We believe plan sponsors should evaluate how fixed income can help meet evolving goals during the retirement savings journey. Fixed income has an important role in the accumulation, consolidation and decumulation phases of the retirement savings journey.

A participant’s fixed income allocation offers meaningful diversification benefits and, depending on how far along the participant is in the retirement savings journey, it can be thoughtfully constructed to also contribute to total return, lower the potential for capital losses, manage inflation risk and generate income — all important considerations in today’s uncertain investment environment.

For plan sponsors, sustainable investing is increasingly important as more and more participants are looking for their investments to behave in sustainable and responsible ways. There is no single right way to implement sustainable investments, with values-based themed funds and integrated materiality-based approaches both available to retirement plans.

At MFS, our purpose is to create long-term value for our clients by investing their assets responsibly over time. Responsibility to us means being disciplined on taking the long-term view, maintaining a commitment to analyzing and actively engaging with the companies we invest in and a constant focus on seeking to understand risk from all angles.