Gross Nabs Index Patent

PIMCO's scored a patent.

The Newport Beach, Calif.-based bond giant has announced today that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has granted the firm's Global Advantage Bond Index (GLADI) a patent.

U.S. Patent Number 8,306,892 was awarded to PIMCO founder and co-chief investment office Bill Gross and Ramin Toloui, global co-head of emerging markets portfolio management.

GLADI is a fixed-income benchmark designed to track global bond markets based on gross domestic product weighting rather than market-capitalization weighting, a company statement explained.

GDP weighting helps avoid the biases embedded in market-cap-weighted indexes, which tend to concentrate large weights in the most highly indebted countries, the statement said. In addition, GLADI incorporates both nominal and inflation-linked securities, making fuller use of the global fixed-income opportunity set, it said.

“PIMCO’s goal in designing a new bond index was to provide investors with a superior compass to guide their portfolios in a New Normal environment where economic and financial power is shifting from developed to emerging markets,” Toloui stated. “Ultimately, we think the Global Advantage Bond Index enhances investors’ ability to target improved risk-adjusted returns, and we are gratified that our work has been recognized with a U.S. patent.”

Representatives of PIMCO were not available for comment by press time.

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