delays in effecting the registration. Also, restricted securities may be difficult to value because market quotations may not be readily available, and the values of restricted securities may have significant volatility. |
• |
securities or sector selection risk: the risk that the securities held by the Fund will underperform securities held in other funds investing in similar asset classes or comparable benchmarks because of the portfolio managers’ choice of securities or sectors for investment. To the extent the Fund allocates a higher percentage of its investment portfolio to a particular sector or related sectors, the Fund will be more susceptible to events or factors affecting companies in that sector or related sectors. For example, the values of securities of companies in the same or related sectors may be negatively affected by the common characteristics they share, the common business risks to which they are subject, common regulatory burdens, or regulatory changes that affect them similarly. Such characteristics, risks, burdens or changes include, but are not limited to, changes in governmental regulation, inflation or deflation, rising or falling interest rates, competition from new entrants, and other economic, market, political or other developments specific to that sector or related sectors. |
• |
sovereign debt obligations risk: the risk that investments in debt obligations of sovereign governments may lose value due to the government entity’s unwillingness or inability to repay principal and interest when due in accordance with the terms of the debt or otherwise in a timely manner. Sovereign governments may default on their debt obligations for a number of reasons, including social, political, economic and diplomatic changes in countries issuing sovereign debt. The Fund may have limited (or no) recourse in the event of a default because bankruptcy, moratorium and other similar laws applicable to issuers of sovereign debt obligations may be substantially different from those applicable to private issuers, and any recourse may be subject to the political climate in the relevant country. In addition, foreign governmental entities may enjoy various levels of sovereign immunity, and it may be difficult or impossible to bring a legal action against a foreign governmental entity or to enforce a judgment against such an entity. Holders of certain foreign government debt securities may be requested to participate in the restructuring of such obligations and to extend further loans to their issuers. There can be no assurance that the foreign government debt securities in which the Fund may invest will not be subject to similar restructuring arrangements or to requests for new credit, which may adversely affect the Fund’s holdings. |
• |
structured products and structured notes risk: the risk that an investment in a structured product, which includes, among other things, collateralized debt obligations, mortgage-backed securities, other types of asset-backed securities and certain types of structured notes, may decline in value due to changes in the underlying instruments, indexes, interest rates or other factors on which the product is based (“reference measure”). Depending on the reference measure used and the use of multipliers or deflators (if any), changes in interest rates and movement of the reference measure may cause significant price and cash flow fluctuations. Application of a multiplier is comparable to the use of financial leverage, a speculative technique. Holders of structured products indirectly bear risks associated with the reference measure, are subject to counterparty risk and typically do not have direct rights against the reference measure. Structured products are generally privately offered and sold, and thus, are not registered under the securities laws and may be thinly traded or have a limited trading market and may have the effect of increasing the Fund’s illiquidity, reducing the Fund’s income and the value of the investment. At a particular point in time, the Fund may be unable to find qualified buyers for these securities. Investments in structured notes involve risks including interest rate risk, credit risk and market risk. |
• |
valuation risk: the risk that the Fund will not value its investments in a manner that accurately reflects their market values or that the Fund will not be able to sell any investment at a price equal to the valuation ascribed to that investment for purposes of calculating the Fund’s net asset value (“NAV”). The valuation of the Fund’s investments involves subjective judgment. Certain securities in which the Fund may invest may be more difficult to value accurately, especially during periods of market disruptions or extreme market volatility. Incorrect valuations of the Fund’s portfolio holdings could result in the Fund’s shareholder transactions being effected at an NAV that does not accurately reflect the underlying value of the Fund’s portfolio, resulting in the dilution of shareholder interests. |
Please see “Additional Information About Principal Investment Strategies and Principal Risks — Principal Risks” for a more detailed description of the principal risks of investing in the Fund.
-27-
Performance
The following performance information provides some indication of the risks of investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows the performance of the Fund’s Class I shares for each full calendar year since the Fund’s inception. The table below shows how the average annual total returns of the Fund’s shares for the periods shown compare to those of a broad-based securities market index. The Fund’s past performance (before and after taxes) is not necessarily an indication of how the Fund will perform in the future. Absent any applicable fee waivers and/or expense limitations (which have applied to the Fund since inception), performance would have been lower. Updated information on the Fund’s investment results can be obtained at no charge by calling 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311) or by visiting the Fund’s website at www.doubleline.com.
Class I Shares
During the periods shown above, the highest and lowest quarterly returns earned by the Fund’s Class I shares were:
Highest: | 14.80% | Quarter ended 6/30/2020 | ||
Lowest: | -15.79% | Quarter ended 3/31/2020 |
The year-to-date total return for the Fund’s Class I shares as of June 30, 2023 was 3.49%.
Average Annual Total Returns (for the periods ended December 31, 2022)
Emerging Markets Fixed Income Fund | One Year | Five Years | Ten Years |
Since Inception (April 6, 2010) |
||||||||||||
Class I | ||||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-15.30% | -0.41% | 1.92% | 3.59% | ||||||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions |
-16.87% | -2.14% | -0.05% | 1.58% | ||||||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares |
-9.05% | -0.97% | 0.62% | 1.95% | ||||||||||||
Class N |
| |||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-15.50% | -0.66% | 1.67% | 3.34% | ||||||||||||
J.P. Morgan Emerging Markets Bond Global Diversified Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) | -17.78% | -1.31% | 1.59% | 3.68% |
The Fund’s after-tax returns as shown in the above table are calculated using the historical highest applicable individual federal marginal income tax rates for the period and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Your actual after-tax returns depend on your tax situation and may differ from those shown. If you own shares of the Fund in a tax-advantaged account, such as a 401(k) plan or an individual retirement account, after-tax returns shown are not relevant to your investment. The “Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares” may be higher than other return figures because when a capital loss occurs upon the redemption of shares of the Fund, a tax deduction is provided that may benefit the investor. After-tax returns are for Class I shares only. After-tax returns for other classes may vary. The J.P. Morgan Emerging Markets Bond Global Diversified Index is a uniquely-weighted version of the EMBI Global. It limits the weights of those index countries with larger debt stocks by only including specified portions of these countries’ eligible current face amounts of debt outstanding. The countries covered in the EMBI Global Diversified are identical to those covered by EMBI Global. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.
-28-
Investment Adviser
DoubleLine Capital is the investment adviser to the Fund.
Portfolio Managers
The portfolio managers for the Fund are:
Name |
Experience with the Fund |
Primary Title with the Investment Adviser | ||
Luz M. Padilla | Since the Fund’s inception in April 2010 | Portfolio Manager | ||
Su Fei Koo | Since December 2015 | Portfolio Manager | ||
Mark W. Christensen | Since December 2015 | Portfolio Manager |
Purchase and Sale of Shares
You may purchase or redeem Class I and Class N shares on any business day when the New York Stock Exchange opens for regular trading. You may purchase or redeem shares by written request via mail (DoubleLine Funds, c/o U.S. Bank Global Fund Services, P.O. Box 701, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0701), by wire transfer, by telephone at 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311), or through authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers (“financial intermediaries”). Telephone transactions will be permitted unless you decline this privilege on your initial purchase application. The minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts for different types of accounts are shown below, although the Fund may reduce or waive the minimums in some cases.
Minimum Initial Investment: | Subsequent Investment: |
|||||||||||
Regular Accounts |
IRAs/HSAs | All Accounts and Automatic Investment Plans |
||||||||||
Class I Shares | $ | 100,000 | $ | 5,000 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class N Shares | $ | 2,000 | $ | 500 | $ | 100 |
The minimum investment may be modified for certain financial intermediaries that submit trades on behalf of underlying investors. Certain financial intermediaries also may have their own investment minimums, which may differ from the Fund’s minimums, and may be waived at the intermediaries’ discretion. The Fund reserves the right to change or waive the minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts without prior notice or to waive the minimum investment amounts for certain intermediaries or individual investors in its discretion.
Tax Information
The Fund’s distributions generally are taxable to you as ordinary income or capital gains, unless you are investing through a tax-advantaged arrangement, such as a 401(k) plan or individual retirement account. If you invest through such tax-advantaged arrangements, you may be taxed later upon withdrawal from those arrangements.
Payments to Broker-Dealers and Other Financial Intermediaries
If you purchase shares of the Fund through a broker-dealer or other financial intermediary (such as a bank), the Fund, the Adviser, and the Fund’s distributor or any of their affiliates may pay the financial intermediary for the sale of Fund shares and related services. These payments may create a conflict of interest by influencing the financial intermediary and your salesperson to recommend the Fund over another investment. Ask your individual salesperson or visit your financial intermediary’s website for more information.
-29-
Fund Summary
DoubleLine Low Duration Bond Fund
Investment Objective
The Fund’s investment objective is to seek current income.
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Fund. You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries (defined below), including when purchasing Class I and Class R6 shares through a broker or other financial intermediary acting as an agent on your behalf. Such commissions and other fees, if any, are not charged by the Fund and are not reflected in the fee table or expense example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | Class R6 | |||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of the offering price) | None | None | None | |||
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of the original purchase price) | None | None | None | |||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Reinvested Dividends | None | None | None | |||
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of shares redeemed within 90 days of purchase) | None | None | None | |||
Fee for Redemption by Wire | $15 | $15 | $15 | |||
Exchange Fee | None | None | None | |||
Account Fee | None | None | None |
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | Class R6 | |||||||||
Management Fees | 0.35% | 0.35% | 0.35% | |||||||||
Distribution and/or Service (12b-1) Fees | None | 0.25% | None | |||||||||
Other Expenses (includes sub-transfer agent accounting or administrative services expenses) | 0.08% | 0.07% | 0.04% | |||||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses | 0.43% | 0.67% | 0.39% |
Example
This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds.
This example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all your shares at the end of those periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same. Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions, your costs would be:
Class I | Class N | Class R6 | ||||
1 Year | $44 | $68 | $40 | |||
3 Years | $138 | $214 | $125 | |||
5 Years | $241 | $373 | $219 | |||
10 Years | $542 | $835 | $493 |
-30-
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund incurs transaction costs when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the Fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 72% of the average value of its portfolio.
Principal Investment Strategies
The Fund seeks current income by investing principally in debt securities of any kind. The Fund may invest without limit in mortgage-backed securities of any maturity or type, including those guaranteed by, or secured by collateral that is guaranteed by, the United States Government, its agencies, instrumentalities or sponsored corporations, as well as those of private issuers not subject to any guarantee. Mortgage-backed securities include, among others, government mortgage pass-through securities, collateralized mortgage obligations, multiclass pass-through securities, private mortgage pass-through securities, stripped mortgage securities (e.g., interest-only and principal-only securities) and inverse floaters. The Fund may also invest in corporate debt obligations; asset-backed securities; foreign securities (corporate and government, including foreign hybrid securities); emerging market securities (corporate and government); inflation-indexed bonds; bank loans and assignments; income-producing securitized products, including collateralized loan obligations (“CLOs”); preferred securities; and other instruments bearing fixed or variable interest rates of any maturity.
DoubleLine Capital LP (the “Adviser” or “DoubleLine Capital”) will normally seek to construct an investment portfolio for the Fund with a dollar-weighted average effective duration of three years or less. Duration is a measure of the expected life of a fixed income instrument that is used to determine the sensitivity of a security’s price to changes in interest rates. Effective duration is a measure of the Fund’s portfolio duration adjusted for the anticipated effect of interest rate changes on bond and mortgage prepayment rates as determined by the Adviser. The effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio may vary significantly from time to time, and there is no assurance that the effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio will not exceed three years at any time. The Fund may invest in individual securities of any maturity or duration.
In managing the Fund’s portfolio, the portfolio managers typically use a controlled risk approach. The techniques of this approach attempt to control the principal risk components of the fixed income markets and may include, among other factors, consideration of the Adviser’s view of the following: the potential relative performance of various market sectors, security selection available within a given sector, the risk/reward equation for different asset classes, liquidity conditions in various market sectors, the shape of the yield curve and projections for changes in the yield curve, potential fluctuations in the overall level of interest rates, and current fiscal policy.
Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest primarily in fixed income and other income-producing instruments rated investment grade and unrated securities considered by the Adviser to be of comparable credit quality. The Fund may, however, invest up to 50% of its total assets in fixed income and other income-producing instruments rated below investment grade and those that are unrated but determined by the Adviser to be of comparable credit quality. Those instruments include high yield, high risk bonds, commonly known as “junk bonds.”
The Adviser monitors the duration of the Fund’s portfolio securities to seek to assess and, in its discretion, adjust the Fund’s exposure to interest rate risk. The Adviser may seek to manage the dollar-weighted average effective duration of the Fund’s portfolio through the use of derivatives and other instruments (including, among others, inverse floaters, futures contracts, U.S. Treasury swaps, interest rate swaps, total return swaps and options, including options on swap agreements). The Fund may incur costs in implementing duration management strategies, and there can be no assurance that the Fund will engage in duration management strategies or that any duration management strategy employed by the Fund will be successful.
The Fund may enter into derivatives transactions and other instruments of any kind for hedging purposes or otherwise to gain, or reduce, long or short exposure to one or more asset classes or issuers. For example, the Fund may use futures contracts and options on futures contracts, in order to gain efficient long or short investment exposures as an alternative to cash investments or to hedge against portfolio exposures; interest rate swaps, to gain indirect long or short exposures to interest rates, issuers, or currencies, or to hedge against portfolio exposures; and total return swaps and credit derivatives (such as credit default swaps), put and call options, and exchange-traded and structured notes, to take indirect long or short positions on indexes, securities, currencies, or other indicators of value, or to hedge against portfolio exposures. The Fund may use derivatives transactions with the purpose or effect of creating investment leverage.
Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in bonds. “Bonds” include bonds, debt securities and fixed income and income-producing instruments of any kind issued by governmental or private-sector entities. Most bonds consist of a security or instrument having one or more
-31-
of the following characteristics: a fixed-income security, a security issued at a discount to its face value, a security that pays interest, whether fixed, floating or variable, or a security with a stated principal amount that requires repayment of some or all of that principal amount to the holder of the security. The Adviser interprets the term bond broadly as an instrument or security evidencing what is commonly referred to as an IOU rather than evidencing the corporate ownership of equity unless that equity represents an indirect or derivative interest in one or more debt securities.
The Fund may pursue its investment objective and obtain exposures to some or all of the asset classes described above by investing in other investment companies, including, for example, other open-end or closed-end investment companies and exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”), including investment companies sponsored or managed by the Adviser or its related parties (“other DoubleLine funds”). The amount of the Fund’s investment in certain investment companies may be limited by law or by tax considerations.
Portfolio securities may be sold at any time. By way of example, sales may occur when the Fund’s portfolio managers determine to take advantage of what the portfolio managers consider to be a better investment opportunity, when the portfolio managers believe the portfolio securities no longer represent relatively attractive investment opportunities, when the portfolio managers perceive deterioration in the credit fundamentals of the issuer, or when the individual security has reached the portfolio managers’ sell target.
Principal Risks
The value of the Fund’s shares will vary as its portfolio investments increase or decrease in value. Therefore, the value of your investment in the Fund could go down as well as up. You can lose money by investing in the Fund. The Fund’s principal risks are listed below in alphabetical order, not in order of importance. The significance of any specific risk to an investment in the Fund will vary over time, depending on the composition of the Fund’s portfolio, market conditions, and other factors. You should read all of the risk information presented below carefully, because any one or more of these risks may result in losses to the Fund.
The principal risks affecting the Fund that can cause a decline in value are:
• |
active management risk: the risk that the Fund will fail to meet its investment objective and that the Fund’s investment performance will depend, at least in part, on how its assets are allocated and reallocated among asset classes, sectors, underlying funds and/or investments and that such allocation will focus on asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or investments that perform poorly or underperform other asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or available investments. Any given investment strategy may fail to produce the intended results, and the Fund’s portfolio may underperform other comparable funds because of portfolio management decisions related to, among other things, the selection of investments, portfolio construction, risk assessments, and/or the outlook on market trends and opportunities. |
• |
asset-backed securities investment risk: the risk that borrowers may default on the obligations that underlie the asset-backed security and that, during periods of falling interest rates, asset-backed securities may be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate, and the risk that the impairment of the value of the collateral underlying a security in which the Fund invests (due, for example, to non-payment of loans) will result in a reduction in the value of the security. |
• |
collateralized debt obligations risk: the risks of an investment in a collateralized debt obligation (“CDO”) depend largely on the quality and type of the collateral and the tranche of the CDO in which the Fund invests. Normally, collateralized bond obligations, CLOs and other CDOs are privately offered and sold, and thus are not registered under the securities laws. As a result, investments in CDOs may be illiquid. In addition to the risks associated with debt instruments (e.g., interest rate risk and credit risk), CDOs carry additional risks including, but not limited to: (i) the possibility that distributions from collateral will not be adequate to make interest or other payments; (ii) the quality of the collateral may decline in value or default; (iii) the possibility that the Fund may invest in CDOs that are subordinate to other classes of the issuer’s securities; and (iv) the complex structure of the security may not be fully understood at the time of investment and may produce disputes with the issuer or unexpected investment results. |
• |
counterparty risk: the risk that the Fund will be subject to credit risk with respect to the counterparties to the derivative contracts and other instruments entered into by the Fund; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; that the Fund will be unable to enforce contractual remedies if its counterparty defaults; that if a counterparty (or an affiliate of a counterparty) becomes bankrupt, the Fund may experience significant delays in obtaining any recovery or may obtain limited or no recovery in a bankruptcy or other insolvency proceeding. To the extent that the Fund enters into multiple transactions with a single or a small set of counterparties, it will be subject to increased counterparty risk. |
-32-
• |
debt securities risks: |
¡ |
credit risk: the risk that an issuer, counterparty or other obligor to the Fund will fail to pay its obligations to the Fund when they are due, which may reduce the Fund’s income and/or reduce, in whole or in part, the value of the Fund’s investment. Actual or perceived changes in the financial condition of an obligor, changes in economic, social or political conditions that affect a particular type of security, instrument, or obligor, and changes in economic, social or political conditions generally can increase the risk of default by an obligor, which can affect a security’s or other instrument’s credit quality or value and an obligor’s ability to honor its obligations when due. The values of lower-quality debt securities (commonly known as “junk bonds”), including floating rate loans, tend to be particularly sensitive to these changes. The values of securities or instruments also may decline for a number of other reasons that relate directly to the obligor, such as management performance, financial leverage, and reduced demand for the obligor’s goods and services, as well as the historical and prospective earnings of the obligor and the value of its assets. |
¡ |
extension risk: the risk that if interest rates rise, repayments of principal on certain debt securities, including, but not limited to, floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, may occur at a slower rate than expected and the expected maturity of those securities could lengthen as a result. Securities that are subject to extension risk generally have a greater potential for loss when prevailing interest rates rise, which could cause their values to fall sharply. |
¡ |
interest rate risk: the risk that debt instruments will change in value because of changes in interest rates. The value of an instrument with a longer duration (whether positive or negative) will be more sensitive to changes in interest rates than a similar instrument with a shorter duration. Bonds and other debt instruments typically have a positive duration. The value of a debt instrument with positive duration will generally decline if interest rates increase. Certain other investments, such as inverse floaters and certain derivative instruments, may have a negative duration. The value of instruments with a negative duration will generally decline if interest rates decrease. Inverse floaters, interest-only and principal-only securities are especially sensitive to interest rate changes, which can affect not only their prices but can also change the income flows and repayment assumptions about those investments. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. The risks associated with rising interest rates are heightened under current market conditions given that the U.S. Federal Reserve has begun to raise interest rates from historically low levels and may continue to do so. Further, in market environments where interest rates are rising, issuers may be less willing or able to make principal and interest payments on fixed-income investments when due. |
¡ |
prepayment risk: the risk that the issuer of a debt security, including floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, repays all or a portion of the principal prior to the security’s maturity. In times of declining interest rates, there is a greater likelihood that the Fund’s higher yielding securities will be pre-paid with the Fund being unable to reinvest the proceeds in an investment with as great a yield. Prepayments can therefore result in lower yields to shareholders of the Fund. |
¡ |
LIBOR phase out/transition risk: the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) was the offered rate for wholesale, unsecured funding available to major international banks. The terms of many investments, financings or other transactions to which the Fund may be a party have been historically tied to LIBOR. LIBOR has historically been a significant factor in relation to payment obligations under a derivative investment and has also been used in other ways that affect the Fund’s investment performance. In connection with the global transition away from LIBOR led by regulators and market participants, LIBOR is no longer published on a representative basis. The transition from LIBOR and the terms of any replacement rate(s), including, for example, the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (“SOFR”) or another rate based on SOFR, may adversely affect transactions that used LIBOR as a reference rate, financial institutions that engaged in such transactions, and the financial markets generally. There are significant differences between LIBOR and SOFR, such as LIBOR being an unsecured lending rate while SOFR is a secured lending rate. As such, the potential effect of the transition away from LIBOR on the Fund or the financial instruments in which the Fund invests cannot yet be fully determined, but the transition may adversely affect the Fund’s performance. |
• |
defaulted securities risk: the significant risk of the uncertainty of repayment of defaulted securities (e.g., a security on which a principal or interest payment is not made when due) and obligations of distressed issuers (including insolvent issuers or issuers in payment or covenant default, in workout or restructuring or in bankruptcy or similar proceedings). Such investments entail high risk and have speculative characteristics. |
-33-
• |
derivatives risk: the risk that an investment in derivatives will not perform as anticipated by the Adviser, may not be available at the time or price desired, cannot be closed out at a favorable time or price, will increase the Fund’s transaction costs, or will increase the Fund’s volatility; that derivatives may create investment leverage; that, when a derivative is used as a substitute for or alternative to a direct cash investment, the transaction may not provide a return that corresponds precisely or at all with that of the cash investment; that the positions may be improperly executed or constructed; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; or that, when used for hedging purposes, derivatives will not provide the anticipated protection, causing the Fund to lose money on both the derivatives transaction and the exposure the Fund sought to hedge. |
Please also see “debt securities risks — LIBOR phase out/transition risk” herein for more information.
