Methodology – Credit research poll 2002

Investors were asked to rate named analysts and teams for the categories indicated. The credit research houses themselves nominated teams. Scores were given in the ratio 5:4:3:2 for first, second, third, fourth and fifth place nominations respectively.

Scores were weighted as follows to take into account the size of funds under management dedicated to credit research or volume of secondary turnover.

Investment grade:

Greater than e10 billion – weighted by factor of 4

Between e5 billion and e10 billion – weighted by a factor of 3

Between e1 billion and e5 billion – weighted by a factor of 2

No estimate provided, or less than e1 billion – no weighting

High-yield

Greater than e500 million – weighted by a factor of three

Between e250 million and e500 million – weighted by a factor of 2

No estimate provided, or less than e250 million – no weighting

Other credit

Asset-backed: weighted as for investment grade

Emerging market sovereigns: weighted as for investment grade

Indices: weighted as for investment grade

Qualitative

Multiple votes from the same institution were averaged out to produce a single score, which was then weighted by the average estimated holding given on all valid questionnaires from that institution.

The weightings were agreed with the participating banks themselves so that they would not feel underweighted according to their particular client profile. The banks saw both first, second and final drafts of the questionnaire before it went out.

Unfortunately it was found necessary to exclude 300 replies due to irregularities in data provided or withheld by respondents.

Among the principal reasons for exclusion were:

• Yahoo/AOL-type email addresses given

• People voting for just one person or one firm on the ballot

• Private investors

• Insufficient biographical details – main reason

• Correlated replies from, usually but not always, the respective asset management division, ie, 5 people from ABC Asset Management voting for only for ABC plc on 5 separate ballots.

  We received 940 valid replies from 654 institutions from Friday, January 25 to March 4 2002.

  Completed questionnaires were received from 73 of the groups ranked by assets under management in the Institutional Investor Euro 100 league table of top fund managers.

  If you have any questions about the survey, please contact Andrew Newby, head of research, on +44-(0)207-7798694, or email him at anewby@euromoneyplc.com.