Western Asset will manage a global active investment-grade credit mandate for New Zealand Superannuation, but NZ Super has refused to divulge any information on the size of the mandate.

The fund has NZ$15.6 billion in funds under management, but Paul Gregory, head of comunications for the fund was not forthcoming on whether the Western Asset funds would come from cashflow or from the termination of another mandate.

Other questions which remained unanswered were whether Western would include investment-grade corporate as well as government debt, and which global credit bond index would be the benchmark.

It was also unclear as to whether the mandate would allow Western to invest in credit derivatives, or whether this would be specifically be disallowed.