• |
emerging market country risk: the risk that investing in emerging markets, as compared to foreign developed markets, increases the likelihood that the Fund will lose money, due to more limited information about the issuer and/or the security; higher brokerage costs; different accounting, auditing and financial reporting standards; less developed legal systems and thinner trading markets; the possibility of currency blockages or transfer restrictions; an emerging market country’s dependence on revenue from particular commodities or international aid; and expropriation, nationalization or other adverse political or economic developments. |
• |
financial services risk: the risk that an investment in issuers in the financial services sector or transactions with one or more counterparties in the financial services sector may be adversely affected by, among other things: (i) changes in governmental regulation, which may limit both the amounts and the types of loans and other financial commitments financial services companies can make, the interest rates and fees they can charge, the scope of their activities, the prices they can charge and the amount of capital they must maintain; (ii) fluctuations, including as a result of interest rate changes or increased competition, in the availability and cost of capital funds on which the profitability of financial services companies is largely dependent; (iii) deterioration of the credit markets; (iv) credit losses resulting from financial difficulties of borrowers, especially when financial services companies are exposed to non-diversified or concentrated loan portfolios; (v) financial losses associated with investment activities, especially when financial services companies are exposed to financial leverage; (vi) the risk that any financial services company experiences substantial declines in the valuations of its assets, takes action to raise capital, or ceases operations; (vii) the risk that a market shock or other unexpected market, economic, political, regulatory, or other event might lead to a sudden decline in the values of most or all companies in the financial services sector; (viii) events leading to limited liquidity, defaults, non-performance or other adverse developments that affect financial institutions or the financial services industry generally, or concerns or rumors about any events of these kinds or other similar risks, leading to market-wide liquidity problems; and (ix) the interconnectedness or interdependence among financial services companies, including the risk that the financial distress or failure of one financial services company may materially and adversely affect a number of other financial services companies. |
• |
foreign currency risk: the risk that fluctuations in exchange rates may adversely affect the value of the Fund’s investments denominated in foreign currencies. |
• |
foreign investing risk: the risk that investments in foreign securities or in issuers with significant exposure to foreign markets, as compared to investments in U.S. securities or in issuers with predominantly domestic market exposure, may be more vulnerable to economic, political, and social instability and subject to less government supervision, less protective custody practices, lack of transparency, inadequate regulatory and accounting standards, delayed or infrequent settlement of transactions, and foreign taxes. If the Fund buys securities denominated in a foreign currency, receives income in foreign currencies, or holds foreign currencies from time to time, the value of the Fund’s assets, as measured in U.S. dollars, can be affected unfavorably by changes in exchange rates relative to the U.S. dollar or other foreign currencies. Foreign markets are also subject to the risk that a foreign government could restrict foreign exchange transactions or otherwise implement unfavorable currency regulations. In addition, foreign securities may be subject to currency exchange rates or regulations, the imposition of economic sanctions, tariffs or other government restrictions, higher transaction and other costs, reduced liquidity, and delays in settlement. |
• |
high yield risk: the risk that debt instruments rated below investment grade or debt instruments that are unrated and of comparable or lesser quality are predominantly speculative. These instruments, commonly known as “junk bonds,” have a higher degree of default risk and may be less liquid than higher-rated bonds. These instruments may be subject to greater price volatility due to such factors as specific corporate developments, interest rate sensitivity, negative perceptions of high yield investments generally, and less secondary market liquidity. |
• |
inflation-indexed bond risk: the risk that such bonds will change in value in response to actual or anticipated changes in inflation rates in a manner unanticipated by the Fund’s portfolio management team or investors generally. Inflation-indexed bonds are subject to debt securities risks. |
-34-
• |
investment company and exchange-traded fund risk: the risk that an investment company or other pooled investment vehicle, including any ETFs or money market funds, in which the Fund invests will not achieve its investment objective or execute its investment strategies effectively or that significant purchase or redemption activity by shareholders of such an investment company might negatively affect the value of its shares. The Fund must pay its pro rata portion of an investment company’s fees and expenses. To the extent the Adviser determines to invest Fund assets in other investment companies, the Adviser will have an incentive to invest in other DoubleLine funds over investment companies sponsored or managed by others and to maintain such investments once made due to its own financial interest in those products and other business considerations. |
• |
leveraging risk: the risk that certain investments by the Fund involving leverage may have the effect of increasing the volatility of the value of the Fund’s portfolio, and the risk of loss in excess of invested capital. |
• |
liquidity risk: the risk that the Fund may be unable to sell a portfolio investment at a desirable time or at the value the Fund has placed on the investment. Illiquidity may be the result of, for example, low trading volume, lack of a market maker, or contractual or legal restrictions that limit or prevent the Fund from selling securities or closing derivative positions. During periods of substantial market disruption, a large portion of the Fund’s assets could potentially experience significant levels of illiquidity. The values of illiquid investments are often more volatile than the values of more liquid investments. It may be more difficult for the Fund to determine a fair value of an illiquid investment than that of a more liquid comparable investment. |
• |
loan risk: the risk that (i) if the Fund holds a loan through another financial intermediary, or relies on a financial intermediary to administer the loan, its receipt of principal and interest on the loan may be subject to the credit risk of that financial intermediary; (ii) any collateral securing a loan may be insufficient or unavailable to the Fund, because, for example, the value of the collateral securing a loan can decline, be insufficient to meet the obligations of the borrower, or be difficult to liquidate, and the Fund’s rights to collateral may be limited by bankruptcy or insolvency laws; (iii) investments in highly leveraged loans or loans of stressed, distressed, or defaulted issuers may be subject to significant credit and liquidity risk; (iv) a bankruptcy or other court proceeding could delay or limit the ability of the Fund to collect the principal and interest payments on that borrower’s loans or adversely affect the Fund’s rights in collateral relating to a loan; (v) there may be limited public information available regarding the loan and the relevant borrower(s); (vi) the use of a particular interest rate benchmark may limit the Fund’s ability to achieve a net return to shareholders that consistently approximates the average published Prime Rate of U.S. banks; (vii) the prices of certain floating rate loans that include a feature that prevents their interest rates from adjusting if market interest rates are below a specified minimum level may appreciate less than other instruments in response to changes in interest rates should interest rates rise but remain below the applicable minimum level; (viii) if a borrower fails to comply with various restrictive covenants that may be found in loan agreements, the borrower may default in payment of the loan; (ix) if the Fund invests in loans that contain fewer or less restrictive constraints on the borrower than certain other types of loans (“covenant-lite” loans), it may have fewer rights against the borrowers of such loans, including fewer protections against the possibility of default and fewer remedies in the event of default; (x) the loan is unsecured; (xi) there is a limited secondary market; (xii) transactions in loans may settle on a delayed basis, and the Fund may not receive the proceeds from the sale of a loan for a substantial period of time after the sale, which may result in sale proceeds related to the sale of loans not being available to make additional investments or to meet the Fund’s redemption obligations until potentially a substantial period after the sale of the loans; and (xiii) loans may be difficult to value and may be illiquid, which may adversely affect an investment in the Fund. The Fund may invest in loans directly or indirectly by investing in shares of the DoubleLine Floating Rate Fund and in either case will be subject to the risks described above. |
• |
market risk: the risk that markets will perform poorly or that the returns from the securities in which the Fund invests will underperform returns from the general securities markets or other types of investments. Markets may, in response to governmental actions or intervention or general market conditions, including real or perceived adverse political, economic or market conditions, tariffs and trade disruptions, inflation, recession, changes in interest or currency rates, lack of liquidity in the bond markets or adverse investor sentiment, or other external factors, experience periods of high volatility and reduced liquidity. During those periods, the Fund may experience high levels of shareholder redemptions, and may have to sell securities at times when the Fund would otherwise not do so, and potentially at unfavorable prices. Certain securities may be difficult to value during such periods. Market risk involves the risk that the value of the Fund’s investment portfolio will change, potentially frequently and in large amounts, as the prices of its investments go up or down. During periods of severe market stress, it is possible that the market for some or all of a Fund’s investments may become highly illiquid. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. Please see “debt securities risks — interest rate risk” herein for more information. |
-35-
• |
mortgage-backed securities risk: the risk that borrowers may default on their mortgage obligations or the guarantees underlying the mortgage-backed securities will default or otherwise fail and that, during periods of falling interest rates, mortgage-backed securities will be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate. During periods of rising interest rates, the average life of a mortgage-backed security may extend, which may lock in a below-market interest rate, increase the security’s duration, and reduce the value of the security. Enforcing rights against the underlying assets or collateral may be difficult, or the underlying assets or collateral may be insufficient if the issuer defaults. The values of certain types of mortgage-backed securities, such as inverse floaters and interest-only and principal-only securities, may be extremely sensitive to changes in interest rates and prepayment rates. The Fund may invest in mortgage-backed securities that are subordinate in their right to receive payment of interest and repayment of principal to other classes of the issuer’s securities. |
• |
operational and information security risks: an investment in the Fund, like any fund, can involve operational risks arising from factors such as processing errors, human errors, inadequate or failed internal or external processes, failures in systems and technology, changes in personnel and errors caused by third-party service providers. The occurrence of any of these failures, errors or breaches could result in investment losses to the Fund, a loss of information, regulatory scrutiny, reputational damage or other events, any of which could have a material adverse effect on the Fund. While the Fund seeks to minimize such events through controls and oversight, there may still be failures that could cause losses to the Fund. |
• |
real estate sector risk: the risk that real estate-related investments may decline in value as a result of factors affecting the real estate sector, such as the supply of real property in certain markets, changes in zoning laws, delays in completion of construction, changes in real estate values, changes in property taxes, levels of occupancy, and local, regional, and general market conditions. Along with the risks common to different types of real estate-related investments, real estate investment trusts (“REITs”), no matter the type, involve additional risk factors, including poor performance by the REIT’s manager, adverse changes to the tax laws, and the possible failure by the REIT to qualify for the favorable tax treatment available to REITs under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, or the exemption from registration under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended. REITs are not diversified and are heavily dependent on cash flow earned on the property interests they hold. |
• |
restricted securities risk: the risk that the Fund may be prevented or limited by law or the terms of an agreement from selling a security (a “restricted security”). To the extent that the Fund is permitted to sell a restricted security, there can be no assurance that a trading market will exist at any particular time, and the Fund may be unable to dispose of the security promptly at reasonable prices or at all. The Fund may have to bear the expense of registering the securities for resale and the risk of substantial delays in effecting the registration. Also, restricted securities may be difficult to value because market quotations may not be readily available, and the values of restricted securities may have significant volatility. |
• |
securities or sector selection risk: the risk that the securities held by the Fund will underperform securities held in other funds investing in similar asset classes or comparable benchmarks because of the portfolio managers’ choice of securities or sectors for investment. To the extent the Fund allocates a higher percentage of its investment portfolio to a particular sector or related sectors, the Fund will be more susceptible to events or factors affecting companies in that sector or related sectors. For example, the values of securities of companies in the same or related sectors may be negatively affected by the common characteristics they share, the common business risks to which they are subject, common regulatory burdens, or regulatory changes that affect them similarly. Such characteristics, risks, burdens or changes include, but are not limited to, changes in governmental regulation, inflation or deflation, rising or falling interest rates, competition from new entrants, and other economic, market, political or other developments specific to that sector or related sectors. |
• |
structured products and structured notes risk: the risk that an investment in a structured product, which includes, among other things, CDOs, mortgage-backed securities, other types of asset-backed securities and certain types of structured notes, may decline in value due to changes in the underlying instruments, indexes, interest rates or other factors on which the product is based (“reference measure”). Depending on the reference measure used and the use of multipliers or deflators (if any), changes in interest rates and movement of the reference measure may cause significant price and cash flow fluctuations. Application of a multiplier is comparable to the use of financial leverage, a speculative technique. Holders of structured products indirectly bear risks associated with the reference measure, are subject to counterparty risk and typically do not have direct rights against the reference measure. Structured products are generally privately offered and sold, and thus, are not registered under the securities laws and may be thinly traded or have a limited trading market and may have the effect of increasing the Fund’s illiquidity, reducing the Fund’s income and the value of the investment. At a particular point in time, the Fund may be unable to find qualified buyers for these securities. Investments in structured notes involve risks including interest rate risk, credit risk and market risk. |
-36-
• |
U.S. Government securities risk: the risk that debt securities issued or guaranteed by certain U.S. Government agencies, instrumentalities, and sponsored enterprises are not supported by the full faith and credit of the U.S. Government, and so investments in their securities or obligations issued by them involve credit risk greater than investments in other types of U.S. Government securities. |
• |
valuation risk: the risk that the Fund will not value its investments in a manner that accurately reflects their market values or that the Fund will not be able to sell any investment at a price equal to the valuation ascribed to that investment for purposes of calculating the Fund’s net asset value (“NAV”). The valuation of the Fund’s investments involves subjective judgment. Certain securities in which the Fund may invest may be more difficult to value accurately, especially during periods of market disruptions or extreme market volatility. Incorrect valuations of the Fund’s portfolio holdings could result in the Fund’s shareholder transactions being effected at an NAV that does not accurately reflect the underlying value of the Fund’s portfolio, resulting in the dilution of shareholder interests. |
Please see “Additional Information About Principal Investment Strategies and Principal Risks — Principal Risks” for a more detailed description of the principal risks of investing in the Fund.
Performance
The following performance information provides some indication of the risks of investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows the performance of the Fund’s Class I shares for each full calendar year since the Fund’s inception. The table below shows how the average annual total returns of the Fund’s shares for the periods shown compare to those of two broad-based securities market indexes. The Fund’s past performance (before and after taxes) is not necessarily an indication of how the Fund will perform in the future. Absent any applicable fee waivers and/or expense limitations (which have applied to the Fund since inception), performance would have been lower. Updated information on the Fund’s investment results can be obtained at no charge by calling 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311) or by visiting the Fund’s website at www.doubleline.com.
Class I Shares
During the periods shown above, the highest and lowest quarterly returns earned by the Fund’s Class I shares were:
Highest: | 4.33% | Quarter ended 6/30/2020 | ||
Lowest: | -4.40% | Quarter ended 3/31/2020 |
The year-to-date total return for the Fund’s Class I shares as of June 30, 2023 was 2.58%.
-37-
Average Annual Total Returns (for the periods ended December 31, 2022)
Low Duration Bond Fund | One Year | Five Years | Ten Years |
Since Inception (September 30, 2011) |
||||||||||||
Class I | ||||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-2.69% | 1.20% | 1.56% | 1.81% | ||||||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions |
-3.66% | 0.16% | 0.55% | 0.82% | ||||||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares |
-1.59% | 0.48% | 0.75% | 0.96% | ||||||||||||
Class N | ||||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-3.04% | 0.95% | 1.31% | 1.55% | ||||||||||||
Class R61 | ||||||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-2.76% | 1.22% | 1.57% | 1.82% | ||||||||||||
ICE BofA 1-3 Year U.S. Treasury Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) |
-3.65% | 0.77% | 0.67% | 0.65% | ||||||||||||
Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate 1-3 Year Bond Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) | -3.72% | 0.86% | 0.86% | 0.91% |
1 |
Class R6 shares were not available for purchase until July 31, 2019. The performance shown for Class R6 shares prior to that date is that of the Class I shares of the Fund, another class of the Fund that is invested in the same portfolio of securities as Class R6 shares. Annual returns of Class R6 shares would have differed from that shown for the period prior to July 31, 2019 only to the extent that Class R6 shares and Class I shares have different expenses. |
The Fund’s after-tax returns as shown in the above table are calculated using the historical highest applicable individual federal marginal income tax rates for the period and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Your actual after-tax returns depend on your tax situation and may differ from those shown. If you own shares of the Fund in a tax-advantaged account, such as a 401(k) plan or an individual retirement account, after-tax returns shown are not relevant to your investment. The “Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares” may be higher than other return figures because when a capital loss occurs upon the redemption of shares of the Fund, a tax deduction is provided that may benefit the investor. After-tax returns are for Class I shares only. After-tax returns for other classes may vary. The ICE BofA 1-3 Year U.S. Treasury Index is an unmanaged index that tracks the performance of the direct sovereign debt of the U.S. Government having a maturity of at least one year and less than three years. Beginning in July 2022, transaction costs were incorporated into the calculation of total return for ICE fixed income indices. The Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate 1-3 Year Bond Index is an unmanaged index that tracks the performance of investment grade, dollar denominated, fixed rate, taxable bonds having a maturity of at least one year and less than three years. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.
Investment Adviser
DoubleLine Capital is the investment adviser to the Fund.
Portfolio Managers
The portfolio managers for the Fund are:
Name |
Experience with the Fund |
Primary Title with the Investment Adviser | ||
Luz M. Padilla | Since the Fund’s inception in September 2011 | Portfolio Manager | ||
Robert Cohen | Since September 2016 | Director of Global Developed Credit | ||
Jeffrey E. Gundlach | Since July 2019 | Chief Executive Officer | ||
Jeffrey J. Sherman | Since July 2019 | Deputy Chief Investment Officer |
-38-
Purchase and Sale of Shares
You may purchase or redeem Class I, Class N and Class R6 shares on any business day when the New York Stock Exchange opens for regular trading. You may purchase or redeem shares by written request via mail (DoubleLine Funds, c/o U.S. Bank Global Fund Services, P.O. Box 701, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0701), by wire transfer, by telephone at 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311), or through authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers (“financial intermediaries”). Telephone transactions will be permitted unless you decline this privilege on your initial purchase application. The minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts for different types of accounts are shown below, although the Fund may reduce or waive the minimums in some cases.
Minimum Initial Investment: | Subsequent Investment: |
|||||||||||
Regular Accounts |
IRAs/HSAs | All Accounts and Automatic Investment Plans |
||||||||||
Class I Shares | $ | 100,000 | $ | 5,000 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class N Shares | $ | 2,000 | $ | 500 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class R6 Shares | None | * | N/A | N/A |
* |
See eligibility limitations below. |
The minimum investment may be modified for certain financial intermediaries that submit trades on behalf of underlying investors. Certain financial intermediaries also may have their own investment minimums, which may differ from the Fund’s minimums, and may be waived at the intermediaries’ discretion. The Fund reserves the right to change or waive the minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts without prior notice or to waive the minimum investment amounts for certain intermediaries or individual investors in its discretion.
Eligibility for Class R6 Shares. Only authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers who have an agreement with the Fund’s distributor to make Class R6 shares available to their clients who are Class R6 eligible plans or other eligible investors are authorized to accept, on behalf of the Fund, purchase and exchange orders and redemption requests for Class R6 shares placed by or on behalf of Class R6 eligible plans or other eligible investors. In addition, Class R6 shares may also be purchased directly from the Fund’s transfer agent by a Class R6 eligible plan if such shares are held in an omnibus account opened in the plan’s name directly with the Fund’s transfer agent.
Tax Information
The Fund’s distributions generally are taxable to you as ordinary income or capital gains, unless you are investing through a tax-advantaged arrangement, such as a 401(k) plan or individual retirement account. If you invest through such tax-advantaged arrangements, you may be taxed later upon withdrawal from those arrangements.
Payments to Broker-Dealers and Other Financial Intermediaries
If you purchase shares of the Fund through a broker-dealer or other financial intermediary (such as a bank), the Fund, the Adviser, and the Fund’s distributor or any of their affiliates may pay the financial intermediary for the sale of Fund shares and related services. These payments may create a conflict of interest by influencing the financial intermediary and your salesperson to recommend the Fund over another investment. Ask your individual salesperson or visit your financial intermediary’s website for more information.
-39-
Fund Summary
Investment Objective
The Fund’s investment objective is to seek a high level of current income.
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Fund. You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries (defined below), including when purchasing Class I shares through a broker or other financial intermediary acting as an agent on your behalf. Such commissions and other fees, if any, are not charged by the Fund and are not reflected in the fee table or expense example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of the offering price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of the original purchase price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Reinvested Dividends | None | None | ||
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of amount redeemed on shares held for 90 days or less) | 1.00% | 1.00% | ||
Fee for Redemption by Wire | $15 | $15 | ||
Exchange Fee | None | None | ||
Account Fee | None | None |
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||||||
Management Fees | 0.50% | 0.50% | ||||||
Distribution and/or Service (12b-1) Fees | None | 0.25% | ||||||
Other Expenses (includes sub-transfer agent accounting or administrative services expenses) | 0.18% | 0.17% | ||||||
Acquired Fund Fees and Expenses1 | 0.01% | 0.01% | ||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses | 0.69% | 0.93% |
1 |
“Acquired Fund Fees and Expenses” are expenses indirectly incurred by the Fund as a result of its investments in one or more underlying funds, including exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”) and money market funds. Because these costs are indirect, the Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses in this fee table will not correlate to the expense ratio in the Fund’s financial statements, since financial statements only include direct costs of the Fund and not the indirect costs of investing in the underlying funds. |
Example
This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds.
This example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all your shares at the end of those periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same. Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions, your costs would be:
Class I | Class N | |||
1 Year | $70 | $95 | ||
3 Years | $221 | $296 | ||
5 Years | $384 | $515 | ||
10 Years | $859 | $1,143 |
-40-
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund incurs transaction costs when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the Fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 17% of the average value of its portfolio.
Principal Investment Strategies
The Fund invests primarily in floating rate loans and other floating rate investments.
Floating rate loans are typically debt obligations with interest rates that adjust or “float” periodically, often on a daily, monthly, quarterly, or semiannual basis by reference to a base lending rate plus a premium. Certain floating rate loans are secured by specific collateral of the borrower and are senior to most other securities of the borrower (e.g., common stock and other debt instruments) in the event of bankruptcy. Other floating rate loans may be unsecured obligations of the borrower. A floating rate loan may be structured and administered by a financial institution that acts as the agent of the lenders participating in the floating rate loan. Such floating rate loans may be acquired through the agent or from the borrower, as an assignment from another lender who holds a direct interest in the floating rate loan, or as a participation interest in another lender’s portion of the floating rate loan.
Floating rate investments include, without limitation, bank loans, including assignments and participations; floating rate debt securities; inflation-indexed securities; certain mortgage- and asset-backed securities, and collateralized debt obligations (“CDOs”), including collateralized loan obligations (“CLOs”) and collateralized mortgage obligations, backed by floating rate instruments or structured as floating rate investments and having, in the judgment of DoubleLine Capital LP (the “Adviser” or “DoubleLine Capital”), characteristics similar to those of other floating rate investments; adjustable rate mortgages; floaters; inverse floaters; money market securities of all types; repurchase agreements; shares of money market and short-term bond funds; and floating rate loans of any kind (including, among others, subordinated loans, debtor-in-possession loans, exit facilities, delayed funding loans and revolving credit facilities).
The Fund normally will invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in floating rate loans and other floating rate investments. For purposes of this policy, any security or instrument will be considered a floating rate investment if it has a maturity of six months or less even if it pays a rate of interest rate that does not reset or adjust prior to maturity. The Fund’s investments in derivatives and other synthetic instruments that provide exposure comparable, in the judgment of the Adviser, to floating rate investments will be counted toward satisfaction of this 80% policy as well.
The Fund may invest in securities or instruments of any credit quality. The Fund expects that many or all of the Fund’s investments will be rated below investment grade or unrated but of comparable credit quality. Corporate bonds and other fixed income instruments, including certain floating rate investments, rated below investment grade, or such instruments that are unrated and determined by the Adviser to be of comparable quality, are high yield, high risk securities, commonly known as “junk bonds.” The Fund may invest in securities of stressed, distressed, and defaulted issuers (including issuers involved in bankruptcy proceedings, reorganizations, financial restructurings, or otherwise experiencing financial hardship). Such investments entail high risk and have speculative characteristics.
Subject to the Fund’s policy to invest at least 80% of its net assets in floating rate loans and other floating rate investments, the Fund may invest any portion of its assets in bonds, debentures, notes and other debt instruments, preferred securities, money market securities, investment-grade debt securities, repurchase agreements, and any security or instrument bearing a fixed, floating or adjustable rate of interest, including by investing in other investment companies, ETFs, and domestic or foreign private investment vehicles, including investment companies sponsored or managed by the Adviser or its related parties. The amount of the Fund’s investment in certain investment companies may be limited by law or by tax considerations.
The Fund may invest in obligations of corporate and governmental issuers of any maturity. The Fund may invest in foreign investments, including obligations of issuers in emerging markets, without limit.
The Fund’s investments in loans may include loans issued in an offering that has been oversubscribed. The Fund may be able to sell such investments at a gain shortly after those investments are made. If the Fund seeks to take advantage of such opportunities, it may lead to higher levels of portfolio turnover, increased transaction costs and greater amounts of taxable distributions to shareholders. There can be no assurance that the Adviser will be able to identify such opportunities successfully or sell any investments at a gain.
-41-
The Adviser monitors the duration of the Fund’s portfolio securities to seek to assess and, in its discretion, adjust the Fund’s exposure to interest rate risk. The Fund may enter into derivatives transactions and other instruments of any kind for duration management purposes, hedging purposes or otherwise to gain, or reduce, long or short exposure to one or more asset classes or issuers. The Fund also may use derivatives transactions with the purpose or effect of creating investment leverage.
The Fund’s portfolio managers may consider a wide variety of factors in purchasing and selling investments for the Fund, including, without limitation, liquidity of the investment, fundamental analysis of the issuer, the credit quality of the issuer and any collateral securing the investment, the issuer’s management, capital structure, leverage, and operational performance, and the business outlook for the industry of the issuer. The Fund also may consider available credit ratings. Although the Fund’s portfolio managers may review credit ratings in making investment decisions, they typically perform their own investment analysis and generally do not rely upon the independent credit rating agencies in making investment decisions.
Proceeds from the sale of a loan may not be available to the Fund for a substantial period of time after the sale. As a result, it is possible that, during a period of substantial shareholder redemptions, proceeds from sales of loans by the Fund will not be available to the Fund on a timely basis for payment to redeeming shareholders. The Fund might as a result incur significant borrowing or other expenses, be forced to sell other securities with shorter settlement periods at unfavorable times or prices, or be forced to delay payment of redemption proceeds beyond the customary period.
Portfolio securities may be sold at any time. By way of example, the Fund’s portfolio managers may sell a Fund investment in order to take advantage of what the portfolio managers consider to be a better investment opportunity, when the portfolio managers believe the investment no longer represents a relatively attractive investment opportunity, when the portfolio managers perceive deterioration in the credit fundamentals of the issuer, or when the individual investment has reached the portfolio managers’ sell target.
Principal Risks
The value of the Fund’s shares will vary as its portfolio investments increase or decrease in value. Therefore, the value of your investment in the Fund could go down as well as up. You can lose money by investing in the Fund. The Fund’s principal risks are listed below in alphabetical order, not in order of importance. The significance of any specific risk to an investment in the Fund will vary over time, depending on the composition of the Fund’s portfolio, market conditions, and other factors. You should read all of the risk information presented below carefully, because any one or more of these risks may result in losses to the Fund.
The principal risks affecting the Fund that can cause a decline in value are:
• |
active management risk: the risk that the Fund will fail to meet its investment objective and that the Fund’s investment performance will depend, at least in part, on how its assets are allocated and reallocated among asset classes, sectors, underlying funds and/or investments and that such allocation will focus on asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or investments that perform poorly or underperform other asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or available investments. Any given investment strategy may fail to produce the intended results, and the Fund’s portfolio may underperform other comparable funds because of portfolio management decisions related to, among other things, the selection of investments, portfolio construction, risk assessments, and/or the outlook on market trends and opportunities. |
• |
asset-backed securities investment risk: the risk that borrowers may default on the obligations that underlie the asset-backed security and that, during periods of falling interest rates, asset-backed securities may be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate, and the risk that the impairment of the value of the collateral underlying a security in which the Fund invests (due, for example, to non-payment of loans) will result in a reduction in the value of the security. |
• |
collateralized debt obligations risk: the risks of an investment in a CDO depend largely on the quality and type of the collateral and the tranche of the CDO in which the Fund invests. Normally, collateralized bond obligations, CLOs and other CDOs are privately offered and sold, and thus are not registered under the securities laws. As a result, investments in CDOs may be illiquid. In addition to the risks associated with debt instruments (e.g., interest rate risk and credit risk), CDOs carry additional risks including, but not limited to: (i) the possibility that distributions from collateral will not be adequate to make interest or other payments; (ii) the quality of the collateral may decline in value or default; (iii) the possibility that the Fund may invest in CDOs that are subordinate to other classes of the issuer’s securities; and (iv) the complex structure of the security may not be fully understood at the time of investment and may produce disputes with the issuer or unexpected investment results. |
-42-
• |
confidential information access risk: the risk that the intentional or unintentional receipt of material, non-public information (“Confidential Information”) by the Adviser could limit the Fund’s ability to sell certain investments held by the Fund or pursue certain investment opportunities on behalf of the Fund, potentially for a substantial period of time. Also, certain issuers of floating rate loans or other investments may not have any publicly traded securities (“Private Issuers”) and may offer private information pursuant to confidentiality agreements or similar arrangements. The Adviser may access such private information, while recognizing that the receipt of that information could potentially limit the Fund’s ability to trade in certain securities, including if the Private Issuer later issues publicly traded securities. In addition, in circumstances when the Adviser declines to receive Confidential Information from issuers of floating rate loans or other investments, the Fund may be disadvantaged in comparison to other investors, including with respect to evaluating the issuer and the price the Fund would pay or receive when it buys or sells those investments, and the Fund may not take advantage of investment opportunities that it otherwise might have if it had received such Confidential Information. In managing the Fund, the Adviser may seek to avoid the receipt of Confidential Information about the issuers of floating rate loans or other investments being considered for acquisition by the Fund or held in the Fund’s portfolio if the receipt of the Confidential Information would restrict one or more of the Adviser’s clients, including, potentially, the Fund, from trading in securities they hold or in which they may invest. |
• |
counterparty risk: the risk that the Fund will be subject to credit risk with respect to the counterparties to the derivative contracts and other instruments entered into by the Fund; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; that the Fund will be unable to enforce contractual remedies if its counterparty defaults; that if a counterparty (or an affiliate of a counterparty) becomes bankrupt, the Fund may experience significant delays in obtaining any recovery or may obtain limited or no recovery in a bankruptcy or other insolvency proceeding. To the extent that the Fund enters into multiple transactions with a single or a small set of counterparties, it will be subject to increased counterparty risk. |
• |
debt securities risks: |
¡ |
credit risk: the risk that an issuer, counterparty or other obligor to the Fund will fail to pay its obligations to the Fund when they are due, which may reduce the Fund’s income and/or reduce, in whole or in part, the value of the Fund’s investment. Actual or perceived changes in the financial condition of an obligor, changes in economic, social or political conditions that affect a particular type of security, instrument, or obligor, and changes in economic, social or political conditions generally can increase the risk of default by an obligor, which can affect a security’s or other instrument’s credit quality or value and an obligor’s ability to honor its obligations when due. The values of lower-quality debt securities (commonly known as “junk bonds”), including floating rate loans, tend to be particularly sensitive to these changes. The values of securities or instruments also may decline for a number of other reasons that relate directly to the obligor, such as management performance, financial leverage, and reduced demand for the obligor’s goods and services, as well as the historical and prospective earnings of the obligor and the value of its assets. |
¡ |
extension risk: the risk that if interest rates rise, repayments of principal on certain debt securities, including, but not limited to, floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, may occur at a slower rate than expected and the expected maturity of those securities could lengthen as a result. Securities that are subject to extension risk generally have a greater potential for loss when prevailing interest rates rise, which could cause their values to fall sharply. |
¡ |
interest rate risk: the risk that debt instruments will change in value because of changes in interest rates. The value of an instrument with a longer duration (whether positive or negative) will be more sensitive to changes in interest rates than a similar instrument with a shorter duration. Bonds and other debt instruments typically have a positive duration. The value of a debt instrument with positive duration will generally decline if interest rates increase. Certain other investments, such as inverse floaters and certain derivative instruments, may have a negative duration. The value of instruments with a negative duration will generally decline if interest rates decrease. Inverse floaters, interest-only and principal-only securities are especially sensitive to interest rate changes, which can affect not only their prices but can also change the income flows and repayment assumptions about those investments. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. The risks associated with rising interest rates are heightened under current market conditions given that the U.S. Federal Reserve has begun to raise interest rates from historically low levels and may continue to do so. Further, in market environments where interest rates are rising, issuers may be less willing or able to make principal and interest payments on fixed-income investments when due. |
-43-
¡ |
prepayment risk: the risk that the issuer of a debt security, including floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, repays all or a portion of the principal prior to the security’s maturity. In times of declining interest rates, there is a greater likelihood that the Fund’s higher yielding securities will be pre-paid with the Fund being unable to reinvest the proceeds in an investment with as great a yield. Prepayments can therefore result in lower yields to shareholders of the Fund. |
¡ |
LIBOR phase out/transition risk: the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) was the offered rate for wholesale, unsecured funding available to major international banks. The terms of many investments, financings or other transactions to which the Fund may be a party have been historically tied to LIBOR. LIBOR has historically been a significant factor in relation to payment obligations under a derivative investment and has also been used in other ways that affect the Fund’s investment performance. In connection with the global transition away from LIBOR led by regulators and market participants, LIBOR is no longer published on a representative basis. The transition from LIBOR and the terms of any replacement rate(s), including, for example, the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (“SOFR”) or another rate based on SOFR, may adversely affect transactions that used LIBOR as a reference rate, financial institutions that engaged in such transactions, and the financial markets generally. There are significant differences between LIBOR and SOFR, such as LIBOR being an unsecured lending rate while SOFR is a secured lending rate. As such, the potential effect of the transition away from LIBOR on the Fund or the financial instruments in which the Fund invests cannot yet be fully determined, but the transition may adversely affect the Fund’s performance. |
• |
defaulted securities risk: the significant risk of the uncertainty of repayment of defaulted securities (e.g., a security on which a principal or interest payment is not made when due) and obligations of distressed issuers (including insolvent issuers or issuers in payment or covenant default, in workout or restructuring or in bankruptcy or similar proceedings). Such investments entail high risk and have speculative characteristics. |
• |
derivatives risk: the risk that an investment in derivatives will not perform as anticipated by the Adviser, may not be available at the time or price desired, cannot be closed out at a favorable time or price, will increase the Fund’s transaction costs, or will increase the Fund’s volatility; that derivatives may create investment leverage; that, when a derivative is used as a substitute for or alternative to a direct cash investment, the transaction may not provide a return that corresponds precisely or at all with that of the cash investment; that the positions may be improperly executed or constructed; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; or that, when used for hedging purposes, derivatives will not provide the anticipated protection, causing the Fund to lose money on both the derivatives transaction and the exposure the Fund sought to hedge. |
Please also see “debt securities risks — LIBOR phase out/transition risk” herein for more information.
