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Viktor Hjort,
Edward Susanto
& team
Morgan Stanley
First-Place Appearances: 1

Total Appearances: 3

Team Debut: 2012

In just its third appearance on this roster, Morgan Stanley claims the top spot, rising from No. 2. The firm’s three Hong Kong–based credit strategists are jointly led by Viktor Hjort and Edward Susanto and earn investor praise for their comprehensive research. In particular, one supporter offers, the analysts have explained in detailed reports why investors should consider the region’s banks well positioned relative to their global peers, considering “where the Asian banks get their capital and how they have a very high rate of savings and are not as reliant on subdebt and senior debt, which is such a small part of their capital bases that they don’t have the same bail-in risks.” For the balance of this year, the team favors financials but advises caution on high-yield Chinese credits. Specific recommendations include certain subordinated debentures issued by Bank of East Asia and Citic Bank International, a subsidiary of Beijing investment company Citic Group. “Hong Kong banks have strong credit fundamentals and are well regulated,” Hjort explains, “and names like [Citic Bank International] also benefit from having a Chinese state-owned banking parent.” The researchers favor independent, local Bank of Asia’s 2022 lower-tier, legacy credit with a coupon of 6.375 percent, which is noncallable before 2017. Likewise, they tout Citic Bank’s 6 percent, 2024 tier-2 security, callable in 2019. Thirty-nine-year-old Hjort jumped to Morgan Stanley in 2008 from Deutsche Bank, where he was responsible for credit derivatives and structured-credit strategy in Europe. He earned a master of science degree in economics at Sweden’s Lund University. Susanto, 49, joined the firm in 2010 after working as a special-situations credit investor at Standard Chartered Bank and other firms. Before earning an MBA in finance and health care at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, he enjoyed an academic career as a neurobiologist, armed with BA and MA degrees in biology from Massachusetts’ Harvard University.