Manulife Investments Launches Two New Mandates within the Manulife Private Investment Pools

Adds Manulife U.S. Fixed Income Private Trust and Manulife Global Balanced Private Trust to popular investment program for affluent investors

TSX/NYSE/PSE: MFC  SEHK:945 

TORONTO, Oct. 15, 2013 /PRNewswire/ - Manulife Investments has added two new options to its line-up of Manulife Private Investment Pools. The two new pools, managed by Manulife Asset Management (US) LLC and Mawer Investment Management Ltd. respectively are both offered in a trust structure as follows:

• Manulife U.S. Fixed Income Private Trust is a highly flexible approach to investing in the world's largest and most dynamic credit market. The Pool seeks to provide long-term total return consisting of income and the potential for capital appreciation by investing primarily in a portfolio of U.S. investment grade and high yield debt securities. The Portfolio Managers for this Pool include Manulife Asset Management (US) LLC's John F. Addeo, a value-oriented fundamental investor with more than 20 years of experience investing across the entire capital structure and credit spectrum, and Dennis F. McCafferty, who specializes in high-yield fixed income and floating rate strategies, and has more than 17 years of investment experience.
  
  
• Manulife Global Balanced Private Trust is managed by Mawer Investment Management Ltd.'s Greg Peterson, Director and Senior Portfolio Manager, Paul Moroz, Deputy Chief Investment Officer, and Jim Hall, Chief Investment Officer. On the equity side, the Portfolio Managers adopt a bottom-up brick-by-brick investment approach to identify wealth-creating companies that they believe have solid management teams but are trading at discounts to their intrinsic values. These equities are combined with global and Canadian fixed income exposure, which will be a minimum of 30 per cent of the Pool. The Pool may be suitable for investors seeking a diversified approach to global equity and fixed income investing.

"To strengthen our Manulife Private Investment Pools offering, we've added a U.S. fixed income pool that can take advantage of all interest rate environments," said Derek Saliba, AVP, Mutual Funds. "At launch, there will be a significant allocation to floating rate loans, which may be an attractive fixed income asset class during a rising interest rate environment. We've also added a second Mawer-managed pool to our line-up which may be an appealing option for affluent clients to invest in the global equity markets with less volatility."

Manulife Investments is also renaming Manulife Balanced Private Pool and Manulife Balanced Private Trust to Manulife U.S. Balanced Private Pool and Manulife U.S. Balanced Private Trust, respectively. In addition to the renaming, Manulife Investments will be making minor adjustments to the current broad investment strategies language to more accurately reflect the pools' focus on U.S. equities and U.S. and international fixed income. These name changes provide investors with better clarity as to the underlying investments held by the pools.

First launched in December 2012, Manulife Private Investment Pools offer a comprehensive suite of investment pools spanning a range of asset classes, and portfolio management by award-winning asset managers from Manulife Asset Management and Mawer Investment Management Ltd.

The minimum investment for the Manulife Private Investment Pools is $150,000 per pool, per account.

Commissions, trailing commissions, management fees and expenses all may be associated with mutual fund investments. Please read the prospectus before investing. Mutual funds are not guaranteed, their values change frequently and past performance may not be repeated. Manulife Funds (including the Trust Pools) and Manulife Corporate Classes (including the Class Pools) are managed by Manulife Mutual Funds.

Additional information can be found at manulifeprivateinvestmentpools.ca.

About Manulife Asset Management
Manulife Asset Management is the global asset management arm of Manulife Financial. Manulife Asset Management provides comprehensive asset management solutions for institutional investors and investment funds in key markets around the world. Manulife Asset Management also provides investment management services to affiliates' retail clients through product offerings of Manulife and John Hancock. This investment expertise extends across a broad range of asset classes including equity, fixed income and alternative investments such as real estate, timber, farmland, as well as asset allocation strategies.

Manulife Asset Management has offices with full investment capabilities in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, and the Philippines. In addition, it has a joint venture asset management business in China, Manulife TEDA. It also has operations in Australia, New Zealand, Brazil and Uruguay. John Hancock Asset Management, Hancock Natural Resource Group and Declaration Management and Research are units of Manulife Asset Management. As at June 30 2013, assets under management were C$260 billion (US $247 billion). Additional information about Manulife Asset Management may be found at ManulifeAM.com.

About Mawer Investment Management Ltd.
Mawer Investment Management Ltd. is one of Canada's most respected independently owned investment management firms. Founded in 1974, Mawer has built its reputation over the past 35+ years by employing a highly-disciplined, research-driven process that systematically creates broadly diversified portfolios of wealth-creating companies bought at a discount to their intrinsic value.

About Manulife Investments
Manulife Investments is the brand name describing certain Canadian subsidiaries and operating divisions of Manulife Financial Corporation that offer personal wealth management products and services in Canada. As one of Canada's leading integrated financial services providers, Manulife Investments offers a variety of products and services including segregated fund contracts, mutual funds, annuities, guaranteed interest contracts and structured products.

About Manulife Financial
Manulife Financial is a leading Canada-based financial services group with principal operations in Asia, Canada and the United States. Clients look to Manulife for strong, reliable, trustworthy and forward-thinking solutions for their most significant financial decisions. Our international network of employees, agents and distribution partners offers financial protection and wealth management products and services to millions of clients. We also provide asset management services to institutional customers. Funds under management by Manulife Financial and its subsidiaries were C$567 billion (US$539 billion) as at June 30, 2013. The Company operates as Manulife Financial in Canada and Asia and primarily as John Hancock in the United States.

Manulife Financial Corporation trades as 'MFC' on the TSX, NYSE and PSE, and under '945' on the SEHK. Manulife Financial can be found on the Internet at manulife.com.

SOURCE Manulife Financial Corporation