• |
emerging market country risk: the risk that investing in emerging markets, as compared to foreign developed markets, increases the likelihood that the Fund will lose money, due to more limited information about the issuer and/or the security; higher brokerage costs; different accounting, auditing and financial reporting standards; less developed legal systems and thinner trading markets; the possibility of currency blockages or transfer restrictions; an emerging market country’s dependence on revenue from particular commodities or international aid; and expropriation, nationalization or other adverse political or economic developments. |
• |
financial services risk: the risk that an investment in issuers in the financial services sector or transactions with one or more counterparties in the financial services sector may be adversely affected by, among other things: (i) changes in governmental regulation, which may limit both the amounts and the types of loans and other financial commitments financial services companies can make, the interest rates and fees they can charge, the scope of their activities, the prices they can charge and the amount of capital they must maintain; (ii) fluctuations, including as a result of interest rate changes or increased competition, in the availability and cost of capital funds on which the profitability of financial services companies is largely dependent; (iii) deterioration of the credit markets; (iv) credit losses resulting from financial difficulties of borrowers, especially when financial services companies are exposed to non-diversified or concentrated loan portfolios; (v) financial losses associated with investment activities, especially when financial services companies are exposed to financial leverage; (vi) the risk that any financial services company experiences substantial declines in the valuations of its assets, takes action to raise capital, or ceases operations; (vii) the risk that a market shock or other unexpected market, economic, political, regulatory, or other event might lead to a sudden decline in the values of most or all companies in the financial services sector; (viii) events leading to limited liquidity, defaults, non-performance or other adverse developments that affect financial institutions or the financial services industry generally, or concerns or rumors about any events of these kinds or other similar risks, leading to market-wide liquidity problems; and (ix) the interconnectedness or interdependence among financial services companies, including the risk that the financial distress or failure of one financial services company may materially and adversely affect a number of other financial services companies. |
-44-
• |
focused investment risk: the risk that a fund that invests a substantial portion of its assets in a particular market, industry, sector, group of industries or sectors, country, region, group of countries or asset class is, relative to a fund that invests in a more diverse investment portfolio, more susceptible to any single economic, market, political, regulatory or other occurrence. This is because, for example, issuers in a particular market, industry, region, sector or asset class may react similarly to specific economic, market, regulatory, political or other developments. The particular markets, industries, regions, sectors or asset classes in which the Fund may focus its investments may change over time and the Fund may alter its focus at inopportune times. |
• |
foreign currency risk: the risk that fluctuations in exchange rates may adversely affect the value of the Fund’s investments denominated in foreign currencies. |
• |
foreign investing risk: the risk that investments in foreign securities or in issuers with significant exposure to foreign markets, as compared to investments in U.S. securities or in issuers with predominantly domestic market exposure, may be more vulnerable to economic, political, and social instability and subject to less government supervision, less protective custody practices, lack of transparency, inadequate regulatory and accounting standards, delayed or infrequent settlement of transactions, and foreign taxes. If the Fund buys securities denominated in a foreign currency, receives income in foreign currencies, or holds foreign currencies from time to time, the value of the Fund’s assets, as measured in U.S. dollars, can be affected unfavorably by changes in exchange rates relative to the U.S. dollar or other foreign currencies. Foreign markets are also subject to the risk that a foreign government could restrict foreign exchange transactions or otherwise implement unfavorable currency regulations. In addition, foreign securities may be subject to currency exchange rates or regulations, the imposition of economic sanctions, tariffs or other government restrictions, higher transaction and other costs, reduced liquidity, and delays in settlement. |
• |
high yield risk: the risk that debt instruments rated below investment grade or debt instruments that are unrated and of comparable or lesser quality are predominantly speculative. These instruments, commonly known as “junk bonds,” have a higher degree of default risk and may be less liquid than higher-rated bonds. These instruments may be subject to greater price volatility due to such factors as specific corporate developments, interest rate sensitivity, negative perceptions of high yield investments generally, and less secondary market liquidity. |
• |
inflation-indexed bond risk: the risk that such bonds will change in value in response to actual or anticipated changes in inflation rates in a manner unanticipated by the Fund’s portfolio management team or investors generally. Inflation-indexed bonds are subject to debt securities risks. |
• |
investment company and exchange-traded fund risk: the risk that an investment company or other pooled investment vehicle, including any ETFs or money market funds, in which the Fund invests will not achieve its investment objective or execute its investment strategies effectively or that significant purchase or redemption activity by shareholders of such an investment company might negatively affect the value of its shares. The Fund must pay its pro rata portion of an investment company’s fees and expenses. To the extent the Adviser determines to invest Fund assets in other investment companies, the Adviser will have an incentive to invest in other investment vehicles sponsored or advised by the Adviser or a related party of the Adviser over investment companies sponsored or managed by others and to maintain such investments once made due to its own financial interest in those products and other business considerations. |
• |
large shareholder risk: the risk that certain account holders, including the Adviser or funds or accounts over which the Adviser (or related parties of the Adviser) has investment discretion, may from time to time own or control a significant percentage of the Fund’s shares. The Fund is subject to the risk that a redemption by those shareholders of all or a portion of their Fund shares, including as a result of an asset allocation decision made by the Adviser (or related parties of the Adviser), will adversely affect the Fund’s performance if it is forced to sell portfolio securities or invest cash when the Adviser would not otherwise choose to do so. Redemptions of a large number of shares may affect the liquidity of the Fund’s portfolio, increase the Fund’s transaction costs, and accelerate the realization of taxable income and/or gains to shareholders. |
• |
leveraging risk: the risk that certain investments by the Fund involving leverage may have the effect of increasing the volatility of the value of the Fund’s portfolio, and the risk of loss in excess of invested capital. |
• |
liquidity risk: the risk that the Fund may be unable to sell a portfolio investment at a desirable time or at the value the Fund has placed on the investment. Illiquidity may be the result of, for example, low trading volume, lack of a market maker, or contractual or legal restrictions that limit or prevent the Fund from selling securities or closing derivative positions. During periods of substantial market disruption, a large portion of the Fund’s assets could potentially experience significant levels of illiquidity. The values of illiquid investments are often more volatile than the values of more liquid investments. It may be more difficult for the Fund to determine a fair value of an illiquid investment than that of a more liquid comparable investment. |
-45-
• |
loan risk: the risk that (i) if the Fund holds a loan through another financial intermediary, or relies on a financial intermediary to administer the loan, its receipt of principal and interest on the loan may be subject to the credit risk of that financial intermediary; (ii) any collateral securing a loan may be insufficient or unavailable to the Fund, because, for example, the value of the collateral securing a loan can decline, be insufficient to meet the obligations of the borrower, or be difficult to liquidate, and the Fund’s rights to collateral may be limited by bankruptcy or insolvency laws; (iii) investments in highly leveraged loans or loans of stressed, distressed, or defaulted issuers may be subject to significant credit and liquidity risk; (iv) a bankruptcy or other court proceeding could delay or limit the ability of the Fund to collect the principal and interest payments on that borrower’s loans or adversely affect the Fund’s rights in collateral relating to a loan; (v) there may be limited public information available regarding the loan and the relevant borrower(s); (vi) the use of a particular interest rate benchmark may limit the Fund’s ability to achieve a net return to shareholders that consistently approximates the average published Prime Rate of U.S. banks; (vii) the prices of certain floating rate loans that include a feature that prevents their interest rates from adjusting if market interest rates are below a specified minimum level may appreciate less than other instruments in response to changes in interest rates should interest rates rise but remain below the applicable minimum level; (viii) if a borrower fails to comply with various restrictive covenants that may be found in loan agreements, the borrower may default in payment of the loan; (ix) if the Fund invests in loans that contain fewer or less restrictive constraints on the borrower than certain other types of loans (“covenant-lite” loans), it may have fewer rights against the borrowers of such loans, including fewer protections against the possibility of default and fewer remedies in the event of default; (x) the loan is unsecured; (xi) there is a limited secondary market; (xii) transactions in loans may settle on a delayed basis, and the Fund may not receive the proceeds from the sale of a loan for a substantial period of time after the sale, which may result in sale proceeds related to the sale of loans not being available to make additional investments or to meet the Fund’s redemption obligations until potentially a substantial period after the sale of the loans; and (xiii) loans may be difficult to value and may be illiquid, which may adversely affect an investment in the Fund. |
• |
market risk: the risk that markets will perform poorly or that the returns from the securities in which the Fund invests will underperform returns from the general securities markets or other types of investments. Markets may, in response to governmental actions or intervention or general market conditions, including real or perceived adverse political, economic or market conditions, tariffs and trade disruptions, inflation, recession, changes in interest or currency rates, lack of liquidity in the bond markets or adverse investor sentiment, or other external factors, experience periods of high volatility and reduced liquidity. During those periods, the Fund may experience high levels of shareholder redemptions, and may have to sell securities at times when the Fund would otherwise not do so, and potentially at unfavorable prices. Certain securities may be difficult to value during such periods. Market risk involves the risk that the value of the Fund’s investment portfolio will change, potentially frequently and in large amounts, as the prices of its investments go up or down. During periods of severe market stress, it is possible that the market for some or all of a Fund’s investments may become highly illiquid. In such an event, the Fund may find it difficult to sell loans it holds, and, for loans it is able to sell in such circumstances, the trade settlement period may be longer than anticipated. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. Please see “debt securities risks — interest rate risk” herein for more information. |
• |
mortgage-backed securities risk: the risk that borrowers may default on their mortgage obligations or the guarantees underlying the mortgage-backed securities will default or otherwise fail and that, during periods of falling interest rates, mortgage-backed securities will be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate. During periods of rising interest rates, the average life of a mortgage-backed security may extend, which may lock in a below-market interest rate, increase the security’s duration, and reduce the value of the security. Enforcing rights against the underlying assets or collateral may be difficult, or the underlying assets or collateral may be insufficient if the issuer defaults. The values of certain types of mortgage-backed securities, such as inverse floaters and interest-only and principal-only securities, may be extremely sensitive to changes in interest rates and prepayment rates. The Fund may invest in mortgage-backed securities that are subordinate in their right to receive payment of interest and repayment of principal to other classes of the issuer’s securities. |
• |
operational and information security risks: an investment in the Fund, like any fund, can involve operational risks arising from factors such as processing errors, human errors, inadequate or failed internal or external processes, failures in systems and technology, changes in personnel and errors caused by third-party service providers. The occurrence of any of these failures, errors or breaches could result in investment losses to the Fund, a loss of information, regulatory scrutiny, reputational damage or other events, any of which could have a material adverse effect on the Fund. While the Fund seeks to minimize such events through controls and oversight, there may still be failures that could cause losses to the Fund. |
-46-
• |
securities or sector selection risk: the risk that the securities held by the Fund will underperform securities held in other funds investing in similar asset classes or comparable benchmarks because of the portfolio managers’ choice of securities or sectors for investment. To the extent the Fund allocates a higher percentage of its investment portfolio to a particular sector or related sectors, the Fund will be more susceptible to events or factors affecting companies in that sector or related sectors. For example, the values of securities of companies in the same or related sectors may be negatively affected by the common characteristics they share, the common business risks to which they are subject, common regulatory burdens, or regulatory changes that affect them similarly. Such characteristics, risks, burdens or changes include, but are not limited to, changes in governmental regulation, inflation or deflation, rising or falling interest rates, competition from new entrants, and other economic, market, political or other developments specific to that sector or related sectors. |
• |
structured products and structured notes risk: the risk that an investment in a structured product, which includes, among other things, CDOs, mortgage-backed securities, other types of asset-backed securities and certain types of structured notes, may decline in value due to changes in the underlying instruments, indexes, interest rates or other factors on which the product is based (“reference measure”). Depending on the reference measure used and the use of multipliers or deflators (if any), changes in interest rates and movement of the reference measure may cause significant price and cash flow fluctuations. Application of a multiplier is comparable to the use of financial leverage, a speculative technique. Holders of structured products indirectly bear risks associated with the reference measure, are subject to counterparty risk and typically do not have direct rights against the reference measure. Structured products are generally privately offered and sold, and thus, are not registered under the securities laws and may be thinly traded or have a limited trading market and may have the effect of increasing the Fund’s illiquidity, reducing the Fund’s income and the value of the investment. At a particular point in time, the Fund may be unable to find qualified buyers for these securities. Investments in structured notes involve risks including interest rate risk, credit risk and market risk. |
• |
U.S. Government securities risk: the risk that debt securities issued or guaranteed by certain U.S. Government agencies, instrumentalities, and sponsored enterprises are not supported by the full faith and credit of the U.S. Government, and so investments in their securities or obligations issued by them involve credit risk greater than investments in other types of U.S. Government securities. |
• |
valuation risk: the risk that the Fund will not value its investments in a manner that accurately reflects their market values or that the Fund will not be able to sell any investment at a price equal to the valuation ascribed to that investment for purposes of calculating the Fund’s net asset value (“NAV”). The valuation of the Fund’s investments involves subjective judgment. Certain securities in which the Fund may invest may be more difficult to value accurately, especially during periods of market disruptions or extreme market volatility. Incorrect valuations of the Fund’s portfolio holdings could result in the Fund’s shareholder transactions being effected at an NAV that does not accurately reflect the underlying value of the Fund’s portfolio, resulting in the dilution of shareholder interests. |
Please see “Additional Information About Principal Investment Strategies and Principal Risks — Principal Risks” for a more detailed description of the principal risks of investing in the Fund.
-47-
Performance
The following performance information provides some indication of the risks of investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows the performance of the Fund’s Class I shares for each full calendar year since the Fund’s inception. The table below shows how the average annual total returns of the Fund’s shares for the periods shown compare to those of a broad-based securities market index. The Fund’s past performance (before and after taxes) is not necessarily an indication of how the Fund will perform in the future. Absent any applicable fee waivers and/or expense limitations (which have applied to the Fund since inception), performance would have been lower. Updated information on the Fund’s investment results can be obtained at no charge by calling 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311) or by visiting the Fund’s website at www.doubleline.com.
Class I Shares
During the periods shown above, the highest and lowest quarterly returns earned by the Fund’s Class I shares were:
Highest: | 7.88% | Quarter ended 6/30/2020 | ||
Lowest: | -10.91% | Quarter ended 3/31/2020 |
The year-to-date total return for the Fund’s Class I shares as of June 30, 2023 was 5.28%.
Average Annual Total Returns (for the periods ended December 31, 2022)
Floating Rate Fund | One Year | Five Years |
Since Inception (February 1, 2013) |
|||||||||
Class I | ||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-2.23% | 2.27% | 2.69% | |||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions |
-4.21% | 0.42% | 1.04% | |||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares |
-1.32% | 0.95% | 1.33% | |||||||||
Class N |
| |||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-2.37% | 2.02% | 2.46% | |||||||||
Morningstar LSTA US Leveraged Loan TR USD Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) | -0.60% | 3.31% | 3.59% |
The Fund’s after-tax returns as shown in the above table are calculated using the historical highest applicable individual federal marginal income tax rates for the period and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Your actual after-tax returns depend on your tax situation and may differ from those shown. If you own shares of the Fund in a tax-advantaged account, such as a 401(k) plan or an individual retirement account, after-tax returns shown are not relevant to your investment. The “Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares” may be higher than other return figures because when a capital loss occurs upon the redemption of shares of the Fund, a tax deduction is provided that may benefit the investor. After-tax returns are for Class I shares only. After-tax returns for other classes may vary. The Morningstar LSTA US Leveraged Loan TR USD Index (formerly the S&P/LSTA Leveraged Loan Index) tracks the market-weighted performance of institutional weighted loans based on market weightings, spreads and interest payments. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.
-48-
Investment Adviser
DoubleLine Capital is the investment adviser to the Fund.
Portfolio Managers
The portfolio managers for the Fund are:
Name | Experience with the Fund |
Primary Title with the Investment Adviser | ||
Robert Cohen | Since the Fund’s inception in February 2013 | Director of Global Developed Credit | ||
Philip Kenney | Since July 2018 | Director of Corporate Research |
Purchase and Sale of Shares
You may purchase or redeem Class I and Class N shares on any business day when the New York Stock Exchange opens for regular trading. You may purchase or redeem shares by written request via mail (DoubleLine Funds, c/o U.S. Bank Global Fund Services, P.O. Box 701, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0701), by wire transfer, by telephone at 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311), or through authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers (“financial intermediaries”). Telephone transactions will be permitted unless you decline this privilege on your initial purchase application. The minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts for different types of accounts are shown below, although the Fund may reduce or waive the minimums in some cases.
Minimum Initial Investment: | Subsequent Investment: |
|||||||||||
Regular Accounts |
IRAs/HSAs |
All Accounts and Investment Plans |
||||||||||
Class I Shares | $ | 100,000 | $ | 5,000 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class N Shares | $ | 2,000 | $ | 500 | $ | 100 |
The minimum investment may be modified for certain financial intermediaries that submit trades on behalf of underlying investors. Certain financial intermediaries also may have their own investment minimums, which may differ from the Fund’s minimums, and may be waived at the intermediaries’ discretion. The Fund reserves the right to change or waive the minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts without prior notice or to waive the minimum investment amounts for certain intermediaries or individual investors in its discretion.
Tax Information
The Fund’s distributions generally are taxable to you as ordinary income or capital gains, unless you are investing through a tax-advantaged arrangement, such as a 401(k) plan or individual retirement account. If you invest through such tax-advantaged arrangements, you may be taxed later upon withdrawal from those arrangements.
Payments to Broker-Dealers and Other Financial Intermediaries
If you purchase shares of the Fund through a broker-dealer or other financial intermediary (such as a bank), the Fund, the Adviser, and the Fund’s distributor or any of their affiliates may pay the financial intermediary for the sale of Fund shares and related services. These payments may create a conflict of interest by influencing the financial intermediary and your salesperson to recommend the Fund over another investment. Ask your individual salesperson or visit your financial intermediary’s website for more information.
-49-
Fund Summary
DoubleLine Flexible Income Fund
Investment Objective
The Fund’s investment objective is to seek long-term total return while striving to generate current income.
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Fund. You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries (defined below), including when purchasing Class I and Class R6 shares through a broker or other financial intermediary acting as an agent on your behalf. Such commissions and other fees, if any, are not charged by the Fund and are not reflected in the fee table or expense example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | Class R6 | |||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of the offering price) | None | None | None | |||
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of the original purchase price) | None | None | None | |||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Reinvested Dividends | None | None | None | |||
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of shares redeemed within 90 days of purchase) | None | None | None | |||
Fee for Redemption by Wire | $15 | $15 | $15 | |||
Exchange Fee | None | None | None | |||
Account Fee | None | None | None |
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | Class R6 | |||||||||
Management Fees | 0.62% | 0.62% | 0.62% | |||||||||
Distribution and/or Service (12b-1) Fees | None | 0.25% | None | |||||||||
Other Expenses (includes sub-transfer agent accounting or administrative services expenses) | 0.12% | 0.12% | 0.08% | |||||||||
Acquired Fund Fees and Expenses1 | 0.01% | 0.01% | 0.01% | |||||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses | 0.75% | 1.00% | 0.71% |
1 |
“Acquired Fund Fees and Expenses” are expenses indirectly incurred by the Fund as a result of its investments in one or more underlying funds, including exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”) and money market funds. Because these costs are indirect, the Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses in this fee table will not correlate to the expense ratio in the Fund’s financial statements, since financial statements only include direct costs of the Fund and not the indirect costs of investing in the underlying funds. |
Example
This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds.
-50-
This example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all your shares at the end of those periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same. Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions, your costs would be:
Class I | Class N | Class R6 | ||||
1 Year | $77 | $102 | $73 | |||
3 Years | $240 | $318 | $227 | |||
5 Years | $417 | $552 | $395 | |||
10 Years | $930 | $1,225 | $883 |
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund incurs transaction costs when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the Fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 13% of the average value of its portfolio.
Principal Investment Strategies
The Fund seeks to achieve its investment objective by active asset allocation among market sectors in the fixed income universe. These sectors may include, for example, U.S. Government securities, corporate debt securities, mortgage- and other asset-backed securities, foreign debt securities, including emerging market debt securities, loans, and high yield debt securities. The Adviser has broad flexibility to use various investment strategies and to invest in a wide variety of fixed income instruments that the Adviser believes offer the potential for current income, capital appreciation, or both. The Fund is not constrained by management against any index.
The Adviser expects to allocate the Fund’s assets in response to changing market, financial, economic, and political factors and events that the Fund’s portfolio managers believe may affect the values of the Fund’s investments. The allocation of the Fund’s assets to different sectors and issuers will change over time, sometimes rapidly, and the Fund may invest without limit in a single sector or a small number of sectors of the fixed income universe.
In managing the Fund’s portfolio, the portfolio managers typically use a controlled risk approach. The techniques of this approach attempt to control the principal risk components of the fixed income markets and may include, among other factors, consideration of the Adviser’s view of the following: the potential relative performance of various market sectors, security selection available within a given sector, the risk/reward equation for different asset classes, liquidity conditions in various market sectors, the shape of the yield curve and projections for changes in the yield curve, potential fluctuations in the overall level of interest rates, and current fiscal policy.
The Fund may invest in securities of any credit quality. The Fund may invest without limit in securities rated below investment grade (securities rated Ba1 or below by Moody’s Investors Service, Inc. (“Moody’s”) and BB+ or below by S&P Global Ratings (“S&P”) and Fitch Ratings, Inc. (“Fitch”)) or unrated securities judged by the Adviser to be of comparable quality.
Corporate bonds and certain other fixed income instruments rated below investment grade, or such instruments that are unrated and determined by the Adviser to be of comparable quality, are high yield, high risk bonds, commonly known as “junk bonds.”
The Fund may invest without limit in foreign securities, including emerging market securities and securities denominated in foreign currencies, including the local currencies of emerging markets.
The Adviser monitors the duration of the Fund’s portfolio securities to seek to assess and, in its discretion, adjust the Fund’s exposure to interest rate risk. The Adviser seeks to manage the Fund’s duration based on the Adviser’s view of, among other things, future interest rates and market conditions. There are no limits on the duration of the Fund’s portfolio. The Adviser retains broad discretion to modify the Fund’s duration within a wide range, including the discretion to construct a portfolio of investments for the Fund with a negative duration. Duration is a measure of the expected life of a fixed income instrument that is used to determine the sensitivity of a security’s price to changes in interest rates. Effective duration is a measure of the Fund’s portfolio duration adjusted for the anticipated effect of interest rate changes on bond and mortgage prepayment rates as determined by the Adviser.
-51-
Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest significantly in instruments the Adviser expects to produce current income. These might include, by way of example, (i) securities or other income-producing instruments issued or guaranteed by the U.S. Government, its agencies, instrumentalities or sponsored corporations (including inflation-protected securities); (ii) corporate obligations; (iii) mortgage-backed securities (including commercial and residential mortgage-backed securities) and other asset-backed securities, collateralized mortgage obligations, government mortgage pass-through securities, multiclass pass-through securities, private mortgage pass-through securities, stripped mortgage securities (e.g., interest-only and principal-only securities), and inverse floaters; (iv) collateralized debt obligations (“CDOs”), including collateralized loan obligations (“CLOs”); (v) foreign securities (corporate and government, including foreign hybrid securities), including emerging market securities; (vi) fixed and floating rate loans of any kind (including, among others, bank loans, assignments, participations, senior loans, second lien or other subordinated or unsecured fixed or floating rate loans, debtor-in-possession loans, exit facilities, delayed funding loans and revolving credit facilities), which may take the form of loans that contain fewer or less restrictive constraints on the borrower than certain other types of loans (“covenant-lite” loans); (vii) municipal securities and other debt obligations issued by states, local governments, and government-sponsored entities, including their agencies, authorities, and instrumentalities; (viii) inflation-indexed bonds; (ix) convertible securities; (x) preferred securities; (xi) real estate investment trust (“REIT”) securities; (xii) distressed and defaulted securities; (xiii) payment-in-kind bonds; (xiv) zero-coupon bonds; (xv) custodial receipts, cash and cash equivalents; (xvi) short-term, high quality investments, including, for example, commercial paper, bankers’ acceptances, certificates of deposit, bank time deposits, repurchase agreements, and investments in money market mutual funds or similar pooled investments; and (xvii) other instruments bearing fixed, floating, or variable interest rates of any maturity. The Fund may invest in any level of the capital structure of an issuer of mortgage-backed or asset-backed securities, including the equity or “first loss” tranche.
