The Manning Monthly Income Fund returned +0.66% in December 2025, 8.96% over 12 months and 9.35% over three years, continuing to deliver net returns of over 5% per annum above the RBA cash rate.
Deployment Timing Into Year-End
As anticipated, the Fund is carrying higher cash balances as several larger transactions progress through final documentation and execution stages. In structured credit, particularly within securitised and multi-party facilities, deployment timing is driven by legal completion, counterparty readiness and warehouse funding mechanics rather than market conditions. This is especially evident around the December and January period, where execution timelines can extend despite underlying asset performance remaining unchanged.
While we continue to manage applications and deployments as tightly as possible, short term variation in monthly returns is more often a function of cash balances than credit outcomes. Importantly, this reflects discipline around structure and execution rather than a shift in risk appetite or opportunity set. We expect these transactions to fund progressively as process permits, consistent with the nature of the asset class.
Risk Dispersion Beneath The Surface
Market conditions remain supportive for issuance, but the dispersion of risk across the credit market continues to widen. Strong demand and elevated capital inflows have tightened pricing in parts of the ABS market, with covenants and structural protections increasingly bid down as competition intensifies. In this environment, headline yield alone provides an incomplete picture of risk. In our view, the more meaningful distinction is not between public and private markets, but between exposures underpinned by observable borrower cashflows and those reliant on refinancing assumptions and capitalised income. As competition increases, this distinction becomes more important. Rather than competing on price, our focus remains on a narrower segment of the market where we can partner with high quality non-bank lenders, access granular loan-level data, and negotiate structures that prioritise durability over volume. Structures that perform well in benign conditions can behave very differently once liquidity tightens or sentiment shifts, even where underlying assets appear similar on the surface.
Structure As a Source Of Resilience
Periods of market volatility are often characterised by dislocation in pricing and liquidity rather than immediate deterioration in underlying collateral. For this reason, we continue to prioritise facilities where downside is managed structurally rather than through timing or discretion. Eligibility constraints, performance triggers and amortisation mechanics are designed to operate early and automatically, reducing reliance on market conditions or our intervention.
As the Fund enters its eleventh year, this emphasis on contracted cashflows, conservative structuring and repeatable processes has remained central to targeting capital stability and a consistent level of income across different market environments. While the backdrop continues to evolve, our approach has not. The focus remains on deploying selectively where structure and risk are appropriately aligned.
