Amherst Securities Group LP (“Amherst Securities”) is a fixed-income specialist focusing on mortgage-related investments for institutional customers, from the largest federal agencies and private asset managers to mid-size depositories.

 

Our specialization gives investors the tools they need to capitalize on market opportunities in the world’s largest and most complex debt market. We only buy securities that we truly understand and want to own, and we individualize our research and advice to help investors understand the risks unique to their situation and how to effectively manage them. Through affiliation with other Amherst companies, we are able to provide model calibration, risk management insight, underwriting and secondary market liquidity.

 

Since 2000, Amherst has dedicated significant resources to developing proprietary analytical tools and methodologies to foster a unique, invaluable perspective of how mortgage assets will perform over time. This initiative transformed Amherst into a data- and technology-driven enterprise and fueled Amherst’s growth.

 

The heart of our business philosophy is disciplined risk management. Our focus on quality of earnings and managing risk in a conservative manner has served our partners, employees and clients in a broad range of market conditions. Amherst is a lean organization that is owned by its principals and employees. We put our own money to work everyday, instilling a discipline that has steered us clear of the legacy issues and losses facing most of the current mortgage participants.

 

As participants in the world’s largest market, we are keenly aware of the importance of combining our years of experience with vast amounts of market information to identify areas that offer relative value opportunities for our clients. Our toolkit of proprietary technologies includes the following.

 

Amherst^® Loan Information Analysis System (ALIAS). This powerful tool is a complete system for quickly analyzing many securities at the loan level and integrating that information with sophisticated prepay, default, and loss models to value and evaluate these securities. ALIAS has emerged as an acclaimed, formidable tool for identifying investment opportunities in today’s tumultuous subprime mortgage market.

 

Amherst^® Bond Locator. This tool allows traders to quickly perform a variety of queries on the universe of fixed income offerings. We identify investors with similar or complementary positions and quickly quantify the fixed-income universe for our customers. This helps expedite the investment decision-making process, resulting in timely trade execution and assuring added due diligence for investment professionals and fiduciaries.

 

Structuring Tool. Our proprietary structuring tool allows our structuring professionals to create securities with unique characteristics that may not be readily available in the secondary markets. Since 2002, our structuring desk has participated in underwriting approximately 100 deals totaling $29 billion.

 

Prepayment Models. Used in option adjusted spread (OAS) analysis, our prepayment models incorporate a wide scope of variables from housing turnover to interest rate sensitivity. Our traders use these models in determining the value of specific bonds on an OAS basis, as well as performing sector analysis.

 

Mortgage Market Index System. This database contains over 130 million records with historical prepayment data on mortgage-backed securities pools. Maintaining detailed historical databases allows us to analyze historical performance and ultimately construct quantitative projections for the future.