The Fund may enter into derivatives transactions and other instruments of any kind for hedging purposes or otherwise to gain, or reduce, long or short exposure to one or more asset classes or issuers. The Fund also may use derivatives transactions with the purpose or effect of creating investment leverage. The Adviser may seek to manage the dollar-weighted average effective duration of the Fund’s portfolio through the use of derivatives and other instruments (including, among others, inverse floaters, futures contracts, U.S. Treasury swaps, interest rate swaps, total return swaps and options, including options on swap agreements). The Fund may incur costs in implementing duration management strategies, and there can be no assurance that the Fund will engage in duration management strategies or that any duration management strategy employed by the Fund will be successful. The Fund may enter into currency-related transactions, including forward exchange contracts and futures contracts. The Fund may, but will not necessarily, enter into foreign currency exchange transactions to hedge against currency exposure in its portfolio.
The Fund may implement short positions, including through the use of derivative instruments, such as swaps or futures, or through short sales of instruments that are eligible investments for the Fund. For example, the Fund may enter into a futures contract pursuant to which it agrees to sell an asset (that it does not currently own) at a specified price in the future in anticipation that the asset’s value will decrease between the time the position is established and the agreed date of sale.
The Fund may purchase or sell securities on a when-issued, delayed delivery or forward commitment basis and may engage in short sales, either to earn additional return or to hedge existing investments. The Fund may seek to obtain market exposure to the securities in which it primarily invests by entering into a series of purchase and sale contracts or by using other investment techniques (such as buy backs or dollar rolls), which may create investment leverage.
The Fund may pursue its investment objective and obtain exposures to some or all of the asset classes described above by investing in other investment companies, including, for example, other open-end or closed-end investment companies and ETFs, including other DoubleLine funds. The amount of the Fund’s investment in certain investment companies may be limited by law or by tax considerations.
Portfolio securities may be sold at any time. By way of example, sales may occur when the Fund’s portfolio managers determine to take advantage of what the portfolio managers consider to be a better investment opportunity, when the portfolio managers believe the portfolio securities no longer represent relatively attractive investment opportunities, when the portfolio managers perceive deterioration in the credit fundamentals of the issuer, or when the individual security has reached the portfolio managers’ sell target.
Principal Risks
The value of the Fund’s shares will vary as its portfolio investments increase or decrease in value. Therefore, the value of your investment in the Fund could go down as well as up. You can lose money by investing in the Fund. The Fund’s principal risks are listed below in alphabetical order, not in order of importance. The significance of any specific risk to an
-52-
investment in the Fund will vary over time, depending on the composition of the Fund’s portfolio, market conditions, and other factors. You should read all of the risk information presented below carefully, because any one or more of these risks may result in losses to the Fund.
The principal risks affecting the Fund that can cause a decline in value are:
• |
active management risk: the risk that the Fund will fail to meet its investment objective and that the Fund’s investment performance will depend, at least in part, on how its assets are allocated and reallocated among asset classes, sectors, underlying funds and/or investments and that such allocation will focus on asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or investments that perform poorly or underperform other asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or available investments. Any given investment strategy may fail to produce the intended results, and the Fund’s portfolio may underperform other comparable funds because of portfolio management decisions related to, among other things, the selection of investments, portfolio construction, risk assessments, and/or the outlook on market trends and opportunities. |
• |
asset-backed securities investment risk: the risk that borrowers may default on the obligations that underlie the asset-backed security and that, during periods of falling interest rates, asset-backed securities may be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate, and the risk that the impairment of the value of the collateral underlying a security in which the Fund invests (due, for example, to non-payment of loans) will result in a reduction in the value of the security. |
• |
cash position risk: the risk that to the extent that the Fund holds assets in cash, cash equivalents, and other short-term investments, the ability of the Fund to meet its objective may be limited. |
• |
collateralized debt obligations risk: the risks of an investment in a CDO depend largely on the quality and type of the collateral and the tranche of the CDO in which the Fund invests. Normally, collateralized bond obligations (“CBOs”), CLOs and other CDOs are privately offered and sold, and thus are not registered under the securities laws. As a result, investments in CDOs may be illiquid. In addition to the risks associated with debt instruments (e.g., interest rate risk and credit risk), CDOs carry additional risks including, but not limited to: (i) the possibility that distributions from collateral will not be adequate to make interest or other payments; (ii) the quality of the collateral may decline in value or default; (iii) the possibility that the Fund may invest in CDOs that are subordinate to other classes of the issuer’s securities; and (iv) the complex structure of the security may not be fully understood at the time of investment and may produce disputes with the issuer or unexpected investment results. |
• |
counterparty risk: the risk that the Fund will be subject to credit risk with respect to the counterparties to the derivative contracts and other instruments entered into by the Fund; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; that the Fund will be unable to enforce contractual remedies if its counterparty defaults; that if a counterparty (or an affiliate of a counterparty) becomes bankrupt, the Fund may experience significant delays in obtaining any recovery or may obtain limited or no recovery in a bankruptcy or other insolvency proceeding. To the extent that the Fund enters into multiple transactions with a single or a small set of counterparties, it will be subject to increased counterparty risk. |
• |
debt securities risks: |
¡ |
credit risk: the risk that an issuer, counterparty or other obligor to the Fund will fail to pay its obligations to the Fund when they are due, which may reduce the Fund’s income and/or reduce, in whole or in part, the value of the Fund’s investment. Actual or perceived changes in the financial condition of an obligor, changes in economic, social or political conditions that affect a particular type of security, instrument, or obligor, and changes in economic, social or political conditions generally can increase the risk of default by an obligor, which can affect a security’s or other instrument’s credit quality or value and an obligor’s ability to honor its obligations when due. The values of lower-quality debt securities (commonly known as “junk bonds”), including floating rate loans, tend to be particularly sensitive to these changes. The values of securities or instruments also may decline for a number of other reasons that relate directly to the obligor, such as management performance, financial leverage, and reduced demand for the obligor’s goods and services, as well as the historical and prospective earnings of the obligor and the value of its assets. |
¡ |
extension risk: the risk that if interest rates rise, repayments of principal on certain debt securities, including, but not limited to, floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, may occur at a slower rate than expected and the expected maturity of those securities could lengthen as a result. Securities that are subject to extension risk generally have a greater potential for loss when prevailing interest rates rise, which could cause their values to fall sharply. |
-53-
¡ |
interest rate risk: the risk that debt instruments will change in value because of changes in interest rates. The value of an instrument with a longer duration (whether positive or negative) will be more sensitive to changes in interest rates than a similar instrument with a shorter duration. Bonds and other debt instruments typically have a positive duration. The value of a debt instrument with positive duration will generally decline if interest rates increase. Certain other investments, such as inverse floaters and certain derivative instruments, may have a negative duration. The value of instruments with a negative duration will generally decline if interest rates decrease. Inverse floaters, interest-only and principal-only securities are especially sensitive to interest rate changes, which can affect not only their prices but can also change the income flows and repayment assumptions about those investments. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. The risks associated with rising interest rates are heightened under current market conditions given that the U.S. Federal Reserve has begun to raise interest rates from historically low levels and may continue to do so. Further, in market environments where interest rates are rising, issuers may be less willing or able to make principal and interest payments on fixed-income investments when due. |
¡ |
prepayment risk: the risk that the issuer of a debt security, including floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, repays all or a portion of the principal prior to the security’s maturity. In times of declining interest rates, there is a greater likelihood that the Fund’s higher yielding securities will be pre-paid with the Fund being unable to reinvest the proceeds in an investment with as great a yield. Prepayments can therefore result in lower yields to shareholders of the Fund. |
¡ |
LIBOR phase out/transition risk: the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) was the offered rate for wholesale, unsecured funding available to major international banks. The terms of many investments, financings or other transactions to which the Fund may be a party have been historically tied to LIBOR. LIBOR has historically been a significant factor in relation to payment obligations under a derivative investment and has also been used in other ways that affect the Fund’s investment performance. In connection with the global transition away from LIBOR led by regulators and market participants, LIBOR is no longer published on a representative basis. The transition from LIBOR and the terms of any replacement rate(s), including, for example, the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (“SOFR”) or another rate based on SOFR, may adversely affect transactions that used LIBOR as a reference rate, financial institutions that engaged in such transactions, and the financial markets generally. There are significant differences between LIBOR and SOFR, such as LIBOR being an unsecured lending rate while SOFR is a secured lending rate. As such, the potential effect of the transition away from LIBOR on the Fund or the financial instruments in which the Fund invests cannot yet be fully determined, but the transition may adversely affect the Fund’s performance. |
• |
defaulted securities risk: the significant risk of the uncertainty of repayment of defaulted securities (e.g., a security on which a principal or interest payment is not made when due) and obligations of distressed issuers (including insolvent issuers or issuers in payment or covenant default, in workout or restructuring or in bankruptcy or similar proceedings). Such investments entail high risk and have speculative characteristics. |
• |
derivatives risk: the risk that an investment in derivatives will not perform as anticipated by the Adviser, may not be available at the time or price desired, cannot be closed out at a favorable time or price, will increase the Fund’s transaction costs, or will increase the Fund’s volatility; that derivatives may create investment leverage; that, when a derivative is used as a substitute for or alternative to a direct cash investment, the transaction may not provide a return that corresponds precisely or at all with that of the cash investment; that the positions may be improperly executed or constructed; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; or that, when used for hedging purposes, derivatives will not provide the anticipated protection, causing the Fund to lose money on both the derivatives transaction and the exposure the Fund sought to hedge. |
Please also see “debt securities risks — LIBOR phase out/transition risk” herein for more information.
• |
emerging market country risk: the risk that investing in emerging markets, as compared to foreign developed markets, increases the likelihood that the Fund will lose money, due to more limited information about the issuer and/or the security; higher brokerage costs; different accounting, auditing and financial reporting standards; less developed legal systems and thinner trading markets; the possibility of currency blockages or transfer restrictions; an emerging market country’s dependence on revenue from particular commodities or international aid; and expropriation, nationalization or other adverse political or economic developments. |
• |
financial services risk: the risk that an investment in issuers in the financial services sector or transactions with one or more counterparties in the financial services sector may be adversely affected by, among other things: (i) changes in |
-54-
governmental regulation, which may limit both the amounts and the types of loans and other financial commitments financial services companies can make, the interest rates and fees they can charge, the scope of their activities, the prices they can charge and the amount of capital they must maintain; (ii) fluctuations, including as a result of interest rate changes or increased competition, in the availability and cost of capital funds on which the profitability of financial services companies is largely dependent; (iii) deterioration of the credit markets; (iv) credit losses resulting from financial difficulties of borrowers, especially when financial services companies are exposed to non-diversified or concentrated loan portfolios; (v) financial losses associated with investment activities, especially when financial services companies are exposed to financial leverage; (vi) the risk that any financial services company experiences substantial declines in the valuations of its assets, takes action to raise capital, or ceases operations; (vii) the risk that a market shock or other unexpected market, economic, political, regulatory, or other event might lead to a sudden decline in the values of most or all companies in the financial services sector; (viii) events leading to limited liquidity, defaults, non-performance or other adverse developments that affect financial institutions or the financial services industry generally, or concerns or rumors about any events of these kinds or other similar risks, leading to market-wide liquidity problems; and (ix) the interconnectedness or interdependence among financial services companies, including the risk that the financial distress or failure of one financial services company may materially and adversely affect a number of other financial services companies. |
• |
focused investment risk: the risk that a fund that invests a substantial portion of its assets in a particular market, industry, sector, group of industries or sectors, country, region, group of countries or asset class is, relative to a fund that invests in a more diverse investment portfolio, more susceptible to any single economic, market, political, regulatory or other occurrence. This is because, for example, issuers in a particular market, industry, region, sector or asset class may react similarly to specific economic, market, regulatory, political or other developments. The particular markets, industries, regions, sectors or asset classes in which the Fund may focus its investments may change over time and the Fund may alter its focus at inopportune times. |
• |
foreign currency risk: the risk that fluctuations in exchange rates may adversely affect the value of the Fund’s investments denominated in foreign currencies. |
• |
foreign investing risk: the risk that investments in foreign securities or in issuers with significant exposure to foreign markets, as compared to investments in U.S. securities or in issuers with predominantly domestic market exposure, may be more vulnerable to economic, political, and social instability and subject to less government supervision, less protective custody practices, lack of transparency, inadequate regulatory and accounting standards, delayed or infrequent settlement of transactions, and foreign taxes. If the Fund buys securities denominated in a foreign currency, receives income in foreign currencies, or holds foreign currencies from time to time, the value of the Fund’s assets, as measured in U.S. dollars, can be affected unfavorably by changes in exchange rates relative to the U.S. dollar or other foreign currencies. Foreign markets are also subject to the risk that a foreign government could restrict foreign exchange transactions or otherwise implement unfavorable currency regulations. In addition, foreign securities may be subject to currency exchange rates or regulations, the imposition of economic sanctions, tariffs or other government restrictions, higher transaction and other costs, reduced liquidity, and delays in settlement. |
• |
high yield risk: the risk that debt instruments rated below investment grade or debt instruments that are unrated and of comparable or lesser quality are predominantly speculative. These instruments, commonly known as “junk bonds,” have a higher degree of default risk and may be less liquid than higher-rated bonds. These instruments may be subject to greater price volatility due to such factors as specific corporate developments, interest rate sensitivity, negative perceptions of high yield investments generally, and less secondary market liquidity. |
• |
inflation-indexed bond risk: the risk that such bonds will change in value in response to actual or anticipated changes in inflation rates in a manner unanticipated by the Fund’s portfolio management team or investors generally. Inflation-indexed bonds are subject to debt securities risks. |
• |
investment company and exchange-traded fund risk: the risk that an investment company or other pooled investment vehicle, including any ETFs or money market funds, in which the Fund invests will not achieve its investment objective or execute its investment strategies effectively or that significant purchase or redemption activity by shareholders of such an investment company might negatively affect the value of its shares. The Fund must pay its pro rata portion of an investment company’s fees and expenses. To the extent the Adviser determines to invest Fund assets in other investment companies, the Adviser will have an incentive to invest in other DoubleLine funds over investment companies sponsored or managed by others and to maintain such investments once made due to its own financial interest in those products and other business considerations. |
-55-
• |
leveraging risk: the risk that certain investments by the Fund involving leverage may have the effect of increasing the volatility of the value of the Fund’s portfolio, and the risk of loss in excess of invested capital. |
• |
liquidity risk: the risk that the Fund may be unable to sell a portfolio investment at a desirable time or at the value the Fund has placed on the investment. Illiquidity may be the result of, for example, low trading volume, lack of a market maker, or contractual or legal restrictions that limit or prevent the Fund from selling securities or closing derivative positions. During periods of substantial market disruption, a large portion of the Fund’s assets could potentially experience significant levels of illiquidity. The values of illiquid investments are often more volatile than the values of more liquid investments. It may be more difficult for the Fund to determine a fair value of an illiquid investment than that of a more liquid comparable investment. |
• |
loan risk: the risk that (i) if the Fund holds a loan through another financial intermediary, or relies on a financial intermediary to administer the loan, its receipt of principal and interest on the loan may be subject to the credit risk of that financial intermediary; (ii) any collateral securing a loan may be insufficient or unavailable to the Fund, because, for example, the value of the collateral securing a loan can decline, be insufficient to meet the obligations of the borrower, or be difficult to liquidate, and the Fund’s rights to collateral may be limited by bankruptcy or insolvency laws; (iii) investments in highly leveraged loans or loans of stressed, distressed, or defaulted issuers may be subject to significant credit and liquidity risk; (iv) a bankruptcy or other court proceeding could delay or limit the ability of the Fund to collect the principal and interest payments on that borrower’s loans or adversely affect the Fund’s rights in collateral relating to a loan; (v) there may be limited public information available regarding the loan and the relevant borrower(s); (vi) the use of a particular interest rate benchmark may limit the Fund’s ability to achieve a net return to shareholders that consistently approximates the average published Prime Rate of U.S. banks; (vii) the prices of certain floating rate loans that include a feature that prevents their interest rates from adjusting if market interest rates are below a specified minimum level may appreciate less than other instruments in response to changes in interest rates should interest rates rise but remain below the applicable minimum level; (viii) if a borrower fails to comply with various restrictive covenants that may be found in loan agreements, the borrower may default in payment of the loan; (ix) if the Fund invests in loans that contain fewer or less restrictive constraints on the borrower than certain other types of loans (“covenant-lite” loans), it may have fewer rights against the borrowers of such loans, including fewer protections against the possibility of default and fewer remedies in the event of default; (x) the loan is unsecured; (xi) there is a limited secondary market; (xii) transactions in loans may settle on a delayed basis, and the Fund may not receive the proceeds from the sale of a loan for a substantial period of time after the sale, which may result in sale proceeds related to the sale of loans not being available to make additional investments or to meet the Fund’s redemption obligations until potentially a substantial period after the sale of the loans; and (xiii) loans may be difficult to value and may be illiquid, which may adversely affect an investment in the Fund. The Fund may invest in loans directly or indirectly by investing in shares of the DoubleLine Floating Rate Fund and in either case will be subject to the risks described above. |
• |
market risk: the risk that markets will perform poorly or that the returns from the securities in which the Fund invests will underperform returns from the general securities markets or other types of investments. Markets may, in response to governmental actions or intervention or general market conditions, including real or perceived adverse political, economic or market conditions, tariffs and trade disruptions, inflation, recession, changes in interest or currency rates, lack of liquidity in the bond markets or adverse investor sentiment, or other external factors, experience periods of high volatility and reduced liquidity. During those periods, the Fund may experience high levels of shareholder redemptions, and may have to sell securities at times when the Fund would otherwise not do so, and potentially at unfavorable prices. Certain securities may be difficult to value during such periods. Market risk involves the risk that the value of the Fund’s investment portfolio will change, potentially frequently and in large amounts, as the prices of its investments go up or down. During periods of severe market stress, it is possible that the market for some or all of a Fund’s investments may become highly illiquid. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. Please see “debt securities risks — interest rate risk” herein for more information. |
• |
mortgage-backed securities risk: the risk that borrowers may default on their mortgage obligations or the guarantees underlying the mortgage-backed securities will default or otherwise fail and that, during periods of falling interest rates, mortgage-backed securities will be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate. During periods of rising interest rates, the average life of a mortgage-backed security may extend, which may lock in a below-market interest rate, increase the security’s duration, and reduce the value of the security. Enforcing rights against the underlying assets or collateral may be difficult, or the underlying assets or collateral may be insufficient if the issuer defaults. The values of certain types of mortgage-backed securities, such as inverse floaters and interest-only and principal-only securities, may be extremely sensitive to changes in interest rates and prepayment rates. The Fund may invest in mortgage-backed securities that are subordinate in their right to receive payment of interest and repayment of principal to other classes of the issuer’s securities. |
-56-
• |
operational and information security risks: an investment in the Fund, like any fund, can involve operational risks arising from factors such as processing errors, human errors, inadequate or failed internal or external processes, failures in systems and technology, changes in personnel and errors caused by third-party service providers. The occurrence of any of these failures, errors or breaches could result in investment losses to the Fund, a loss of information, regulatory scrutiny, reputational damage or other events, any of which could have a material adverse effect on the Fund. While the Fund seeks to minimize such events through controls and oversight, there may still be failures that could cause losses to the Fund. |
• |
real estate sector risk: the risk that real estate-related investments may decline in value as a result of factors affecting the real estate sector, such as the supply of real property in certain markets, changes in zoning laws, delays in completion of construction, changes in real estate values, changes in property taxes, levels of occupancy, and local, regional, and general market conditions. Equity REITs, which invest primarily in direct fee ownership or leasehold ownership of real property and derive most of their income from rents, are generally affected by changes in the values of and incomes from the properties they own. Mortgage REITs invest mostly in mortgages on real estate, which may secure, for example, construction, development or long-term loans, and the main source of their income is mortgage interest payments. Mortgage REITs may be affected by the credit quality of the mortgage loans they hold. A hybrid REIT combines the characteristics of equity REITs and mortgage REITs, generally by holding both ownership interests and mortgage interests in real estate, and thus may be subject to risks associated with both real estate ownership and mortgage-related investments. Along with the risks common to different types of real estate-related investments, REITs, no matter the type, involve additional risk factors, including poor performance by the REIT’s manager, adverse changes to the tax laws, and the possible failure by the REIT to qualify for the favorable tax treatment available to REITs under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, or the exemption from registration under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended. REITs are not diversified and are heavily dependent on cash flow earned on the property interests they hold. |
• |
restricted securities risk: the risk that the Fund may be prevented or limited by law or the terms of an agreement from selling a security (a “restricted security”). To the extent that the Fund is permitted to sell a restricted security, there can be no assurance that a trading market will exist at any particular time, and the Fund may be unable to dispose of the security promptly at reasonable prices or at all. The Fund may have to bear the expense of registering the securities for resale and the risk of substantial delays in effecting the registration. Also, restricted securities may be difficult to value because market quotations may not be readily available, and the values of restricted securities may have significant volatility. |
• |
securities or sector selection risk: the risk that the securities held by the Fund will underperform securities held in other funds investing in similar asset classes or comparable benchmarks because of the portfolio managers’ choice of securities or sectors for investment. To the extent the Fund allocates a higher percentage of its investment portfolio to a particular sector or related sectors, the Fund will be more susceptible to events or factors affecting companies in that sector or related sectors. For example, the values of securities of companies in the same or related sectors may be negatively affected by the common characteristics they share, the common business risks to which they are subject, common regulatory burdens, or regulatory changes that affect them similarly. Such characteristics, risks, burdens or changes include, but are not limited to, changes in governmental regulation, inflation or deflation, rising or falling interest rates, competition from new entrants, and other economic, market, political or other developments specific to that sector or related sectors. |
• |
short position risk: the risk that an increase in the value of an instrument, index or interest rate with respect to which the Fund has established a short position will result in a loss to the Fund. |
• |
sovereign debt obligations risk: the risk that investments in debt obligations of sovereign governments may lose value due to the government entity’s unwillingness or inability to repay principal and interest when due in accordance with the terms of the debt or otherwise in a timely manner. Sovereign governments may default on their debt obligations for a number of reasons, including social, political, economic and diplomatic changes in countries issuing sovereign debt. The Fund may have limited (or no) recourse in the event of a default because bankruptcy, moratorium and other similar laws applicable to issuers of sovereign debt obligations may be substantially different from those applicable to private issuers, and any recourse may be subject to the political climate in the relevant country. In addition, foreign governmental entities may enjoy various levels of sovereign immunity, and it may be difficult or impossible to bring a legal action against a foreign governmental entity or to enforce a judgment against such an entity. Holders of certain foreign government debt securities may be requested to participate in the restructuring of such obligations and to extend further loans to their issuers. There can be no assurance that the foreign government debt securities in which the Fund may invest will not be subject to similar restructuring arrangements or to requests for new credit, which may adversely affect the Fund’s holdings. |
-57-
• |
structured products and structured notes risk: the risk that an investment in a structured product, which includes, among other things, CDOs, mortgage-backed securities, other types of asset-backed securities and certain types of structured notes, may decline in value due to changes in the underlying instruments, indexes, interest rates or other factors on which the product is based (“reference measure”). Depending on the reference measure used and the use of multipliers or deflators (if any), changes in interest rates and movement of the reference measure may cause significant price and cash flow fluctuations. Application of a multiplier is comparable to the use of financial leverage, a speculative technique. Holders of structured products indirectly bear risks associated with the reference measure, are subject to counterparty risk and typically do not have direct rights against the reference measure. Structured products are generally privately offered and sold, and thus, are not registered under the securities laws and may be thinly traded or have a limited trading market and may have the effect of increasing the Fund’s illiquidity, reducing the Fund’s income and the value of the investment. At a particular point in time, the Fund may be unable to find qualified buyers for these securities. Investments in structured notes involve risks including interest rate risk, credit risk and market risk. |
• |
U.S. Government securities risk: the risk that debt securities issued or guaranteed by certain U.S. Government agencies, instrumentalities, and sponsored enterprises are not supported by the full faith and credit of the U.S. Government, and so investments in their securities or obligations issued by them involve credit risk greater than investments in other types of U.S. Government securities. |
• |
valuation risk: the risk that the Fund will not value its investments in a manner that accurately reflects their market values or that the Fund will not be able to sell any investment at a price equal to the valuation ascribed to that investment for purposes of calculating the Fund’s net asset value (“NAV”). The valuation of the Fund’s investments involves subjective judgment. Certain securities in which the Fund may invest may be more difficult to value accurately, especially during periods of market disruptions or extreme market volatility. Incorrect valuations of the Fund’s portfolio holdings could result in the Fund’s shareholder transactions being effected at an NAV that does not accurately reflect the underlying value of the Fund’s portfolio, resulting in the dilution of shareholder interests. |
Please see “Additional Information About Principal Investment Strategies and Principal Risks — Principal Risks” for a more detailed description of the principal risks of investing in the Fund.
Performance
The following performance information provides some indication of the risks of investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows the performance of the Fund’s Class I shares for each full calendar year since the Fund’s inception. The table below shows how the average annual total returns of the Fund’s shares for the periods shown compare to those of a broad-based securities market index and another performance benchmark. The Fund’s past performance (before and after taxes) is not necessarily an indication of how the Fund will perform in the future. Absent any applicable fee waivers and/or expense limitations (which have applied to the Fund since inception), performance would have been lower. Updated information on the Fund’s investment results can be obtained at no charge by calling 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311) or by visiting the Fund’s website at www.doubleline.com.
Class I Shares
During the periods shown above, the highest and lowest quarterly returns earned by the Fund’s Class I shares were:
Highest: | 9.85% | Quarter ended 6/30/2020 | ||
Lowest: | -12.56% | Quarter ended 3/31/2020 |
The year-to-date total return for the Fund’s Class I shares as of June 30, 2023 was 2.77%.
