BlueBay Asset Management has appointed David Zobel as a principal of the firm and head of hedge fund strategies - a newly created role.

Zobel joins the London-based specialist fixed income manager from Deutsche Asset Management where he was a Managing Director, responsible for the group's European Fund of Hedge Funds business. David founded Deutsche's original Fund of Hedge Funds business in 1996, which was based in the Asia-Pacific region.

With over a decade of experience in the hedge fund business, Zobel is one of the industry's leading hedge fund specialists. Reporting directly to Hugh Willis, Chief Executive, he will be responsible for all aspects of BlueBay's hedge fund business other than the management of the portfolios themselves. This will include: developing new hedge fund strategies for BlueBay; further broadening the company's hedge fund investor base; and exploring structured product innovations for BlueBay's funds.

Established in 2001 with high profile institutional backing, BlueBay has generated exceptional performance across the firm's current hedge fund disciplines in global investment grade credit, emerging markets, high yield and event driven strategies. This has attracted strong growth in assets under management, which recently passed the USD 5 billion mark across both new generation long only and total return strategies. December 2005 also saw the launch of BlueBay's Emerging Market Local Currency Bond Fund; one of the first dedicated products to be managed against JP Morgan's new local market bond index - the JP Morgan Government Bond Index-Emerging Markets (GBI-EM).

'David's appointment represents a key strategic initiative for BlueBay and reflects our desire to embark on a second, major stage of growth and development in our hedge fund business - one designed to significantly build out and broaden our existing hedge fund business over the next two to three years,' says Willis. 'We are delighted to have attracted someone of David's calibre to spearhead the development of this crucial aspect of the firm's strategy'.

Background notes: BlueBay Asset Management Limited ('BlueBay') is a specialist manager of fixed income credit products across Investment Grade, High Yield and Emerging Markets. Based in London, BlueBay provides investment management services to institutions and high net worth individuals seeking exposure to the rapidly growing asset class of European fixed income credit. The firm currently employs 98 people, including 41 investment professionals, and manage USD 5 billion across our range of specialist credit products; encompassing both long/short and long-only mandates.

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