-58-
Average Annual Total Returns (for the periods ended December 31, 2022)
Flexible Income Fund | One Year | Five Years |
Since Inception (April 7, 2014) |
|||||||||
Class I | ||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-8.48% | 0.96% | 2.09% | |||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions |
-10.15% | -0.77% | 0.36% | |||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares |
-5.00% | 0.03% | 0.85% | |||||||||
Class N | ||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-8.73% | 0.71% | 1.83% | |||||||||
Class R61 | ||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-8.45% | 0.99% | 2.11% | |||||||||
ICE BofA 1-3 Year Eurodollar
Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) |
-3.73% | 1.35% | 1.34% | |||||||||
ICE BofA SOFR
Overnight Rate Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) |
1.66% | 1.18% | 0.83% |
1 |
Class R6 shares were not available for purchase until July 31, 2019. The performance shown for Class R6 shares prior to that date is that of the Class I shares of the Fund, another class of the Fund that is invested in the same portfolio of securities as Class R6 shares. Annual returns of Class R6 shares would have differed from that shown for the period prior to July 31, 2019 only to the extent that Class R6 shares and Class I shares have different expenses. |
The Fund’s after-tax returns as shown in the above table are calculated using the historical highest applicable individual federal marginal income tax rates for the period and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Your actual after-tax returns depend on your tax situation and may differ from those shown. If you own shares of the Fund in a tax-advantaged account, such as a 401(k) plan or an individual retirement account, after-tax returns shown are not relevant to your investment. The “Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares” may be higher than other return figures because when a capital loss occurs upon the redemption of shares of the Fund, a tax deduction is provided that may benefit the investor. After-tax returns are for Class I shares only. After-tax returns for other classes may vary. The ICE BofA 1-3 Year Eurodollar Index is a subset of the ICE BofA Eurodollar Index including all securities with a remaining term to final maturity less than 3 years. The ICE BofA Eurodollar Index tracks the performance of US dollar denominated investment grade quasigovernment, corporate, securitized and collateralized debt publicly issued in the eurobond markets. Qualifying securities must have an investment grade rating (based on an average of Moody’s, S&P and Fitch). The ICE BofA SOFR Overnight Rate Index tracks the performance of a synthetic asset paying SOFR to a stated maturity. The ICE BofA SOFR Overnight Rate Index is based on the assumed purchase at par of a synthetic instrument having exactly its stated maturity and with a coupon equal to that day’s fixing rate. That issue is assumed to be sold the following business day (priced at a yield equal to the current day fixing rate) and rolled into a new instrument. Beginning in July 2022, transaction costs were incorporated into the calculation of total return for ICE fixed income indices. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.
Investment Adviser
DoubleLine Capital is the investment adviser to the Fund.
-59-
Portfolio Managers
The portfolio managers for the Fund are:
Name | Experience with the Fund |
Primary Title with the Investment Adviser | ||
Jeffrey E. Gundlach | Since the Fund’s inception in April 2014 | Chief Executive Officer | ||
Jeffrey J. Sherman | Since September 2016 | Deputy Chief Investment Officer |
Purchase and Sale of Shares
You may purchase or redeem Class I, Class N and Class R6 shares on any business day when the New York Stock Exchange opens for regular trading. You may purchase or redeem shares by written request via mail (DoubleLine Funds, c/o U.S. Bank Global Fund Services, P.O. Box 701, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0701), by wire transfer, by telephone at 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311), or through authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers (“financial intermediaries”). Telephone transactions will be permitted unless you decline this privilege on your initial purchase application. The minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts for different types of accounts are shown below, although the Fund may reduce or waive the minimums in some cases.
Minimum Initial Investment: | Subsequent Investment: |
|||||||||||
Regular Accounts |
IRAs/HSAs |
All Accounts and Investment Plans |
||||||||||
Class I Shares | $ | 100,000 | $ | 5,000 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class N Shares | $ | 2,000 | $ | 500 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class R6 Shares | None | * | N/A | N/A |
* |
See eligibility limitations below. |
The minimum investment may be modified for certain financial intermediaries that submit trades on behalf of underlying investors. Certain financial intermediaries also may have their own investment minimums, which may differ from the Fund’s minimums, and may be waived at the intermediaries’ discretion. The Fund reserves the right to change or waive the minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts without prior notice or to waive the minimum investment amounts for certain intermediaries or individual investors in its discretion.
Eligibility for Class R6 Shares. Only authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers who have an agreement with the Fund’s distributor to make Class R6 shares available to their clients who are Class R6 eligible plans or other eligible investors are authorized to accept, on behalf of the Fund, purchase and exchange orders and redemption requests for Class R6 shares placed by or on behalf of Class R6 eligible plans or other eligible investors. In addition, Class R6 shares may also be purchased directly from the Fund’s transfer agent by a Class R6 eligible plan if such shares are held in an omnibus account opened in the plan’s name directly with the Fund’s transfer agent.
Tax Information
The Fund’s distributions generally are taxable to you as ordinary income or capital gains, unless you are investing through a tax-advantaged arrangement, such as a 401(k) plan or individual retirement account. If you invest through such tax-advantaged arrangements, you may be taxed later upon withdrawal from those arrangements.
Payments to Broker-Dealers and Other Financial Intermediaries
If you purchase shares of the Fund through a broker-dealer or other financial intermediary (such as a bank), the Fund, the Adviser, and the Fund’s distributor or any of their affiliates may pay the financial intermediary for the sale of Fund shares and related services. These payments may create a conflict of interest by influencing the financial intermediary and your salesperson to recommend the Fund over another investment. Ask your individual salesperson or visit your financial intermediary’s website for more information.
-60-
Fund Summary
DoubleLine Low Duration Emerging
Markets Fixed Income Fund
Investment Objective
The Fund’s investment objective is to seek long term total return.
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Fund. You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries (defined below), including when purchasing Class I shares through a broker or other financial intermediary acting as an agent on your behalf. Such commissions and other fees, if any, are not charged by the Fund and are not reflected in the fee table or expense example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of the offering price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of the original purchase price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Reinvested Dividends | None | None | ||
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of shares redeemed within 90 days of purchase) | None | None | ||
Fee for Redemption by Wire | $15 | $15 | ||
Exchange Fee | None | None | ||
Account Fee | None | None |
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||||||
Management Fees | 0.50% | 0.50% | ||||||
Distribution and/or Service (12b-1) Fees | None | 0.25% | ||||||
Other Expenses (includes sub-transfer agent accounting or administrative services expenses) | 0.19% | 0.18% | ||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses Before Fee Waiver and/or Expense Reimbursement | 0.69% | 0.93% | ||||||
Fee Waiver and/or Expense Reimbursement1 |
-0.10% | -0.09% | ||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses After Fee Waiver and/or Expense Reimbursement |
0.59% | 0.84% |
1 |
DoubleLine Capital LP (the “Adviser” or “DoubleLine Capital”) has contractually agreed to waive its investment advisory fee and to reimburse the Fund for other ordinary operating expenses to the extent necessary to limit ordinary operating expenses to an amount not to exceed 0.59% for Class I shares and 0.84% for Class N shares. Ordinary operating expenses exclude taxes, commissions, mark-ups, litigation expenses, indemnification expenses, interest expenses, Acquired Fund Fees and Expenses, and any extraordinary expenses. These expense limitations will apply until at least August 1, 2024, except that they may be terminated by the Board of Trustees at any time. To the extent that the Adviser waives its investment advisory fee and/or reimburses the Fund for other ordinary operating expenses, it may seek reimbursement of a portion or all of such amounts at any time within three fiscal years after the fiscal year in which such amounts were waived or reimbursed. Any such recoupment may not cause the Fund’s ordinary operating expenses to exceed the expense limitation that was in place when the fees were waived or expenses were reimbursed. Additionally, the Adviser would generally seek recoupment only in accordance with the terms of any expense limitation that is in place at the time of recoupment. |
Example
This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds.
-61-
This example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all your shares at the end of those periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same (taking into account the Fund’s expense limitation for the first year). Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions, your costs would be:
Class I | Class N | |||
1 Year | $60 | $86 | ||
3 Years | $211 | $287 | ||
5 Years | $374 | $506 | ||
10 Years | $849 | $1,135 |
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund incurs transaction costs when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the Fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 37% of the average value of its portfolio.
Principal Investment Strategies
The Fund normally invests primarily in debt obligations issued by sovereign, quasi-sovereign and private (non-government) emerging market issuers. Sovereign and quasi-sovereign emerging market issuers include governments of emerging market countries, and governmental entities or agencies, and issuers that are owned, in whole or in part, or whose obligations are guaranteed, in whole or in part, by a government or governmental entity or agency of an emerging market country. Private emerging market issuers include private (non-governmental) issuers domiciled or located in emerging market countries, issuers with their principal place of business or corporate headquarters located in an emerging market country, or issuers the Adviser has determined are emerging market issuers based on a consideration of a number of qualitative factors, including the relative importance of emerging markets to the issuer’s business, including the issuer’s profits, revenues, assets and/or future potential growth.
Although the Fund may invest in individual securities of any maturity or duration, the Adviser will normally seek to construct an investment portfolio for the Fund with a dollar-weighted average effective duration of three years or less. Duration is a measure of the expected life of a fixed income instrument that is used to determine the sensitivity of a security’s price to changes in interest rates. Effective duration is a measure of the Fund’s portfolio duration adjusted for the anticipated effect of interest rate changes on prepayment rates as determined by the Adviser. The effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio may vary significantly from time to time, and there is no assurance that the effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio will not exceed three years at any time.
An “emerging market country” is a country that, at the time the Fund invests in the related fixed income instruments, is classified as an emerging or developing economy by any supranational organization such as an institution in the World Bank Group or the United Nations, or an agency thereof, or is considered an emerging market country for purposes of constructing a major emerging market securities index.
The Fund may invest without limit in investments denominated in any currency, but currently expects to invest a substantial amount of its assets in investments denominated in the U.S. dollar.
The Fund generally will invest in at least three emerging market countries. In allocating investments among various emerging market countries, the portfolio managers attempt to analyze internal political, market and economic factors. These factors may include:
• |
public finances; |
• |
monetary policy; |
• |
external accounts; |
• |
financial markets; |
• |
foreign investment regulations; |
-62-
• |
stability of exchange rate policy; and |
• |
labor conditions. |
The Fund may invest in obligations of any credit quality, including those that at the time of investment are rated BB+ or lower by S&P Global Ratings or Ba1 or lower by Moody’s Investors Service, Inc. or the equivalent by any other nationally recognized statistical rating organization or in unrated securities that are determined by the Adviser to be of comparable quality. Corporate bonds and certain other fixed income instruments rated below investment grade, or such instruments that are unrated and determined by the Adviser to be of comparable quality, are high yield, high risk bonds, commonly known as “junk bonds.”
The Fund may invest in fixed income and debt obligations of any kind. Fixed income obligations include bonds, debt securities and fixed income and income-producing instruments of any kind issued or guaranteed by governmental or private-sector entities and other securities or instruments bearing fixed, floating, or variable interest rates of any maturity. Most fixed income obligations consist of a security or instrument having one or more of the following characteristics: an income-producing obligation, an obligation issued at a discount to its face value, an obligation that pays interest, whether fixed, floating or variable, or an obligation with a stated principal amount that requires repayment of some or all of that principal amount to the holder of the obligation. The Adviser interprets the term fixed income obligation broadly as an instrument or security evidencing what is commonly referred to as an IOU rather than evidencing the ownership of corporate equity unless that equity represents an indirect or derivative interest in one or more debt securities. The Fund’s fixed-income investments may include, by way of example, corporate debt obligations; mortgage- and asset-backed securities; inflation-indexed bonds; fixed and floating rate loans of any kind (including, among others, bank loans, and assignments, participations, subordinated loans, debtor-in-possession loans, exit facilities, delayed funding loans and revolving credit facilities); income-producing securitized products; and preferred securities.
Under normal circumstances, the Fund invests at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in fixed income instruments. If the Fund changes this investment policy, it will notify shareholders at least 60 days in advance of the change.
The Fund may invest in hybrid securities relating to emerging market countries.
The Fund may invest up to 20% of its net assets in defaulted corporate securities. The Fund might do so, for example, where the portfolio managers believe the restructured enterprise valuations or liquidation valuations may exceed current market values. In addition, the Fund may invest in defaulted sovereign investments, including, for example, where the portfolio managers believe the expected debt sustainability of the country is not reflected in current market valuations.
The Fund may pursue its investment objective and obtain exposures to some or all of the asset classes described above by investing in other investment companies, including, for example, other open-end or closed-end investment companies and exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”), including investment companies sponsored or managed by the Adviser or its related parties. The amount of the Fund’s investment in certain investment companies may be limited by law or by tax considerations.
The Adviser monitors the duration of the Fund’s portfolio securities to seek to assess and, in its discretion, adjust the Fund’s exposure to interest rate risk. The Adviser may seek to manage the dollar-weighted average effective duration of the Fund’s portfolio through the use of derivatives and other instruments (including, among others, inverse floaters, futures contracts, U.S. Treasury swaps, interest rate swaps, total return swaps and options, including options on swap agreements). The Fund may incur costs in implementing duration management strategies, and there can be no assurance that the Fund will engage in duration management strategies or that any duration management strategy employed by the Fund will be successful.
The Fund may enter into derivatives transactions and other instruments of any kind for hedging purposes or otherwise to gain, or reduce, long or short exposure to one or more asset classes or issuers. The Fund also may use derivatives transactions with the purpose or effect of creating investment leverage. The Fund may enter into currency-related transactions, including spot transactions, forward exchange contracts and futures contracts. The Fund may, but will not necessarily, enter into foreign currency exchange transactions to take a “long” or “short” position in a currency or to hedge against currency exposure in its portfolio. The results of such transactions also may represent, from time to time, a significant component of the Fund’s investment returns. The Adviser considers various factors, such as availability and cost, in deciding whether, when and to what extent to enter into derivative transactions.
There is no limit on the amount of the Fund’s assets that may be allocated to one or more specific asset classes or market sectors.
-63-
Portfolio securities may be sold at any time. By way of example, sales may occur when the Fund’s portfolio managers determine to take advantage of what the portfolio managers consider to be a better investment opportunity, when the portfolio managers believe the portfolio securities no longer represent relatively attractive investment opportunities, when the portfolio managers perceive deterioration in the credit fundamentals of the issuer, or when the individual security has reached the portfolio managers’ sell target.
Principal Risks
The value of the Fund’s shares will vary as its portfolio investments increase or decrease in value. Therefore, the value of your investment in the Fund could go down as well as up. You can lose money by investing in the Fund. The Fund’s principal risks are listed below in alphabetical order, not in order of importance. The significance of any specific risk to an investment in the Fund will vary over time, depending on the composition of the Fund’s portfolio, market conditions, and other factors. You should read all of the risk information presented below carefully, because any one or more of these risks may result in losses to the Fund.
The principal risks affecting the Fund that can cause a decline in value are:
• |
active management risk: the risk that the Fund will fail to meet its investment objective and that the Fund’s investment performance will depend, at least in part, on how its assets are allocated and reallocated among asset classes, sectors, underlying funds and/or investments and that such allocation will focus on asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or investments that perform poorly or underperform other asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or available investments. Any given investment strategy may fail to produce the intended results, and the Fund’s portfolio may underperform other comparable funds because of portfolio management decisions related to, among other things, the selection of investments, portfolio construction, risk assessments, and/or the outlook on market trends and opportunities. |
• |
cash position risk: the risk that to the extent that the Fund holds assets in cash, cash equivalents, and other short-term investments, the ability of the Fund to meet its objective may be limited. |
• |
counterparty risk: the risk that the Fund will be subject to credit risk with respect to the counterparties to the derivative contracts and other instruments entered into by the Fund; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; that the Fund will be unable to enforce contractual remedies if its counterparty defaults; that if a counterparty (or an affiliate of a counterparty) becomes bankrupt, the Fund may experience significant delays in obtaining any recovery or may obtain limited or no recovery in a bankruptcy or other insolvency proceeding. To the extent that the Fund enters into multiple transactions with a single or a small set of counterparties, it will be subject to increased counterparty risk. |
• |
debt securities risks: |
¡ |
credit risk: the risk that an issuer, counterparty or other obligor to the Fund will fail to pay its obligations to the Fund when they are due, which may reduce the Fund’s income and/or reduce, in whole or in part, the value of the Fund’s investment. Actual or perceived changes in the financial condition of an obligor, changes in economic, social or political conditions that affect a particular type of security, instrument, or obligor, and changes in economic, social or political conditions generally can increase the risk of default by an obligor, which can affect a security’s or other instrument’s credit quality or value and an obligor’s ability to honor its obligations when due. The values of lower-quality debt securities (commonly known as “junk bonds”), including floating rate loans, tend to be particularly sensitive to these changes. The values of securities or instruments also may decline for a number of other reasons that relate directly to the obligor, such as management performance, financial leverage, and reduced demand for the obligor’s goods and services, as well as the historical and prospective earnings of the obligor and the value of its assets. |
¡ |
extension risk: the risk that if interest rates rise, repayments of principal on certain debt securities, including, but not limited to, floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, may occur at a slower rate than expected and the expected maturity of those securities could lengthen as a result. Securities that are subject to extension risk generally have a greater potential for loss when prevailing interest rates rise, which could cause their values to fall sharply. |
¡ |
interest rate risk: the risk that debt instruments will change in value because of changes in interest rates. The value of an instrument with a longer duration (whether positive or negative) will be more sensitive to changes in interest rates than a similar instrument with a shorter duration. Bonds and other debt instruments typically have a positive |
-64-
duration. The value of a debt instrument with positive duration will generally decline if interest rates increase. Certain other investments, such as inverse floaters and certain derivative instruments, may have a negative duration. The value of instruments with a negative duration will generally decline if interest rates decrease. Inverse floaters, interest-only and principal-only securities are especially sensitive to interest rate changes, which can affect not only their prices but can also change the income flows and repayment assumptions about those investments. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. The risks associated with rising interest rates are heightened under current market conditions given that the U.S. Federal Reserve has begun to raise interest rates from historically low levels and may continue to do so. Further, in market environments where interest rates are rising, issuers may be less willing or able to make principal and interest payments on fixed-income investments when due. |
¡ |
prepayment risk: the risk that the issuer of a debt security, including floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, repays all or a portion of the principal prior to the security’s maturity. In times of declining interest rates, there is a greater likelihood that the Fund’s higher yielding securities will be pre-paid with the Fund being unable to reinvest the proceeds in an investment with as great a yield. Prepayments can therefore result in lower yields to shareholders of the Fund. |
¡ |
LIBOR phase out/transition risk: the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) was the offered rate for wholesale, unsecured funding available to major international banks. The terms of many investments, financings or other transactions to which the Fund may be a party have been historically tied to LIBOR. LIBOR has historically been a significant factor in relation to payment obligations under a derivative investment and has also been used in other ways that affect the Fund’s investment performance. In connection with the global transition away from LIBOR led by regulators and market participants, LIBOR is no longer published on a representative basis. The transition from LIBOR and the terms of any replacement rate(s), including, for example, the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (“SOFR”) or another rate based on SOFR, may adversely affect transactions that used LIBOR as a reference rate, financial institutions that engaged in such transactions, and the financial markets generally. There are significant differences between LIBOR and SOFR, such as LIBOR being an unsecured lending rate while SOFR is a secured lending rate. As such, the potential effect of the transition away from LIBOR on the Fund or the financial instruments in which the Fund invests cannot yet be fully determined, but the transition may adversely affect the Fund’s performance. |
• |
defaulted securities risk: the significant risk of the uncertainty of repayment of defaulted securities (e.g., a security on which a principal or interest payment is not made when due) and obligations of distressed issuers (including insolvent issuers or issuers in payment or covenant default, in workout or restructuring or in bankruptcy or similar proceedings). Such investments entail high risk and have speculative characteristics. |
• |
derivatives risk: the risk that an investment in derivatives will not perform as anticipated by the Adviser, may not be available at the time or price desired, cannot be closed out at a favorable time or price, will increase the Fund’s transaction costs, or will increase the Fund’s volatility; that derivatives may create investment leverage; that, when a derivative is used as a substitute for or alternative to a direct cash investment, the transaction may not provide a return that corresponds precisely or at all with that of the cash investment; that the positions may be improperly executed or constructed; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; or that, when used for hedging purposes, derivatives will not provide the anticipated protection, causing the Fund to lose money on both the derivatives transaction and the exposure the Fund sought to hedge. |
Please also see “debt securities risks — LIBOR phase out/transition risk” herein for more information.
• |
emerging market country risk: the risk that investing in emerging markets, as compared to foreign developed markets, increases the likelihood that the Fund will lose money, due to more limited information about the issuer and/or the security; higher brokerage costs; different accounting, auditing and financial reporting standards; less developed legal systems and thinner trading markets; the possibility of currency blockages or transfer restrictions; an emerging market country’s dependence on revenue from particular commodities or international aid; and expropriation, nationalization or other adverse political or economic developments. |
• |
financial services risk: the risk that an investment in issuers in the financial services sector or transactions with one or more counterparties in the financial services sector may be adversely affected by, among other things: (i) changes in governmental regulation, which may limit both the amounts and the types of loans and other financial commitments financial services companies can make, the interest rates and fees they can charge, the scope of their activities, the prices |
-65-
they can charge and the amount of capital they must maintain; (ii) fluctuations, including as a result of interest rate changes or increased competition, in the availability and cost of capital funds on which the profitability of financial services companies is largely dependent; (iii) deterioration of the credit markets; (iv) credit losses resulting from financial difficulties of borrowers, especially when financial services companies are exposed to non-diversified or concentrated loan portfolios; (v) financial losses associated with investment activities, especially when financial services companies are exposed to financial leverage; (vi) the risk that any financial services company experiences substantial declines in the valuations of its assets, takes action to raise capital, or ceases operations; (vii) the risk that a market shock or other unexpected market, economic, political, regulatory, or other event might lead to a sudden decline in the values of most or all companies in the financial services sector; (viii) events leading to limited liquidity, defaults, non-performance or other adverse developments that affect financial institutions or the financial services industry generally, or concerns or rumors about any events of these kinds or other similar risks, leading to market-wide liquidity problems; and (ix) the interconnectedness or interdependence among financial services companies, including the risk that the financial distress or failure of one financial services company may materially and adversely affect a number of other financial services companies. |
• |
foreign currency risk: the risk that fluctuations in exchange rates may adversely affect the value of the Fund’s investments denominated in foreign currencies. |
• |
foreign investing risk: the risk that investments in foreign securities or in issuers with significant exposure to foreign markets, as compared to investments in U.S. securities or in issuers with predominantly domestic market exposure, may be more vulnerable to economic, political, and social instability and subject to less government supervision, less protective custody practices, lack of transparency, inadequate regulatory and accounting standards, delayed or infrequent settlement of transactions, and foreign taxes. If the Fund buys securities denominated in a foreign currency, receives income in foreign currencies, or holds foreign currencies from time to time, the value of the Fund’s assets, as measured in U.S. dollars, can be affected unfavorably by changes in exchange rates relative to the U.S. dollar or other foreign currencies. Foreign markets are also subject to the risk that a foreign government could restrict foreign exchange transactions or otherwise implement unfavorable currency regulations. In addition, foreign securities may be subject to currency exchange rates or regulations, the imposition of economic sanctions, tariffs or other government restrictions, higher transaction and other costs, reduced liquidity, and delays in settlement. |
• |
high yield risk: the risk that debt instruments rated below investment grade or debt instruments that are unrated and of comparable or lesser quality are predominantly speculative. These instruments, commonly known as “junk bonds,” have a higher degree of default risk and may be less liquid than higher-rated bonds. These instruments may be subject to greater price volatility due to such factors as specific corporate developments, interest rate sensitivity, negative perceptions of high yield investments generally, and less secondary market liquidity. |
• |
inflation-indexed bond risk: the risk that such bonds will change in value in response to actual or anticipated changes in inflation rates in a manner unanticipated by the Fund’s portfolio management team or investors generally. Inflation-indexed bonds are subject to debt securities risks. |
• |
investment company and exchange-traded fund risk: the risk that an investment company or other pooled investment vehicle, including any ETFs or money market funds, in which the Fund invests will not achieve its investment objective or execute its investment strategies effectively or that significant purchase or redemption activity by shareholders of such an investment company might negatively affect the value of its shares. The Fund must pay its pro rata portion of an investment company’s fees and expenses. To the extent the Adviser determines to invest Fund assets in other investment companies, the Adviser will have an incentive to invest in other investment vehicles sponsored or advised by the Adviser or a related party of the Adviser over investment companies sponsored or managed by others and to maintain such investments once made due to its own financial interest in those products and other business considerations. |
• |
large shareholder risk: the risk that certain account holders, including the Adviser or funds or accounts over which the Adviser (or related parties of the Adviser) has investment discretion, may from time to time own or control a significant percentage of the Fund’s shares. The Fund is subject to the risk that a redemption by those shareholders of all or a portion of their Fund shares, including as a result of an asset allocation decision made by the Adviser (or related parties of the Adviser), will adversely affect the Fund’s performance if it is forced to sell portfolio securities or invest cash when the Adviser would not otherwise choose to do so. Redemptions of a large number of shares may affect the liquidity of the Fund’s portfolio, increase the Fund’s transaction costs, and accelerate the realization of taxable income and/or gains to shareholders. |
• |
leveraging risk: the risk that certain investments by the Fund involving leverage may have the effect of increasing the volatility of the value of the Fund’s portfolio, and the risk of loss in excess of invested capital. |
-66-
• |
liquidity risk: the risk that the Fund may be unable to sell a portfolio investment at a desirable time or at the value the Fund has placed on the investment. Illiquidity may be the result of, for example, low trading volume, lack of a market maker, or contractual or legal restrictions that limit or prevent the Fund from selling securities or closing derivative positions. During periods of substantial market disruption, a large portion of the Fund’s assets could potentially experience significant levels of illiquidity. The values of illiquid investments are often more volatile than the values of more liquid investments. It may be more difficult for the Fund to determine a fair value of an illiquid investment than that of a more liquid comparable investment. |
• |
market risk: the risk that markets will perform poorly or that the returns from the securities in which the Fund invests will underperform returns from the general securities markets or other types of investments. Markets may, in response to governmental actions or intervention or general market conditions, including real or perceived adverse political, economic or market conditions, tariffs and trade disruptions, inflation, recession, changes in interest or currency rates, lack of liquidity in the bond markets or adverse investor sentiment, or other external factors, experience periods of high volatility and reduced liquidity. During those periods, the Fund may experience high levels of shareholder redemptions, and may have to sell securities at times when the Fund would otherwise not do so, and potentially at unfavorable prices. Certain securities may be difficult to value during such periods. Market risk involves the risk that the value of the Fund’s investment portfolio will change, potentially frequently and in large amounts, as the prices of its investments go up or down. During periods of severe market stress, it is possible that the market for some or all of a Fund’s investments may become highly illiquid. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. Please see “debt securities risks – interest rate risk” herein for more information. |
• |
operational and information security risks: an investment in the Fund, like any fund, can involve operational risks arising from factors such as processing errors, human errors, inadequate or failed internal or external processes, failures in systems and technology, changes in personnel and errors caused by third-party service providers. The occurrence of any of these failures, errors or breaches could result in investment losses to the Fund, a loss of information, regulatory scrutiny, reputational damage or other events, any of which could have a material adverse effect on the Fund. While the Fund seeks to minimize such events through controls and oversight, there may still be failures that could cause losses to the Fund. |
• |
restricted securities risk: the risk that the Fund may be prevented or limited by law or the terms of an agreement from selling a security (a “restricted security”). To the extent that the Fund is permitted to sell a restricted security, there can be no assurance that a trading market will exist at any particular time, and the Fund may be unable to dispose of the security promptly at reasonable prices or at all. The Fund may have to bear the expense of registering the securities for resale and the risk of substantial delays in effecting the registration. Also, restricted securities may be difficult to value because market quotations may not be readily available, and the values of restricted securities may have significant volatility. |
• |
securities or sector selection risk: the risk that the securities held by the Fund will underperform securities held in other funds investing in similar asset classes or comparable benchmarks because of the portfolio managers’ choice of securities or sectors for investment. To the extent the Fund allocates a higher percentage of its investment portfolio to a particular sector or related sectors, the Fund will be more susceptible to events or factors affecting companies in that sector or related sectors. For example, the values of securities of companies in the same or related sectors may be negatively affected by the common characteristics they share, the common business risks to which they are subject, common regulatory burdens, or regulatory changes that affect them similarly. Such characteristics, risks, burdens or changes include, but are not limited to, changes in governmental regulation, inflation or deflation, rising or falling interest rates, competition from new entrants, and other economic, market, political or other developments specific to that sector or related sectors. |
• |
sovereign debt obligations risk: the risk that investments in debt obligations of sovereign governments may lose value due to the government entity’s unwillingness or inability to repay principal and interest when due in accordance with the terms of the debt or otherwise in a timely manner. Sovereign governments may default on their debt obligations for a number of reasons, including social, political, economic and diplomatic changes in countries issuing sovereign debt. The Fund may have limited (or no) recourse in the event of a default because bankruptcy, moratorium and other similar laws applicable to issuers of sovereign debt obligations may be substantially different from those applicable to private issuers, and any recourse may be subject to the political climate in the relevant country. In addition, foreign governmental entities may enjoy various levels of sovereign immunity, and it may be difficult or impossible to bring a legal action against a foreign governmental entity or to enforce a judgment against such an entity. Holders of certain foreign government debt securities may be requested to participate in the restructuring of such obligations and to extend further loans to their issuers. There |
-67-
can be no assurance that the foreign government debt securities in which the Fund may invest will not be subject to similar restructuring arrangements or to requests for new credit, which may adversely affect the Fund’s holdings. |
• |
structured products and structured notes risk: the risk that an investment in a structured product, which includes, among other things, collateralized debt obligations, mortgage-backed securities, other types of asset-backed securities and certain types of structured notes, may decline in value due to changes in the underlying instruments, indexes, interest rates or other factors on which the product is based (“reference measure”). Depending on the reference measure used and the use of multipliers or deflators (if any), changes in interest rates and movement of the reference measure may cause significant price and cash flow fluctuations. Application of a multiplier is comparable to the use of financial leverage, a speculative technique. Holders of structured products indirectly bear risks associated with the reference measure, are subject to counterparty risk and typically do not have direct rights against the reference measure. Structured products are generally privately offered and sold, and thus, are not registered under the securities laws and may be thinly traded or have a limited trading market and may have the effect of increasing the Fund’s illiquidity, reducing the Fund’s income and the value of the investment. At a particular point in time, the Fund may be unable to find qualified buyers for these securities. Investments in structured notes involve risks including interest rate risk, credit risk and market risk. |
• |
valuation risk: the risk that the Fund will not value its investments in a manner that accurately reflects their market values or that the Fund will not be able to sell any investment at a price equal to the valuation ascribed to that investment for purposes of calculating the Fund’s net asset value (“NAV”). The valuation of the Fund’s investments involves subjective judgment. Certain securities in which the Fund may invest may be more difficult to value accurately, especially during periods of market disruptions or extreme market volatility. Incorrect valuations of the Fund’s portfolio holdings could result in the Fund’s shareholder transactions being effected at an NAV that does not accurately reflect the underlying value of the Fund’s portfolio, resulting in the dilution of shareholder interests. |
Please see “Additional Information About Principal Investment Strategies and Principal Risks — Principal Risks” for a more detailed description of the principal risks of investing in the Fund.
Performance
The following performance information provides some indication of the risks of investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows the performance of the Fund’s Class I shares for each full calendar year since the Fund’s inception. The table below shows how the average annual total returns of the Fund’s shares for the periods shown compare to those of a broad-based securities market index. The Fund’s past performance (before and after taxes) is not necessarily an indication of how the Fund will perform in the future. Absent any applicable fee waivers and/or expense limitations (which have applied to the Fund since inception), performance would have been lower. Updated information on the Fund’s investment results can be obtained at no charge by calling 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311) or by visiting the Fund’s website at www.doubleline.com.
Class I Shares
During the periods shown above, the highest and lowest quarterly returns earned by the Fund’s Class I shares were:
Highest: | 5.13% | Quarter ended 6/30/2020 | ||
Lowest: | -4.71% | Quarter ended 3/31/2020 |
The year-to-date total return for the Fund’s Class I shares as of June 30, 2023 was 2.47%.
-68-
Average Annual Total Returns (for the periods ended December 31, 2022)
Low Duration Emerging Markets Fixed Income Fund | One Year | Five Years |
Since Inception (April 7, 2014) |
|||||||||
Class I | ||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-5.05% | 1.10% | 1.91% | |||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions |
-5.97% | -0.05% | 0.61% | |||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares |
-2.99% | 0.37% | 0.90% | |||||||||
Class N | ||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-5.38% | 0.84% | 1.66% | |||||||||
J.P. Morgan
CEMBI Broad Diversified 1-3 Year
Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) |
-7.77% | 1.50% | 2.32% |
The Fund’s after-tax returns as shown in the above table are calculated using the historical highest applicable individual federal marginal income tax rates for the period and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Your actual after-tax returns depend on your tax situation and may differ from those shown. If you own shares of the Fund in a tax-advantaged account, such as a 401(k) plan or an individual retirement account, after-tax returns shown are not relevant to your investment. The “Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares” may be higher than other return figures because when a capital loss occurs upon the redemption of shares of the Fund, a tax deduction is provided that may benefit the investor. After-tax returns are for Class I shares only. After-tax returns for other classes may vary. The J.P. Morgan CEMBI Broad Diversified 1-3 Year Index is a market capitalization weighted index consisting of US denominated emerging market corporate bonds with 1-3 year maturity. It is a liquid global corporate benchmark representing Asia, Latin America, Europe, and the Middle East/Africa. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.
Investment Adviser
DoubleLine Capital is the investment adviser to the Fund.
Portfolio Managers
The portfolio managers for the Fund are:
Name |
Experience with the Fund |
Primary Title with the Investment Adviser | ||
Mark W. Christensen | Since the Fund’s inception in April 2014 | Portfolio Manager | ||
Su Fei Koo | Since the Fund’s inception in April 2014 | Portfolio Manager | ||
Luz M. Padilla | Since the Fund’s inception in April 2014 | Portfolio Manager |
Purchase and Sale of Shares
You may purchase or redeem Class I and Class N shares on any business day when the New York Stock Exchange opens for regular trading. You may purchase or redeem shares by written request via mail (DoubleLine Funds, c/o U.S. Bank Global Fund Services, P.O. Box 701, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0701), by wire transfer, by telephone at 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311), or through authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers (“financial intermediaries”). Telephone transactions will be permitted unless you decline this privilege on your initial purchase application. The minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts for different types of accounts are shown below, although the Fund may reduce or waive the minimums in some cases.
Minimum Initial Investment: | Subsequent Investment: |
|||||||||||
Regular Accounts |
IRAs/HSAs | All Accounts and Automatic Investment Plans |
||||||||||
Class I Shares | $ | 100,000 | $ | 5,000 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class N Shares | $ | 2,000 | $ | 500 | $ | 100 |
-69-
The minimum investment may be modified for certain financial intermediaries that submit trades on behalf of underlying investors. Certain financial intermediaries also may have their own investment minimums, which may differ from the Fund’s minimums, and may be waived at the intermediaries’ discretion. The Fund reserves the right to change or waive the minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts without prior notice or to waive the minimum investment amounts for certain intermediaries or individual investors in its discretion.
Tax Information
The Fund’s distributions generally are taxable to you as ordinary income or capital gains, unless you are investing through a tax-advantaged arrangement, such as a 401(k) plan or individual retirement account. If you invest through such tax-advantaged arrangements, you may be taxed later upon withdrawal from those arrangements.
Payments to Broker-Dealers and Other Financial Intermediaries
If you purchase shares of the Fund through a broker-dealer or other financial intermediary (such as a bank), the Fund, the Adviser, and the Fund’s distributor or any of their affiliates may pay the financial intermediary for the sale of Fund shares and related services. These payments may create a conflict of interest by influencing the financial intermediary and your salesperson to recommend the Fund over another investment. Ask your individual salesperson or visit your financial intermediary’s website for more information.
-70-
Fund Summary
DoubleLine Long Duration Total Return Bond Fund
Investment Objective
The Fund’s investment objective is to seek long-term total return.
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Fund. You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries (defined below), including when purchasing Class I shares through a broker or other financial intermediary acting as an agent on your behalf. Such commissions and other fees, if any, are not charged by the Fund and are not reflected in the fee table or expense example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of the offering price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of the original purchase price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Reinvested Dividends | None | None | ||
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of shares redeemed within 90 days of purchase) | None | None | ||
Fee for Redemption by Wire | $15 | $15 | ||
Exchange Fee | None | None | ||
Account Fee | None | None |
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||||||
Management Fees | 0.35% | 0.35% | ||||||
Distribution and/or Service (12b-1) Fees | None | 0.25% | ||||||
Other Expenses (includes sub-transfer agent accounting or administrative services expenses) | 0.24% | 0.23% | ||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses Before Fee Waiver and/or Expense Reimbursement | 0.59% | 0.83% | ||||||
Fee Waiver and/or Expense Reimbursement1 |
-0.09% | -0.08% | ||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses After Fee Waiver and/or Expense Reimbursement |
0.50% | 0.75% |
1 |
DoubleLine Capital LP (the “Adviser” or “DoubleLine Capital”) has contractually agreed to waive its investment advisory fee and to reimburse the Fund for other ordinary operating expenses to the extent necessary to limit ordinary operating expenses to an amount not to exceed 0.50% for Class I shares and 0.75% for Class N shares. Ordinary operating expenses exclude taxes, commissions, mark-ups, litigation expenses, indemnification expenses, interest expenses, Acquired Fund Fees and Expenses, and any extraordinary expenses. These expense limitations will apply until at least August 1, 2024, except that they may be terminated by the Board of Trustees at any time. To the extent that the Adviser waives its investment advisory fee and/or reimburses the Fund for other ordinary operating expenses, it may seek reimbursement of a portion or all of such amounts at any time within three fiscal years after the fiscal year in which such amounts were waived or reimbursed. Any such recoupment may not cause the Fund’s ordinary operating expenses to exceed the expense limitation that was in place when the fees were waived or expenses were reimbursed. Additionally, the Adviser would generally seek recoupment only in accordance with the terms of any expense limitation that is in place at the time of recoupment. |
Example
This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds.
-71-
This example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all your shares at the end of those periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same (taking into account the Fund’s expense limitation for the first year). Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions, your costs would be:
Class I | Class N | |||
1 Year | $51 | $77 | ||
3 Years | $180 | $257 | ||
5 Years | $320 | $453 | ||
10 Years | $729 | $1,018 |
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund incurs transaction costs when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the Fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 227% of the average value of its portfolio.
Principal Investment Strategies
The Fund seeks long-term total return comprised of capital growth and current income by investing principally in debt securities of any kind. The Fund may invest without limit in mortgage-backed securities of any maturity or type, including those guaranteed by, or secured by collateral that is guaranteed by, the United States Government, its agencies, instrumentalities or sponsored corporations, as well as those of private issuers not subject to any guarantee. Mortgage-backed securities include, among others, government mortgage pass-through securities, collateralized mortgage obligations, multiclass pass-through securities, private mortgage pass-through securities, stripped mortgage securities (e.g., interest-only and principal-only securities) and inverse floaters. The Fund may also invest in corporate debt obligations; asset-backed securities; foreign securities (corporate and government, including foreign hybrid securities); emerging market securities (corporate and government); inflation-indexed bonds; bank loans and assignments; income-producing securitized products, including collateralized loan obligations (“CLOs”); preferred securities; and other instruments bearing fixed or variable interest rates of any maturity.
Under normal circumstances, the Adviser expects to construct an investment portfolio for the Fund with a dollar-weighted average effective duration of at least ten years. Duration is a measure of the expected life of a fixed income instrument that is used to determine the sensitivity of a security’s price to changes in interest rates. Effective duration is a measure of the Fund’s portfolio duration adjusted for the anticipated effect of interest rate changes on bond and mortgage prepayment rates as determined by the Adviser. The effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio may vary significantly from time to time based on, among other things, fluctuations in interest rates, changes in the rate of prepayments on mortgages underlying the Fund’s mortgage-related investments, and the Adviser’s expectations with respect to future interest rates. There can be no assurance that the effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio will equal or exceed ten years at all times. The Fund may invest in individual securities of any maturity or duration. Because the Fund will usually have a relatively long duration, the value of its shares will be especially sensitive to changes in interest rates.
In managing the Fund’s portfolio, the portfolio managers typically use a controlled risk approach. The techniques of this approach attempt to control the principal risk components of the fixed income markets and may include, among other factors, consideration of the Adviser’s view of the following: the potential relative performance of various market sectors, security selection available within a given sector, the risk/reward equation for different asset classes, liquidity conditions in various market sectors, the shape of the yield curve and projections for changes in the yield curve, potential fluctuations in the overall level of interest rates, and current fiscal policy.
Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest primarily in fixed income and other income-producing instruments rated investment grade and unrated securities considered by the Adviser to be of comparable credit quality. The Fund may, however, invest up to 20% of its total assets in fixed income and other income-producing instruments rated below investment grade and those that are unrated but determined by the Adviser to be of comparable credit quality. Those instruments include high yield, high risk bonds, commonly known as “junk bonds.”
-72-
The Fund will normally limit its foreign currency exposure (from non-U.S. dollar denominated securities or currencies) to 30% of its total assets, and may invest without limit in U.S. dollar-denominated securities of foreign issuers. The Fund may invest up to 25% of its total assets in obligations of governmental or private obligors in emerging market countries. The Adviser considers an “emerging market country” to be a country that, at the time the Fund invests in the related fixed income instruments, is classified as an emerging or developing economy by any supranational organization such as an institution in the World Bank Group or the United Nations, or an agency thereof, or is considered an emerging market country for purposes of constructing a major emerging market securities index.
The Adviser monitors the duration of the Fund’s portfolio securities to seek to assess and, in its discretion and subject to the duration parameters described above, adjust the Fund’s exposure to interest rate risk. The Adviser may seek to manage the dollar-weighted average effective duration of the Fund’s portfolio through the use of derivatives and other instruments (including, among others, inverse floaters, futures contracts, U.S. Treasury swaps, interest rate swaps, total return swaps and options, including options on swap agreements). The Fund may incur costs in implementing duration management strategies, and there can be no assurance that the Fund will engage in duration management strategies or that any duration management strategy employed by the Fund will be successful.
The Fund may enter into derivatives transactions and other instruments of any kind for hedging purposes or otherwise to gain, or reduce, long or short exposure to one or more asset classes or issuers. For example, the Fund may use futures contracts and options on futures contracts, in order to gain efficient long or short investment exposures as an alternative to cash investments or to hedge against portfolio exposures; interest rate swaps, to gain indirect long or short exposures to interest rates, issuers, or currencies, or to hedge against portfolio exposures; and total return swaps and credit derivatives (such as credit default swaps), put and call options, and exchange-traded and structured notes, to take indirect long or short positions on indexes, securities, currencies, or other indicators of value, or to hedge against portfolio exposures. The Fund may also engage in short sales or take short positions, either to adjust its duration or for other investment purposes. The Fund may use derivatives transactions with the purpose or effect of creating investment leverage.
Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in bonds. “Bonds” include bonds, debt securities and fixed income and income-producing instruments of any kind issued by governmental or private-sector entities. Most bonds consist of a security or instrument having one or more of the following characteristics: a fixed-income security, a security issued at a discount to its face value, a security that pays interest, whether fixed, floating or variable, or a security with a stated principal amount that requires repayment of some or all of that principal amount to the holder of the security. The Adviser interprets the term bond broadly as an instrument or security evidencing what is commonly referred to as an IOU rather than evidencing the corporate ownership of equity unless that equity represents an indirect or derivative interest in one or more debt securities.
The Fund may pursue its investment objective and obtain exposures to some or all of the asset classes described above by investing in other investment companies, including, for example, other open-end or closed-end investment companies and exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”), including investment companies sponsored or managed by the Adviser or its related parties. The amount of the Fund’s investment in certain investment companies may be limited by law or by tax considerations.
Portfolio securities may be sold at any time. By way of example, sales may occur when the Fund’s portfolio managers determine to take advantage of what the portfolio managers consider to be a better investment opportunity, when the portfolio managers believe the portfolio securities no longer represent relatively attractive investment opportunities, when the portfolio managers perceive deterioration in the credit fundamentals of the issuer, or when the individual security has reached the portfolio managers’ sell target.
Principal Risks
The value of the Fund’s shares will vary as its portfolio investments increase or decrease in value. Therefore, the value of your investment in the Fund could go down as well as up. You can lose money by investing in the Fund. The Fund’s principal risks are listed below in alphabetical order, not in order of importance. The significance of any specific risk to an investment in the Fund will vary over time, depending on the composition of the Fund’s portfolio, market conditions, and other factors. You should read all of the risk information presented below carefully, because any one or more of these risks may result in losses to the Fund.
-73-
The principal risks affecting the Fund that can cause a decline in value are:
• |
active management risk: the risk that the Fund will fail to meet its investment objective and that the Fund’s investment performance will depend, at least in part, on how its assets are allocated and reallocated among asset classes, sectors, underlying funds and/or investments and that such allocation will focus on asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or investments that perform poorly or underperform other asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or available investments. Any given investment strategy may fail to produce the intended results, and the Fund’s portfolio may underperform other comparable funds because of portfolio management decisions related to, among other things, the selection of investments, portfolio construction, risk assessments, and/or the outlook on market trends and opportunities. |
• |
asset-backed securities investment risk: the risk that borrowers may default on the obligations that underlie the asset-backed security and that, during periods of falling interest rates, asset-backed securities may be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate, and the risk that the impairment of the value of the collateral underlying a security in which the Fund invests (due, for example, to non-payment of loans) will result in a reduction in the value of the security. |
• |
cash position risk: the risk that to the extent that the Fund holds assets in cash, cash equivalents, and other short-term investments, the ability of the Fund to meet its objective may be limited. |
• |
collateralized debt obligations risk: the risks of an investment in a collateralized debt obligation (“CDO”) depend largely on the quality and type of the collateral and the tranche of the CDO in which the Fund invests. Normally, collateralized bond obligations, CLOs and other CDOs are privately offered and sold, and thus are not registered under the securities laws. As a result, investments in CDOs may be illiquid. In addition to the risks associated with debt instruments (e.g., interest rate risk and credit risk), CDOs carry additional risks including, but not limited to: (i) the possibility that distributions from collateral will not be adequate to make interest or other payments; (ii) the quality of the collateral may decline in value or default; (iii) the possibility that the Fund may invest in CDOs that are subordinate to other classes of the issuer’s securities; and (iv) the complex structure of the security may not be fully understood at the time of investment and may produce disputes with the issuer or unexpected investment results. |
• |
counterparty risk: the risk that the Fund will be subject to credit risk with respect to the counterparties to the derivative contracts and other instruments entered into by the Fund; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; that the Fund will be unable to enforce contractual remedies if its counterparty defaults; that if a counterparty (or an affiliate of a counterparty) becomes bankrupt, the Fund may experience significant delays in obtaining any recovery or may obtain limited or no recovery in a bankruptcy or other insolvency proceeding. To the extent that the Fund enters into multiple transactions with a single or a small set of counterparties, it will be subject to increased counterparty risk. |
• |
debt securities risks: |
¡ |
credit risk: the risk that an issuer, counterparty or other obligor to the Fund will fail to pay its obligations to the Fund when they are due, which may reduce the Fund’s income and/or reduce, in whole or in part, the value of the Fund’s investment. Actual or perceived changes in the financial condition of an obligor, changes in economic, social or political conditions that affect a particular type of security, instrument, or obligor, and changes in economic, social or political conditions generally can increase the risk of default by an obligor, which can affect a security’s or other instrument’s credit quality or value and an obligor’s ability to honor its obligations when due. The values of lower-quality debt securities (commonly known as “junk bonds”), including floating rate loans, tend to be particularly sensitive to these changes. The values of securities or instruments also may decline for a number of other reasons that relate directly to the obligor, such as management performance, financial leverage, and reduced demand for the obligor’s goods and services, as well as the historical and prospective earnings of the obligor and the value of its assets. |
¡ |
extension risk: the risk that if interest rates rise, repayments of principal on certain debt securities, including, but not limited to, floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, may occur at a slower rate than expected and the expected maturity of those securities could lengthen as a result. Securities that are subject to extension risk generally have a greater potential for loss when prevailing interest rates rise, which could cause their values to fall sharply. |
¡ |
interest rate risk: the risk that debt instruments will change in value because of changes in interest rates. The value of an instrument with a longer duration (whether positive or negative) will be more sensitive to changes in interest |
-74-
rates than a similar instrument with a shorter duration. Bonds and other debt instruments typically have a positive duration. The value of a debt instrument with positive duration will generally decline if interest rates increase. Certain other investments, such as inverse floaters and certain derivative instruments, may have a negative duration. The value of instruments with a negative duration will generally decline if interest rates decrease. Inverse floaters, interest-only and principal-only securities are especially sensitive to interest rate changes, which can affect not only their prices but can also change the income flows and repayment assumptions about those investments. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. The risks associated with rising interest rates are heightened under current market conditions given that the U.S. Federal Reserve has begun to raise interest rates from historically low levels and may continue to do so. Further, in market environments where interest rates are rising, issuers may be less willing or able to make principal and interest payments on fixed-income investments when due. |
¡ |
prepayment risk: the risk that the issuer of a debt security, including floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, repays all or a portion of the principal prior to the security’s maturity. In times of declining interest rates, there is a greater likelihood that the Fund’s higher yielding securities will be pre-paid with the Fund being unable to reinvest the proceeds in an investment with as great a yield. Prepayments can therefore result in lower yields to shareholders of the Fund. |
¡ |
LIBOR phase out/transition risk: the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) was the offered rate for wholesale, unsecured funding available to major international banks. The terms of many investments, financings or other transactions to which the Fund may be a party have been historically tied to LIBOR. LIBOR has historically been a significant factor in relation to payment obligations under a derivative investment and has also been used in other ways that affect the Fund’s investment performance. In connection with the global transition away from LIBOR led by regulators and market participants, LIBOR is no longer published on a representative basis. The transition from LIBOR and the terms of any replacement rate(s), including, for example, the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (“SOFR”) or another rate based on SOFR, may adversely affect transactions that used LIBOR as a reference rate, financial institutions that engaged in such transactions, and the financial markets generally. There are significant differences between LIBOR and SOFR, such as LIBOR being an unsecured lending rate while SOFR is a secured lending rate. As such, the potential effect of the transition away from LIBOR on the Fund or the financial instruments in which the Fund invests cannot yet be fully determined, but the transition may adversely affect the Fund’s performance. |
• |
defaulted securities risk: the significant risk of the uncertainty of repayment of defaulted securities (e.g., a security on which a principal or interest payment is not made when due) and obligations of distressed issuers (including insolvent issuers or issuers in payment or covenant default, in workout or restructuring or in bankruptcy or similar proceedings). Such investments entail high risk and have speculative characteristics. |
• |
derivatives risk: the risk that an investment in derivatives will not perform as anticipated by the Adviser, may not be available at the time or price desired, cannot be closed out at a favorable time or price, will increase the Fund’s transaction costs, or will increase the Fund’s volatility; that derivatives may create investment leverage; that, when a derivative is used as a substitute for or alternative to a direct cash investment, the transaction may not provide a return that corresponds precisely or at all with that of the cash investment; that the positions may be improperly executed or constructed; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; or that, when used for hedging purposes, derivatives will not provide the anticipated protection, causing the Fund to lose money on both the derivatives transaction and the exposure the Fund sought to hedge. |
Please also see “debt securities risks — LIBOR phase out/transition risk” herein for more information.
• |
emerging market country risk: the risk that investing in emerging markets, as compared to foreign developed markets, increases the likelihood that the Fund will lose money, due to more limited information about the issuer and/or the security; higher brokerage costs; different accounting, auditing and financial reporting standards; less developed legal systems and thinner trading markets; the possibility of currency blockages or transfer restrictions; an emerging market country’s dependence on revenue from particular commodities or international aid; and expropriation, nationalization or other adverse political or economic developments. |
• |
financial services risk: the risk that an investment in issuers in the financial services sector or transactions with one or more counterparties in the financial services sector may be adversely affected by, among other things: (i) changes in governmental regulation, which may limit both the amounts and the types of loans and other financial commitments |
-75-
financial services companies can make, the interest rates and fees they can charge, the scope of their activities, the prices they can charge and the amount of capital they must maintain; (ii) fluctuations, including as a result of interest rate changes or increased competition, in the availability and cost of capital funds on which the profitability of financial services companies is largely dependent; (iii) deterioration of the credit markets; (iv) credit losses resulting from financial difficulties of borrowers, especially when financial services companies are exposed to non-diversified or concentrated loan portfolios; (v) financial losses associated with investment activities, especially when financial services companies are exposed to financial leverage; (vi) the risk that any financial services company experiences substantial declines in the valuations of its assets, takes action to raise capital, or ceases operations; (vii) the risk that a market shock or other unexpected market, economic, political, regulatory, or other event might lead to a sudden decline in the values of most or all companies in the financial services sector; (viii) events leading to limited liquidity, defaults, non-performance or other adverse developments that affect financial institutions or the financial services industry generally, or concerns or rumors about any events of these kinds or other similar risks, leading to market-wide liquidity problems; and (ix) the interconnectedness or interdependence among financial services companies, including the risk that the financial distress or failure of one financial services company may materially and adversely affect a number of other financial services companies. |
• |
focused investment risk: the risk that a fund that invests a substantial portion of its assets in a particular market, industry, sector, group of industries or sectors, country, region, group of countries or asset class is, relative to a fund that invests in a more diverse investment portfolio, more susceptible to any single economic, market, political, regulatory or other occurrence. This is because, for example, issuers in a particular market, industry, region, sector or asset class may react similarly to specific economic, market, regulatory, political or other developments. The particular markets, industries, regions, sectors or asset classes in which the Fund may focus its investments may change over time and the Fund may alter its focus at inopportune times. |
• |
foreign currency risk: the risk that fluctuations in exchange rates may adversely affect the value of the Fund’s investments denominated in foreign currencies. |
• |
foreign investing risk: the risk that investments in foreign securities or in issuers with significant exposure to foreign markets, as compared to investments in U.S. securities or in issuers with predominantly domestic market exposure, may be more vulnerable to economic, political, and social instability and subject to less government supervision, less protective custody practices, lack of transparency, inadequate regulatory and accounting standards, delayed or infrequent settlement of transactions, and foreign taxes. If the Fund buys securities denominated in a foreign currency, receives income in foreign currencies, or holds foreign currencies from time to time, the value of the Fund’s assets, as measured in U.S. dollars, can be affected unfavorably by changes in exchange rates relative to the U.S. dollar or other foreign currencies. Foreign markets are also subject to the risk that a foreign government could restrict foreign exchange transactions or otherwise implement unfavorable currency regulations. In addition, foreign securities may be subject to currency exchange rates or regulations, the imposition of economic sanctions, tariffs or other government restrictions, higher transaction and other costs, reduced liquidity, and delays in settlement. |
• |
high yield risk: the risk that debt instruments rated below investment grade or debt instruments that are unrated and of comparable or lesser quality are predominantly speculative. These instruments, commonly known as “junk bonds,” have a higher degree of default risk and may be less liquid than higher-rated bonds. These instruments may be subject to greater price volatility due to such factors as specific corporate developments, interest rate sensitivity, negative perceptions of high yield investments generally, and less secondary market liquidity. |
• |
inflation-indexed bond risk: the risk that such bonds will change in value in response to actual or anticipated changes in inflation rates in a manner unanticipated by the Fund’s portfolio management team or investors generally. Inflation-indexed bonds are subject to debt securities risks. |
• |
investment company and exchange-traded fund risk: the risk that an investment company or other pooled investment vehicle, including any ETFs or money market funds, in which the Fund invests will not achieve its investment objective or execute its investment strategies effectively or that significant purchase or redemption activity by shareholders of such an investment company might negatively affect the value of its shares. The Fund must pay its pro rata portion of an investment company’s fees and expenses. To the extent the Adviser determines to invest Fund assets in other investment companies, the Adviser will have an incentive to invest in other investment vehicles sponsored or advised by the Adviser or a related party of the Adviser over investment companies sponsored or managed by others and to maintain such investments once made due to its own financial interest in those products and other business considerations. |
-76-
• |
large shareholder risk: the risk that certain account holders, including the Adviser or funds or accounts over which the Adviser (or related parties of the Adviser) has investment discretion, may from time to time own or control a significant percentage of the Fund’s shares. The Fund is subject to the risk that a redemption by those shareholders of all or a portion of their Fund shares, including as a result of an asset allocation decision made by the Adviser (or related parties of the Adviser), will adversely affect the Fund’s performance if it is forced to sell portfolio securities or invest cash when the Adviser would not otherwise choose to do so. Redemptions of a large number of shares may affect the liquidity of the Fund’s portfolio, increase the Fund’s transaction costs, and accelerate the realization of taxable income and/or gains to shareholders. |
• |
leveraging risk: the risk that certain investments by the Fund involving leverage may have the effect of increasing the volatility of the value of the Fund’s portfolio, and the risk of loss in excess of invested capital. |
• |
liquidity risk: the risk that the Fund may be unable to sell a portfolio investment at a desirable time or at the value the Fund has placed on the investment. Illiquidity may be the result of, for example, low trading volume, lack of a market maker, or contractual or legal restrictions that limit or prevent the Fund from selling securities or closing derivative positions. During periods of substantial market disruption, a large portion of the Fund’s assets could potentially experience significant levels of illiquidity. The values of illiquid investments are often more volatile than the values of more liquid investments. It may be more difficult for the Fund to determine a fair value of an illiquid investment than that of a more liquid comparable investment. |
• |
loan risk: the risk that (i) if the Fund holds a loan through another financial intermediary, or relies on a financial intermediary to administer the loan, its receipt of principal and interest on the loan may be subject to the credit risk of that financial intermediary; (ii) any collateral securing a loan may be insufficient or unavailable to the Fund, because, for example, the value of the collateral securing a loan can decline, be insufficient to meet the obligations of the borrower, or be difficult to liquidate, and the Fund’s rights to collateral may be limited by bankruptcy or insolvency laws; (iii) investments in highly leveraged loans or loans of stressed, distressed, or defaulted issuers may be subject to significant credit and liquidity risk; (iv) a bankruptcy or other court proceeding could delay or limit the ability of the Fund to collect the principal and interest payments on that borrower’s loans or adversely affect the Fund’s rights in collateral relating to a loan; (v) there may be limited public information available regarding the loan and the relevant borrower(s); (vi) the use of a particular interest rate benchmark may limit the Fund’s ability to achieve a net return to shareholders that consistently approximates the average published Prime Rate of U.S. banks; (vii) the prices of certain floating rate loans that include a feature that prevents their interest rates from adjusting if market interest rates are below a specified minimum level may appreciate less than other instruments in response to changes in interest rates should interest rates rise but remain below the applicable minimum level; (viii) if a borrower fails to comply with various restrictive covenants that may be found in loan agreements, the borrower may default in payment of the loan; (ix) if the Fund invests in loans that contain fewer or less restrictive constraints on the borrower than certain other types of loans (“covenant-lite” loans), it may have fewer rights against the borrowers of such loans, including fewer protections against the possibility of default and fewer remedies in the event of default; (x) the loan is unsecured; (xi) there is a limited secondary market; (xii) transactions in loans may settle on a delayed basis, and the Fund may not receive the proceeds from the sale of a loan for a substantial period of time after the sale, which may result in sale proceeds related to the sale of loans not being available to make additional investments or to meet the Fund’s redemption obligations until potentially a substantial period after the sale of the loans; and (xiii) loans may be difficult to value and may be illiquid, which may adversely affect an investment in the Fund. |
• |
market risk: the risk that markets will perform poorly or that the returns from the securities in which the Fund invests will underperform returns from the general securities markets or other types of investments. Markets may, in response to governmental actions or intervention or general market conditions, including real or perceived adverse political, economic or market conditions, tariffs and trade disruptions, inflation, recession, changes in interest or currency rates, lack of liquidity in the bond markets or adverse investor sentiment, or other external factors, experience periods of high volatility and reduced liquidity. During those periods, the Fund may experience high levels of shareholder redemptions, and may have to sell securities at times when the Fund would otherwise not do so, and potentially at unfavorable prices. Certain securities may be difficult to value during such periods. Market risk involves the risk that the value of the Fund’s investment portfolio will change, potentially frequently and in large amounts, as the prices of its investments go up or down. During periods of severe market stress, it is possible that the market for some or all of a Fund’s investments may become highly illiquid. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. Please see “debt securities risks — interest rate risk” herein for more information. |
• |
mortgage-backed securities risk: the risk that borrowers may default on their mortgage obligations or the guarantees underlying the mortgage-backed securities will default or otherwise fail and that, during periods of falling interest rates, |
-77-
mortgage-backed securities will be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate. During periods of rising interest rates, the average life of a mortgage-backed security may extend, which may lock in a below-market interest rate, increase the security’s duration, and reduce the value of the security. Enforcing rights against the underlying assets or collateral may be difficult, or the underlying assets or collateral may be insufficient if the issuer defaults. The values of certain types of mortgage-backed securities, such as inverse floaters and interest-only and principal-only securities, may be extremely sensitive to changes in interest rates and prepayment rates. The Fund may invest in mortgage-backed securities that are subordinate in their right to receive payment of interest and repayment of principal to other classes of the issuer’s securities. |
• |
operational and information security risks: an investment in the Fund, like any fund, can involve operational risks arising from factors such as processing errors, human errors, inadequate or failed internal or external processes, failures in systems and technology, changes in personnel and errors caused by third-party service providers. The occurrence of any of these failures, errors or breaches could result in investment losses to the Fund, a loss of information, regulatory scrutiny, reputational damage or other events, any of which could have a material adverse effect on the Fund. While the Fund seeks to minimize such events through controls and oversight, there may still be failures that could cause losses to the Fund. |
• |
portfolio turnover risk: the risk that frequent purchases and sales of portfolio securities may result in higher Fund expenses and may result in larger distributions of taxable capital gains to investors as compared to a fund that trades less frequently. |
• |
real estate sector risk: the risk that real estate-related investments may decline in value as a result of factors affecting the real estate sector, such as the supply of real property in certain markets, changes in zoning laws, delays in completion of construction, changes in real estate values, changes in property taxes, levels of occupancy, and local, regional, and general market conditions. Along with the risks common to different types of real estate-related investments, real estate investment trusts (“REITs”), no matter the type, involve additional risk factors, including poor performance by the REIT’s manager, adverse changes to the tax laws, and the possible failure by the REIT to qualify for the favorable tax treatment available to REITs under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended, or the exemption from registration under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended. REITs are not diversified and are heavily dependent on cash flow earned on the property interests they hold. |
• |
securities or sector selection risk: the risk that the securities held by the Fund will underperform securities held in other funds investing in similar asset classes or comparable benchmarks because of the portfolio managers’ choice of securities or sectors for investment. To the extent the Fund allocates a higher percentage of its investment portfolio to a particular sector or related sectors, the Fund will be more susceptible to events or factors affecting companies in that sector or related sectors. For example, the values of securities of companies in the same or related sectors may be negatively affected by the common characteristics they share, the common business risks to which they are subject, common regulatory burdens, or regulatory changes that affect them similarly. Such characteristics, risks, burdens or changes include, but are not limited to, changes in governmental regulation, inflation or deflation, rising or falling interest rates, competition from new entrants, and other economic, market, political or other developments specific to that sector or related sectors. |
• |
short position risk: the risk that an increase in the value of an instrument, index or interest rate with respect to which the Fund has established a short position will result in a loss to the Fund. |
• |
sovereign debt obligations risk: the risk that investments in debt obligations of sovereign governments may lose value due to the government entity’s unwillingness or inability to repay principal and interest when due in accordance with the terms of the debt or otherwise in a timely manner. Sovereign governments may default on their debt obligations for a number of reasons, including social, political, economic and diplomatic changes in countries issuing sovereign debt. The Fund may have limited (or no) recourse in the event of a default because bankruptcy, moratorium and other similar laws applicable to issuers of sovereign debt obligations may be substantially different from those applicable to private issuers, and any recourse may be subject to the political climate in the relevant country. In addition, foreign governmental entities may enjoy various levels of sovereign immunity, and it may be difficult or impossible to bring a legal action against a foreign governmental entity or to enforce a judgment against such an entity. Holders of certain foreign government debt securities may be requested to participate in the restructuring of such obligations and to extend further loans to their issuers. There can be no assurance that the foreign government debt securities in which the Fund may invest will not be subject to similar restructuring arrangements or to requests for new credit, which may adversely affect the Fund’s holdings. |
• |
structured products and structured notes risk: the risk that an investment in a structured product, which includes, among other things, CDOs, mortgage-backed securities, other types of asset-backed securities and certain types of structured notes, may decline in value due to changes in the underlying instruments, indexes, interest rates or other factors on which the product is based (“reference measure”). Depending on the reference measure used and the use of multipliers or |
-78-
deflators (if any), changes in interest rates and movement of the reference measure may cause significant price and cash flow fluctuations. Application of a multiplier is comparable to the use of financial leverage, a speculative technique. Holders of structured products indirectly bear risks associated with the reference measure, are subject to counterparty risk and typically do not have direct rights against the reference measure. Structured products are generally privately offered and sold, and thus, are not registered under the securities laws and may be thinly traded or have a limited trading market and may have the effect of increasing the Fund’s illiquidity, reducing the Fund’s income and the value of the investment. At a particular point in time, the Fund may be unable to find qualified buyers for these securities. Investments in structured notes involve risks including interest rate risk, credit risk and market risk. |
• |
U.S. Government securities risk: the risk that debt securities issued or guaranteed by certain U.S. Government agencies, instrumentalities, and sponsored enterprises are not supported by the full faith and credit of the U.S. Government, and so investments in their securities or obligations issued by them involve credit risk greater than investments in other types of U.S. Government securities. |
• |
valuation risk: the risk that the Fund will not value its investments in a manner that accurately reflects their market values or that the Fund will not be able to sell any investment at a price equal to the valuation ascribed to that investment for purposes of calculating the Fund’s net asset value (“NAV”). The valuation of the Fund’s investments involves subjective judgment. Certain securities in which the Fund may invest may be more difficult to value accurately, especially during periods of market disruptions or extreme market volatility. Incorrect valuations of the Fund’s portfolio holdings could result in the Fund’s shareholder transactions being effected at an NAV that does not accurately reflect the underlying value of the Fund’s portfolio, resulting in the dilution of shareholder interests. |
Please see “Additional Information About Principal Investment Strategies and Principal Risks — Principal Risks” for a more detailed description of the principal risks of investing in the Fund.
Performance
The following performance information provides some indication of the risks of investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows the performance of the Fund’s Class I shares for each full calendar year since the Fund’s inception. The table below shows how the average annual total returns of the Fund’s shares for the periods shown compare to those of a broad-based securities market index. The Fund’s past performance (before and after taxes) is not necessarily an indication of how the Fund will perform in the future. Absent any applicable fee waivers and/or expense limitations (which have applied to the Fund since inception), performance would have been lower. Updated information on the Fund’s investment results can be obtained at no charge by calling 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311) or by visiting the Fund’s website at www.doubleline.com.
Class I Shares
During the periods shown above, the highest and lowest quarterly returns earned by the Fund’s Class I shares were:
Highest: | 15.82% | Quarter ended 3/31/2020 | ||
Lowest: | -11.42% | Quarter ended 6/30/2022 |
The year-to-date total return for the Fund’s Class I shares as of June 30, 2023 was 3.57%.
-79-
Average Annual Total Returns (for the periods ended December 31, 2022)
Long Duration Total Return Bond Fund | One Year | Five Years |
Since Inception (December 15, 2014) |
|||||||||
Class I | ||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-29.25% | -3.01% | -0.70% | |||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions |
-30.11% | -4.69% | -2.28% | |||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares |
-17.24% | -2.62% | -0.96% | |||||||||
Class N | ||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-29.32% | -3.26% | -0.97% | |||||||||
Bloomberg U.S.
Long Government/Credit Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) |
-27.09% | -1.21% | 0.95% |
The Fund’s after-tax returns as shown in the above table are calculated using the historical highest applicable individual federal marginal income tax rates for the period and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Your actual after-tax returns depend on your tax situation and may differ from those shown. If you own shares of the Fund in a tax-advantaged account, such as a 401(k) plan or an individual retirement account, after-tax returns shown are not relevant to your investment. The “Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares” may be higher than other return figures because when a capital loss occurs upon the redemption of shares of the Fund, a tax deduction is provided that may benefit the investor. After-tax returns are for Class I shares only. After-tax returns for other classes may vary. The Bloomberg U.S. Long Government/Credit Index includes publicly issued U.S. Treasury debt, U.S. government agency debt, taxable debt issued by U.S. states and territories and their political subdivisions, debt issued by U.S. and non-U.S. government debt and supranational debt. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.
Investment Adviser
DoubleLine Capital is the investment adviser to the Fund.
Portfolio Managers
The portfolio managers for the Fund are:
Name |
Experience with the Fund |
Primary Title with the Investment Adviser | ||
Jeffrey E. Gundlach | Since the Fund’s inception in December 2014 | Chief Executive Officer | ||
Vitaliy Liberman | Since the Fund’s inception in December 2014 | Portfolio Manager |
Purchase and Sale of Shares
You may purchase or redeem Class I and Class N shares on any business day when the New York Stock Exchange opens for regular trading. You may purchase or redeem shares by written request via mail (DoubleLine Funds, c/o U.S. Bank Global Fund Services, P.O. Box 701, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0701), by wire transfer, by telephone at 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311), or through authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers (“financial intermediaries”). Telephone transactions will be permitted unless you decline this privilege on your initial purchase application. The minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts for different types of accounts are shown below, although the Fund may reduce or waive the minimums in some cases.
Minimum Initial Investment: | Subsequent Investment: |
|||||||||||
Regular Accounts |
IRAs/HSAs |
All Accounts and Automatic Investment Plans |
||||||||||
Class I Shares | $ | 100,000 | $ | 5,000 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class N Shares | $ | 2,000 | $ | 500 | $ | 100 |
-80-
The minimum investment may be modified for certain financial intermediaries that submit trades on behalf of underlying investors. Certain financial intermediaries also may have their own investment minimums, which may differ from the Fund’s minimums, and may be waived at the intermediaries’ discretion. The Fund reserves the right to change or waive the minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts without prior notice or to waive the minimum investment amounts for certain intermediaries or individual investors in its discretion.
Tax Information
The Fund’s distributions generally are taxable to you as ordinary income or capital gains, unless you are investing through a tax-advantaged arrangement, such as a 401(k) plan or individual retirement account. If you invest through such tax-advantaged arrangements, you may be taxed later upon withdrawal from those arrangements.
Payments to Broker-Dealers and Other Financial Intermediaries
If you purchase shares of the Fund through a broker-dealer or other financial intermediary (such as a bank), the Fund, the Adviser, and the Fund’s distributor or any of their affiliates may pay the financial intermediary for the sale of Fund shares and related services. These payments may create a conflict of interest by influencing the financial intermediary and your salesperson to recommend the Fund over another investment. Ask your individual salesperson or visit your financial intermediary’s website for more information.
-81-
Fund Summary
Investment Objective
The Fund’s investment objective is to seek long-term total return.
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Fund. You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries (defined below), including when purchasing Class I shares through a broker or other financial intermediary acting as an agent on your behalf. Such commissions and other fees, if any, are not charged by the Fund and are not reflected in the fee table or expense example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of the offering price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of the original purchase price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Reinvested Dividends | None | None | ||
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of shares redeemed within 90 days of purchase) | None | None | ||
Fee for Redemption by Wire | $15 | $15 | ||
Exchange Fee | None | None | ||
Account Fee | None | None |
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||||||
Management Fees | 0.50% | 0.50% | ||||||
Distribution and/or Service (12b-1) Fees | None | 0.25% | ||||||
Other Expenses (includes sub-transfer agent accounting or administrative services expenses)1 | 0.16% | 0.17% | ||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses | 0.66% | 0.92% |
1 |
Restated to reflect current fees. |
Example
This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds.
This example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all your shares at the end of those periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same. Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions, your costs would be:
Class I | Class N | |||
1 Year | $67 | $94 | ||
3 Years | $211 | $293 | ||
5 Years | $368 | $509 | ||
10 Years | $822 | $1,131 |
-82-
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund incurs transaction costs when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the Fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 112% of the average value of its portfolio.
Principal Investment Strategies
The Fund normally invests primarily in debt obligations issued by governments and governmental agencies, authorities or instrumentalities, located anywhere in the world. The Fund expects to invest significantly in obligations of members of the G20, an organization of governments composed of 20 of the major economies in the world, including developed markets and emerging market economies.
The Adviser expects to allocate the Fund’s assets among a variety of debt instruments based on its view of their potential to provide current income, capital appreciation, or both, as well as the Adviser’s view of changing global macroeconomic conditions such as, but not limited to, broad dollar trends, commodity cycles, cross border trade and portfolio flows, and relative growth and inflation differentials. The Adviser will also consider changes in a specific country’s market, economic, monetary and political factors and other developments that the Adviser believes may affect the values of the Fund’s investments.
The Fund’s investment universe includes, without limitation, sovereign debt, including U.S. Government securities; quasi-sovereign debt, such as obligations issued by governmental agencies and instrumentalities; and supra-national obligations. The Fund may also invest in obligations of private, non-governmental issuers. The Fund’s investments may include government and private high yield and defaulted debt securities; inflation-indexed securities; mortgage- and asset-backed securities; bank loans; and securities or structured products that are linked to or derive their values from another security, asset or currency of any country or issuer in which the Fund may otherwise invest.
The Fund expects normally to have significant exposure to foreign currencies, which may be achieved by investing in bonds denominated in the local currencies of foreign issuers or by investing in currencies directly or in currency-related instruments, such as forward contracts. The Fund may enter into foreign currency exchange transactions, including foreign currency futures and forward contracts and foreign currency swaps and options, to take long or short positions in various currencies, including currencies to which the Fund might not otherwise have exposure, in order to benefit from changes in the values of those currencies anticipated by the Adviser. The Fund may also, but will not necessarily, enter into foreign currency exchange transactions in order to hedge against changes in the values of its portfolio investments due to declines in the values of the currencies in which those investments are denominated against the U.S. dollar. The Fund may use any of the instruments, or any combination of the instruments, above (e.g., an interest rate swap combined with a long forward currency contract) to create long or short synthetic positions as a substitute for a cash investment. Foreign currency exchange transactions may have the effect of creating investment leverage in the Fund’s portfolio and the returns from such transactions may represent, from time to time, a significant component of the Fund’s investment returns.
In managing the Fund’s portfolio, the portfolio managers typically use a controlled risk approach. The techniques of this approach attempt to control the principal risk components of the fixed income markets and may include, among other factors, consideration of the Adviser’s view of the following: the potential relative performance of various market sectors, security selection available within a given sector, the risk/reward equation for different asset classes, liquidity conditions in various market sectors, the shape of the yield curve and projections for changes in the yield curve, potential fluctuations in the overall level of interest rates, and current fiscal policy.
Under normal market conditions, the Fund will generally invest in securities that provide exposure to at least three different countries, not including the United States. There is no limit on the percentage of the Fund that may be invested in emerging market countries or in any single or small number of currencies or issuers.
The Fund normally invests principally in “investment grade” securities (i.e., those rated above Ba1 by Moody’s Investors Service, Inc. or above BB+ by S&P Global Ratings or Fitch Ratings, Inc. or, if unrated, determined by the Adviser to be of comparable quality). The Fund normally will not invest more than 25% of its total assets in fixed income instruments that are, at the time of purchase, rated or determined by the Adviser to be below investment grade. Fixed income instruments rated below investment grade, or unrated securities that are determined by the Adviser to be of comparable quality, are high yield, high risk bonds, commonly known as “junk bonds.” Generally, lower-rated debt securities offer a higher yield than higher rated debt securities of similar maturity but are subject to greater risk of loss of principal and interest than higher rated securities of similar maturity.
-83-
Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in bonds. Bonds include debt securities, debt obligations, fixed-income instruments, and any evidence of indebtedness, including, by way of example, a security or instrument having one or more of the following characteristics: a security or instrument issued at a discount to its face value, a security or instrument that pays interest at a fixed, floating, or variable rate, or a security or instrument with a stated principal amount that requires repayment of some or all of that principal amount to the holder of the security. For these purposes, the term bond shall be interpreted broadly to include any instrument or security evidencing what is commonly referred to as an IOU rather than evidencing the corporate ownership of equity unless that equity represents an indirect or derivative interest in one or more debt securities. For purposes of the Fund’s 80% policy, bonds also include instruments that are intended to provide one or more of the characteristics of a direct investment in one or more debt securities, such as an exchange-traded fund (“ETF”) that invests in bonds. If the Fund changes its 80% policy, it will notify shareholders at least 60 days in advance of the change.
The Fund is classified as a non-diversified fund under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended, and may invest in the securities of a smaller number of issuers than a diversified fund.
The Adviser monitors the duration of the Fund’s portfolio securities to seek to assess and, in its discretion, adjust the Fund’s exposure to interest rate risk. In managing the Fund’s investments, under normal market conditions, the portfolio managers intend to seek to construct an investment portfolio with a dollar-weighted average effective duration of no less than one year and no more than ten years. Duration is a measure of the expected life of a fixed income instrument that is used to determine the sensitivity of a security’s price to changes in interest rates. All other things remaining equal, for each one percentage point increase in interest rates, the value of a portfolio of fixed income securities would generally be expected to decline by one percent for every year of the portfolio’s average duration above zero. For example, the value of a portfolio of fixed income securities with an average duration of three years would generally be expected to decline by approximately 3% if interest rates rose by one percentage point. Effective duration is a measure of the Fund’s portfolio duration adjusted for the anticipated effect of interest rate changes on bond and mortgage prepayment rates as determined by the Adviser. The effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio may vary materially from its target range, from time to time, and there is no assurance that the effective duration of the Fund’s investment portfolio will always be within its target range.
The Adviser may also seek to manage the dollar-weighted average effective duration of the Fund’s portfolio through the use of derivatives and other instruments (including, among others, inverse floaters, futures contracts, U.S. Treasury swaps, interest rate swaps, total return swaps and options, including options on swap agreements). The Fund may incur costs in implementing duration management strategies, and there can be no assurance that the Fund will engage in duration management strategies or that any duration management strategy employed by the Fund will be successful.
In addition to its use of foreign currency exchange transactions, the Fund may use other derivatives transactions with the purpose or effect of creating investment leverage or for other purposes. For example, the Fund may use futures contracts and options on futures contracts, in order to gain efficient long or short investment exposures as an alternative to cash investments or to hedge against portfolio exposures; swaps, to gain indirect long or short exposures to interest rates, issuers, or currencies, or to hedge against portfolio exposures; and total return swaps and credit derivatives (such as credit default swaps), put and call options, and exchange-traded and structured notes, to take indirect long or short positions on indexes, securities, or other indicators of value, or to hedge against portfolio exposures. The Adviser considers various factors, such as availability and cost, in deciding whether, when and to what extent to enter into derivative transactions. The Fund will incur costs in implementing derivatives strategies, and there can be no assurance that the Fund will engage in derivatives strategies or that any such strategy will be successful. Any use of derivatives strategies entails the risks of investing directly in the securities, instruments or assets underlying the derivatives strategies, as well as the risks of using derivatives generally, and in some cases the risks of leverage, described in this Prospectus and in the Fund’s Statement of Additional Information.
The Fund may pursue its investment objective and obtain exposures to some or all of the asset classes described above by investing in other investment companies, including, for example, other open-end or closed-end investment companies and ETFs, including investment companies sponsored or managed by the Adviser or its related parties. The amount of the Fund’s investment in certain investment companies may be limited by law or by tax considerations.
Principal Risks
The value of the Fund’s shares will vary as its portfolio investments increase or decrease in value. Therefore, the value of your investment in the Fund could go down as well as up. You can lose money by investing in the Fund. The Fund’s principal risks are listed below in alphabetical order, not in order of importance. The significance of any specific risk to an investment in the Fund will vary over time, depending on the composition of the Fund’s portfolio, market conditions, and other factors. You should read all of the risk information presented below carefully, because any one or more of these risks may result in losses to the Fund.
-84-
The principal risks affecting the Fund that can cause a decline in value are:
• |
active management risk: the risk that the Fund will fail to meet its investment objective and that the Fund’s investment performance will depend, at least in part, on how its assets are allocated and reallocated among asset classes, sectors, underlying funds and/or investments and that such allocation will focus on asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or investments that perform poorly or underperform other asset classes, sectors, underlying funds, and/or available investments. Any given investment strategy may fail to produce the intended results, and the Fund’s portfolio may underperform other comparable funds because of portfolio management decisions related to, among other things, the selection of investments, portfolio construction, risk assessments, and/or the outlook on market trends and opportunities. |
• |
asset-backed securities investment risk: the risk that borrowers may default on the obligations that underlie the asset-backed security and that, during periods of falling interest rates, asset-backed securities may be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate, and the risk that the impairment of the value of the collateral underlying a security in which the Fund invests (due, for example, to non-payment of loans) will result in a reduction in the value of the security. |
• |
cash position risk: the risk that to the extent that the Fund holds assets in cash, cash equivalents, and other short-term investments, the ability of the Fund to meet its objective may be limited. |
• |
counterparty risk: the risk that the Fund will be subject to credit risk with respect to the counterparties to the derivative contracts and other instruments entered into by the Fund; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; that the Fund will be unable to enforce contractual remedies if its counterparty defaults; that if a counterparty (or an affiliate of a counterparty) becomes bankrupt, the Fund may experience significant delays in obtaining any recovery or may obtain limited or no recovery in a bankruptcy or other insolvency proceeding. To the extent that the Fund enters into multiple transactions with a single or a small set of counterparties, it will be subject to increased counterparty risk. |
• |
debt securities risks: |
¡ |
credit risk: the risk that an issuer, counterparty or other obligor to the Fund will fail to pay its obligations to the Fund when they are due, which may reduce the Fund’s income and/or reduce, in whole or in part, the value of the Fund’s investment. Actual or perceived changes in the financial condition of an obligor, changes in economic, social or political conditions that affect a particular type of security, instrument, or obligor, and changes in economic, social or political conditions generally can increase the risk of default by an obligor, which can affect a security’s or other instrument’s credit quality or value and an obligor’s ability to honor its obligations when due. The values of lower-quality debt securities (commonly known as “junk bonds”), including floating rate loans, tend to be particularly sensitive to these changes. The values of securities or instruments also may decline for a number of other reasons that relate directly to the obligor, such as management performance, financial leverage, and reduced demand for the obligor’s goods and services, as well as the historical and prospective earnings of the obligor and the value of its assets. |
¡ |
extension risk: the risk that if interest rates rise, repayments of principal on certain debt securities, including, but not limited to, floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, may occur at a slower rate than expected and the expected maturity of those securities could lengthen as a result. Securities that are subject to extension risk generally have a greater potential for loss when prevailing interest rates rise, which could cause their values to fall sharply. |
¡ |
interest rate risk: the risk that debt instruments will change in value because of changes in interest rates. The value of an instrument with a longer duration (whether positive or negative) will be more sensitive to changes in interest rates than a similar instrument with a shorter duration. Bonds and other debt instruments typically have a positive duration. The value of a debt instrument with positive duration will generally decline if interest rates increase. Certain other investments, such as inverse floaters and certain derivative instruments, may have a negative duration. The value of instruments with a negative duration will generally decline if interest rates decrease. Inverse floaters, interest-only and principal-only securities are especially sensitive to interest rate changes, which can affect not only their prices but can also change the income flows and repayment assumptions about those investments. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. The risks associated with rising interest rates are heightened under current market conditions given that the U.S. Federal Reserve has begun to raise interest rates from historically low levels and may continue to do so. Further, in market environments where interest rates are rising, issuers may be less willing or able to make principal and interest payments on fixed-income investments when due. |
-85-
¡ |
prepayment risk: the risk that the issuer of a debt security, including floating rate loans and mortgage-related securities, repays all or a portion of the principal prior to the security’s maturity. In times of declining interest rates, there is a greater likelihood that the Fund’s higher yielding securities will be pre-paid with the Fund being unable to reinvest the proceeds in an investment with as great a yield. Prepayments can therefore result in lower yields to shareholders of the Fund. |
¡ |
LIBOR phase out/transition risk: the London Interbank Offered Rate (“LIBOR”) was the offered rate for wholesale, unsecured funding available to major international banks. The terms of many investments, financings or other transactions to which the Fund may be a party have been historically tied to LIBOR. LIBOR has historically been a significant factor in relation to payment obligations under a derivative investment and has also been used in other ways that affect the Fund’s investment performance. In connection with the global transition away from LIBOR led by regulators and market participants, LIBOR is no longer published on a representative basis. The transition from LIBOR and the terms of any replacement rate(s), including, for example, the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (“SOFR”) or another rate based on SOFR, may adversely affect transactions that used LIBOR as a reference rate, financial institutions that engaged in such transactions, and the financial markets generally. There are significant differences between LIBOR and SOFR, such as LIBOR being an unsecured lending rate while SOFR is a secured lending rate. As such, the potential effect of the transition away from LIBOR on the Fund or the financial instruments in which the Fund invests cannot yet be fully determined, but the transition may adversely affect the Fund’s performance. |
• |
defaulted securities risk: the significant risk of the uncertainty of repayment of defaulted securities (e.g., a security on which a principal or interest payment is not made when due) and obligations of distressed issuers (including insolvent issuers or issuers in payment or covenant default, in workout or restructuring or in bankruptcy or similar proceedings). Such investments entail high risk and have speculative characteristics. |
• |
derivatives risk: the risk that an investment in derivatives will not perform as anticipated by the Adviser, may not be available at the time or price desired, cannot be closed out at a favorable time or price, will increase the Fund’s transaction costs, or will increase the Fund’s volatility; that derivatives may create investment leverage; that, when a derivative is used as a substitute for or alternative to a direct cash investment, the transaction may not provide a return that corresponds precisely or at all with that of the cash investment; that the positions may be improperly executed or constructed; that the Fund’s counterparty will be unable or unwilling to perform its obligations; or that, when used for hedging purposes, derivatives will not provide the anticipated protection, causing the Fund to lose money on both the derivatives transaction and the exposure the Fund sought to hedge. |
Please also see “debt securities risks – LIBOR phase out/transition risk” herein for more information.
• |
emerging market country risk: the risk that investing in emerging markets, as compared to foreign developed markets, increases the likelihood that the Fund will lose money, due to more limited information about the issuer and/or the security; higher brokerage costs; different accounting, auditing and financial reporting standards; less developed legal systems and thinner trading markets; the possibility of currency blockages or transfer restrictions; an emerging market country’s dependence on revenue from particular commodities or international aid; and expropriation, nationalization or other adverse political or economic developments. |
• |
focused investment risk: the risk that a fund that invests a substantial portion of its assets in a particular market, industry, sector, group of industries or sectors, country, region, group of countries or asset class is, relative to a fund that invests in a more diverse investment portfolio, more susceptible to any single economic, market, political, regulatory or other occurrence. This is because, for example, issuers in a particular market, industry, region, sector or asset class may react similarly to specific economic, market, regulatory, political or other developments. The particular markets, industries, regions, sectors or asset classes in which the Fund may focus its investments may change over time and the Fund may alter its focus at inopportune times. |
• |
foreign currency risk: the risk that fluctuations in exchange rates may adversely affect the value of the Fund’s investments denominated in foreign currencies. |
• |
foreign investing risk: the risk that investments in foreign securities or in issuers with significant exposure to foreign markets, as compared to investments in U.S. securities or in issuers with predominantly domestic market exposure, may be more vulnerable to economic, political, and social instability and subject to less government supervision, less protective custody practices, lack of transparency, inadequate regulatory and accounting standards, delayed or infrequent settlement of transactions, and foreign taxes. If the Fund buys securities denominated in a foreign currency, receives |
-86-
income in foreign currencies, or holds foreign currencies from time to time, the value of the Fund’s assets, as measured in U.S. dollars, can be affected unfavorably by changes in exchange rates relative to the U.S. dollar or other foreign currencies. Foreign markets are also subject to the risk that a foreign government could restrict foreign exchange transactions or otherwise implement unfavorable currency regulations. In addition, foreign securities may be subject to currency exchange rates or regulations, the imposition of economic sanctions, tariffs or other government restrictions, higher transaction and other costs, reduced liquidity, and delays in settlement. |
• |
high yield risk: the risk that debt instruments rated below investment grade or debt instruments that are unrated and of comparable or lesser quality are predominantly speculative. These instruments, commonly known as “junk bonds,” have a higher degree of default risk and may be less liquid than higher-rated bonds. These instruments may be subject to greater price volatility due to such factors as specific corporate developments, interest rate sensitivity, negative perceptions of high yield investments generally, and less secondary market liquidity. |
• |
inflation-indexed bond risk: the risk that such bonds will change in value in response to actual or anticipated changes in inflation rates in a manner unanticipated by the Fund’s portfolio management team or investors generally. Inflation-indexed bonds are subject to debt securities risks. |
• |
investment company and exchange-traded fund risk: the risk that an investment company or other pooled investment vehicle, including any ETFs or money market funds, in which the Fund invests will not achieve its investment objective or execute its investment strategies effectively or that significant purchase or redemption activity by shareholders of such an investment company might negatively affect the value of its shares. The Fund must pay its pro rata portion of an investment company’s fees and expenses. To the extent the Adviser determines to invest Fund assets in other investment companies, the Adviser will have an incentive to invest in other investment vehicles sponsored or advised by the Adviser or a related party of the Adviser over investment companies sponsored or managed by others and to maintain such investments once made due to its own financial interest in those products and other business considerations. |
• |
large shareholder risk: the risk that certain account holders, including the Adviser or funds or accounts over which the Adviser (or related parties of the Adviser) has investment discretion, may from time to time own or control a significant percentage of the Fund’s shares. The Fund is subject to the risk that a redemption by those shareholders of all or a portion of their Fund shares, including as a result of an asset allocation decision made by the Adviser (or related parties of the Adviser), will adversely affect the Fund’s performance if it is forced to sell portfolio securities or invest cash when the Adviser would not otherwise choose to do so. Redemptions of a large number of shares may affect the liquidity of the Fund’s portfolio, increase the Fund’s transaction costs, and accelerate the realization of taxable income and/or gains to shareholders. |
• |
leveraging risk: the risk that certain investments by the Fund involving leverage may have the effect of increasing the volatility of the value of the Fund’s portfolio, and the risk of loss in excess of invested capital. |
• |
liquidity risk: the risk that the Fund may be unable to sell a portfolio investment at a desirable time or at the value the Fund has placed on the investment. Illiquidity may be the result of, for example, low trading volume, lack of a market maker, or contractual or legal restrictions that limit or prevent the Fund from selling securities or closing derivative positions. During periods of substantial market disruption, a large portion of the Fund’s assets could potentially experience significant levels of illiquidity. The values of illiquid investments are often more volatile than the values of more liquid investments. It may be more difficult for the Fund to determine a fair value of an illiquid investment than that of a more liquid comparable investment. |
• |
loan risk: the risk that (i) if the Fund holds a loan through another financial intermediary, or relies on a financial intermediary to administer the loan, its receipt of principal and interest on the loan may be subject to the credit risk of that financial intermediary; (ii) any collateral securing a loan may be insufficient or unavailable to the Fund, because, for example, the value of the collateral securing a loan can decline, be insufficient to meet the obligations of the borrower, or be difficult to liquidate, and the Fund’s rights to collateral may be limited by bankruptcy or insolvency laws; (iii) investments in highly leveraged loans or loans of stressed, distressed, or defaulted issuers may be subject to significant credit and liquidity risk; (iv) a bankruptcy or other court proceeding could delay or limit the ability of the Fund to collect the principal and interest payments on that borrower’s loans or adversely affect the Fund’s rights in collateral relating to a loan; (v) there may be limited public information available regarding the loan and the relevant borrower(s); (vi) the use of a particular interest rate benchmark may limit the Fund’s ability to achieve a net return to shareholders that consistently approximates the average published Prime Rate of U.S. banks; (vii) the prices of certain floating rate loans that include a feature that prevents their interest rates from adjusting if market interest rates are below a specified minimum level may appreciate less than other instruments in response to changes in interest rates should interest rates |
-87-
rise but remain below the applicable minimum level; (viii) if a borrower fails to comply with various restrictive covenants that may be found in loan agreements, the borrower may default in payment of the loan; (ix) if the Fund invests in loans that contain fewer or less restrictive constraints on the borrower than certain other types of loans (“covenant-lite” loans), it may have fewer rights against the borrowers of such loans, including fewer protections against the possibility of default and fewer remedies in the event of default; (x) the loan is unsecured; (xi) there is a limited secondary market; (xii) transactions in loans may settle on a delayed basis, and the Fund may not receive the proceeds from the sale of a loan for a substantial period of time after the sale, which may result in sale proceeds related to the sale of loans not being available to make additional investments or to meet the Fund’s redemption obligations until potentially a substantial period after the sale of the loans; and (xiii) loans may be difficult to value and may be illiquid, which may adversely affect an investment in the Fund. |
• |
market risk: the risk that markets will perform poorly or that the returns from the securities in which the Fund invests will underperform returns from the general securities markets or other types of investments. Markets may, in response to governmental actions or intervention or general market conditions, including real or perceived adverse political, economic or market conditions, tariffs and trade disruptions, inflation, recession, changes in interest or currency rates, lack of liquidity in the bond markets or adverse investor sentiment, or other external factors, experience periods of high volatility and reduced liquidity. During those periods, the Fund may experience high levels of shareholder redemptions, and may have to sell securities at times when the Fund would otherwise not do so, and potentially at unfavorable prices. Certain securities may be difficult to value during such periods. Market risk involves the risk that the value of the Fund’s investment portfolio will change, potentially frequently and in large amounts, as the prices of its investments go up or down. During periods of severe market stress, it is possible that the market for some or all of a Fund’s investments may become highly illiquid. Recently, there have been inflationary price movements, which have caused the fixed income securities markets to experience heightened levels of interest rate volatility and liquidity risk. Please see “debt securities risks — interest rate risk” herein for more information. |
• |
mortgage-backed securities risk: the risk that borrowers may default on their mortgage obligations or the guarantees underlying the mortgage-backed securities will default or otherwise fail and that, during periods of falling interest rates, mortgage-backed securities will be called or prepaid, which may result in the Fund having to reinvest proceeds in other investments at a lower interest rate. During periods of rising interest rates, the average life of a mortgage-backed security may extend, which may lock in a below-market interest rate, increase the security’s duration, and reduce the value of the security. Enforcing rights against the underlying assets or collateral may be difficult, or the underlying assets or collateral may be insufficient if the issuer defaults. The values of certain types of mortgage-backed securities, such as inverse floaters and interest-only and principal-only securities, may be extremely sensitive to changes in interest rates and prepayment rates. The Fund may invest in mortgage-backed securities that are subordinate in their right to receive payment of interest and repayment of principal to other classes of the issuer’s securities. |
• |
non-diversification risk: the risk that, because a relatively higher percentage of the Fund’s assets may be invested in a limited number of issuers, the Fund may be more susceptible to any single economic, political, or regulatory occurrence than a diversified fund investing in a broader range of issuers. A decline in the market value of one of the Fund’s investments may affect the Fund’s value more than if the Fund were a diversified fund. |
• |
operational and information security risks: an investment in the Fund, like any fund, can involve operational risks arising from factors such as processing errors, human errors, inadequate or failed internal or external processes, failures in systems and technology, changes in personnel and errors caused by third-party service providers. The occurrence of any of these failures, errors or breaches could result in investment losses to the Fund, a loss of information, regulatory scrutiny, reputational damage or other events, any of which could have a material adverse effect on the Fund. While the Fund seeks to minimize such events through controls and oversight, there may still be failures that could cause losses to the Fund. |
• |
portfolio turnover risk: the risk that frequent purchases and sales of portfolio securities may result in higher Fund expenses and may result in larger distributions of taxable capital gains to investors as compared to a fund that trades less frequently. |
• |
restricted securities risk: the risk that the Fund may be prevented or limited by law or the terms of an agreement from selling a security (a “restricted security”). To the extent that the Fund is permitted to sell a restricted security, there can be no assurance that a trading market will exist at any particular time, and the Fund may be unable to dispose of the security promptly at reasonable prices or at all. The Fund may have to bear the expense of registering the securities for resale and the risk of substantial delays in effecting the registration. Also, restricted securities may be difficult to value because market quotations may not be readily available, and the values of restricted securities may have significant volatility. |
-88-
• |
securities or sector selection risk: the risk that the securities held by the Fund will underperform securities held in other funds investing in similar asset classes or comparable benchmarks because of the portfolio managers’ choice of securities or sectors for investment. To the extent the Fund allocates a higher percentage of its investment portfolio to a particular sector or related sectors, the Fund will be more susceptible to events or factors affecting companies in that sector or related sectors. For example, the values of securities of companies in the same or related sectors may be negatively affected by the common characteristics they share, the common business risks to which they are subject, common regulatory burdens, or regulatory changes that affect them similarly. Such characteristics, risks, burdens or changes include, but are not limited to, changes in governmental regulation, inflation or deflation, rising or falling interest rates, competition from new entrants, and other economic, market, political or other developments specific to that sector or related sectors. |
• |
short position risk: the risk that an increase in the value of an instrument, index or interest rate with respect to which the Fund has established a short position will result in a loss to the Fund. |
• |
sovereign debt obligations risk: the risk that investments in debt obligations of sovereign governments may lose value due to the government entity’s unwillingness or inability to repay principal and interest when due in accordance with the terms of the debt or otherwise in a timely manner. Sovereign governments may default on their debt obligations for a number of reasons, including social, political, economic and diplomatic changes in countries issuing sovereign debt. The Fund may have limited (or no) recourse in the event of a default because bankruptcy, moratorium and other similar laws applicable to issuers of sovereign debt obligations may be substantially different from those applicable to private issuers, and any recourse may be subject to the political climate in the relevant country. In addition, foreign governmental entities may enjoy various levels of sovereign immunity, and it may be difficult or impossible to bring a legal action against a foreign governmental entity or to enforce a judgment against such an entity. Holders of certain foreign government debt securities may be requested to participate in the restructuring of such obligations and to extend further loans to their issuers. There can be no assurance that the foreign government debt securities in which the Fund may invest will not be subject to similar restructuring arrangements or to requests for new credit, which may adversely affect the Fund’s holdings. |
• |
structured products and structured notes risk: the risk that an investment in a structured product, which includes, among other things, collateralized debt obligations, mortgage-backed securities, other types of asset-backed securities and certain types of structured notes, may decline in value due to changes in the underlying instruments, indexes, interest rates or other factors on which the product is based (“reference measure”). Depending on the reference measure used and the use of multipliers or deflators (if any), changes in interest rates and movement of the reference measure may cause significant price and cash flow fluctuations. Application of a multiplier is comparable to the use of financial leverage, a speculative technique. Holders of structured products indirectly bear risks associated with the reference measure, are subject to counterparty risk and typically do not have direct rights against the reference measure. Structured products are generally privately offered and sold, and thus, are not registered under the securities laws and may be thinly traded or have a limited trading market and may have the effect of increasing the Fund’s illiquidity, reducing the Fund’s income and the value of the investment. At a particular point in time, the Fund may be unable to find qualified buyers for these securities. Investments in structured notes involve risks including interest rate risk, credit risk and market risk. |
• |
U.S. Government securities risk: the risk that debt securities issued or guaranteed by certain U.S. Government agencies, instrumentalities, and sponsored enterprises are not supported by the full faith and credit of the U.S. Government, and so investments in their securities or obligations issued by them involve credit risk greater than investments in other types of U.S. Government securities. |
• |
valuation risk: the risk that the Fund will not value its investments in a manner that accurately reflects their market values or that the Fund will not be able to sell any investment at a price equal to the valuation ascribed to that investment for purposes of calculating the Fund’s net asset value (“NAV”). The valuation of the Fund’s investments involves subjective judgment. Certain securities in which the Fund may invest may be more difficult to value accurately, especially during periods of market disruptions or extreme market volatility. Incorrect valuations of the Fund’s portfolio holdings could result in the Fund’s shareholder transactions being effected at an NAV that does not accurately reflect the underlying value of the Fund’s portfolio, resulting in the dilution of shareholder interests. |
Please see “Additional Information About Principal Investment Strategies and Principal Risks — Principal Risks” for a more detailed description of the principal risks of investing in the Fund.
-89-
Performance
The following performance information provides some indication of the risks of investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows the performance of the Fund’s Class I shares for each full calendar year since the Fund’s inception. The table below shows how the average annual total returns of the Fund’s shares for the periods shown compare to those of a broad-based securities market index. The Fund’s past performance (before and after taxes) is not necessarily an indication of how the Fund will perform in the future. Absent any applicable fee waivers and/or expense limitations (which have applied to the Fund since inception), performance would have been lower. Updated information on the Fund’s investment results can be obtained at no charge by calling 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311) or by visiting the Fund’s website at www.doubleline.com.
Class I Shares
During the periods shown above, the highest and lowest quarterly returns earned by the Fund’s Class I shares were:
Highest: | 5.63% | Quarter ended 3/31/2016 | ||
Lowest: | -7.87% | Quarter ended 12/31/2016 |
The year-to-date total return for the Fund’s Class I shares as of June 30, 2023 was 0.97%.
Average Annual Total Returns (for the periods ended December 31, 2022)
Global Bond Fund | One Year | Five Years |
Since Inception (December 17, 2015) |
|||||||||
Class I | ||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-16.16% | -3.78% | -1.76% | |||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions |
-16.12% | -4.08% | -2.08% | |||||||||
Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares |
-9.53% | -2.86% | -1.39% | |||||||||
Class N | ||||||||||||
Return Before Taxes |
-16.31% | -3.99% | -1.98% | |||||||||
FTSE World
Government Bond Index (reflects no deduction for fees, expenses or taxes) |
-18.26% | -2.54% | -0.52% |
The Fund’s after-tax returns as shown in the above table are calculated using the historical highest applicable individual federal marginal income tax rates for the period and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Your actual after-tax returns depend on your tax situation and may differ from those shown. If you own shares of the Fund in a tax-advantaged account, such as a 401(k) plan or an individual retirement account, after-tax returns shown are not relevant to your investment. The “Return After Taxes on Distributions and Sale of Fund Shares” may be higher than other return figures because when a capital loss occurs upon the redemption of shares of the Fund, a tax deduction is provided that may benefit the investor. After-tax returns are for Class I shares only. After-tax returns for other classes may vary. The FTSE World Government Bond Index (“WGBI”) measures the performance of fixed-rate, local currency, investment grade sovereign bonds. The WGBI is a widely used benchmark that currently includes sovereign debt from over 20 countries, denominated in a variety of currencies, and has more than 30 years of history available. The WGBI provides a broad benchmark for the global sovereign fixed income market. It is not possible to invest directly in an index.
-90-
Investment Adviser
DoubleLine Capital is the investment adviser to the Fund.
Portfolio Managers
The portfolio managers for the Fund are:
Name | Experience with the Fund |
Primary Title with the Investment Adviser | ||
Jeffrey E. Gundlach | Since the Fund’s inception in December 2015 | Chief Executive Officer | ||
William Campbell | Since July 2016 | Portfolio Manager | ||
Valerie Ho | Since July 2016 | Portfolio Manager |
Purchase and Sale of Shares
You may purchase or redeem Class I and Class N shares on any business day when the New York Stock Exchange opens for regular trading. You may purchase or redeem shares by written request via mail (DoubleLine Funds, c/o U.S. Bank Global Fund Services, P.O. Box 701, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0701), by wire transfer, by telephone at 877-DLine11 (877-354-6311), or through authorized dealers, brokers, or other service providers (“financial intermediaries”). Telephone transactions will be permitted unless you decline this privilege on your initial purchase application. The minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts for different types of accounts are shown below, although the Fund may reduce or waive the minimums in some cases.
Minimum Initial Investment: | Subsequent Investment: |
|||||||||||
Regular Accounts |
IRAs/HSAs |
All Accounts and Investment Plans |
||||||||||
Class I Shares | $ | 100,000 | $ | 5,000 | $ | 100 | ||||||
Class N Shares | $ | 2,000 | $ | 500 | $ | 100 |
The minimum investment may be modified for certain financial intermediaries that submit trades on behalf of underlying investors. Certain financial intermediaries also may have their own investment minimums, which may differ from the Fund’s minimums, and may be waived at the intermediaries’ discretion. The Fund reserves the right to change or waive the minimum initial and subsequent investment amounts without prior notice or to waive the minimum investment amounts for certain intermediaries or individual investors in its discretion.
Tax Information
The Fund’s distributions generally are taxable to you as ordinary income or capital gains, unless you are investing through a tax-advantaged arrangement, such as a 401(k) plan or individual retirement account. If you invest through such tax-advantaged arrangements, you may be taxed later upon withdrawal from those arrangements.
Payments to Broker-Dealers and Other Financial Intermediaries
If you purchase shares of the Fund through a broker-dealer or other financial intermediary (such as a bank), the Fund, the Adviser, and the Fund’s distributor or any of their affiliates may pay the financial intermediary for the sale of Fund shares and related services. These payments may create a conflict of interest by influencing the financial intermediary and your salesperson to recommend the Fund over another investment. Ask your individual salesperson or visit your financial intermediary’s website for more information.
-91-
Fund Summary
DoubleLine Infrastructure Income Fund
Investment Objective
The Fund’s investment objective is to seek long-term total return while striving to generate current income.
Fees and Expenses of the Fund
This table describes the fees and expenses you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Fund. You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries (defined below), including when purchasing Class I shares through a broker or other financial intermediary acting as an agent on your behalf. Such commissions and other fees, if any, are not charged by the Fund and are not reflected in the fee table or expense example below.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of the offering price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of the original purchase price) | None | None | ||
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Reinvested Dividends | None | None | ||
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of shares redeemed within 90 days of purchase) | None | None | ||
Fee for Redemption by Wire | $15 | $15 | ||
Exchange Fee | None | None | ||
Account Fee | None | None |
Annual Fund Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment)
Share Class | Class I | Class N | ||||||
Management Fees | 0.50% | 0.50% | ||||||
Distribution and/or Service (12b-1) Fees | None | 0.25% | ||||||
Other Expenses (includes sub-transfer agent accounting or administrative services expenses) | 0.07% | 0.07% | ||||||
Total Annual Fund Operating Expenses | 0.57% | 0.82% |
Example
This example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Fund with the cost of investing in other mutual funds.
This example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Fund for the time periods indicated and then redeem all your shares at the end of those periods. The example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Fund’s operating expenses remain the same. Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions, your costs would be:
Class I | Class N | |||
1 Year | $58 | $84 | ||
3 Years | $183 | $262 | ||
5 Years | $318 | $455 | ||
10 Years | $714 | $1,014 |
Portfolio Turnover
The Fund incurs transaction costs when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual fund operating expenses or in the example, affect the Fund’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Fund’s portfolio turnover rate was 8% of the average value of its portfolio.
-92-
Principal Investment Strategies
Under normal market conditions, the Fund intends to invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in “Infrastructure Investments.” Infrastructure Investments include any assets or projects that support the operation, function, growth or development of a community or economy.
The Infrastructure Investments in which the Fund may invest include, without limitation, fixed or floating-rate debt instruments, loans or other income-producing instruments issued:
• |
by companies or other issuers to finance (or re-finance) the ownership, development, construction, maintenance, renovation, enhancement, or operation of infrastructure assets; |
• |
by companies or other issuers that invest in, own, lease or hold infrastructure assets; and |
• |
by companies or other issuers that operate infrastructure assets or provide services, products or raw materials related to the development, construction, maintenance, renovation, enhancement or operation of infrastructure assets. |
The Fund may hold instruments issued by a wide range of entities including, among others, operating companies, holding companies, special purpose vehicles, including vehicles created to hold or finance infrastructure assets, municipal issuers, and governments and governmental agencies, authorities or instrumentalities.
The infrastructure assets to which the Fund may have exposure through its investments include, without limitation, assets related to:
• |
transportation (e.g., airports, metro systems, subways, railroads, ports, toll roads); |
• |
transportation equipment (e.g., shipping, aircraft, railcars, containers); |
• |