/EINPresswire.com/ -- KANSAS CITY, MO--(Marketwired - December 06, 2016) - Effective today, the AC Alternatives Emerging Opportunities Total Return Fund is available to clients and investors seeking ways to diversify their fixed income portfolios through securities that are economically tied to emerging market countries. Managed by a team of emerging markets debt specialists, the new fund is available in investor, institutional, A, R and R6 share classes.

The product intends to be a "best ideas" Emerging Markets Debt (EMD) portfolio, according to American Century's head of Emerging Markets Debt Marge Karner.

"Our new total return fund is a benchmark-agnostic portfolio that tactically allocates among all EMD asset classes, including sovereigns and corporates, hard and local currency debt, currencies and derivatives," said Karner. "We strive to capture most of the upside in the EMD universe with only 50 to 75 percent of the volatility over the full business cycle. Our goal is to provide an alternative to clients seeking exposure to the full range of EMD asset classes with a focus on seeking strong risk-adjusted returns and on minimizing drawdowns."

The team utilizes a combination of top-down and bottom-up analysis to develop their views on emerging markets and an integrated fundamental and quantitative investment process to seek to deliver clients consistent and repeatable performance. The fund's investment process focuses on delivering returns through enhanced attention to risk and stress testing of portfolios. Consequently, proprietary risk management and portfolio engineering tools are integrated into the daily portfolio management process.

According to Co-Chief Investment Officer David MacEwen, American Century is committed to offering a solution-based product that aims to help clients navigate the complex EMD universe, while striving to actively manage downside risk.

"We believe emerging markets may account for roughly two thirds of global growth over the next few years, fueled by supportive demographics, the growing middle class and increasing incomes," MacEwen said. "Over the past few years, we've built an experienced team of EMD experts to manage our growing capabilities and to respond to our clients' evolving preferences."

The new fund is managed by Vice President and Senior Portfolio Manager Marge Karner, Vice President and Portfolio Manager Abdelak Adjriou, Senior Vice President and Senior Portfolio Manager John Lovito and Vice President and Senior Portfolio Manager Kevin Akioka. They are supported by Vice President and Senior Sovereign Strategist Alessandra Alecci and dedicated EM Corporate Analysts Thomas Youn and Valeria Cisnero, as well as American Century's global credit analyst team and Global Analytics team.

American Century launched its first EMD fund, Emerging Markets Debt, in July 2014. The strategy focuses on corporate debt.

American Century Investments is a leading global asset manager focused on delivering investment results and building long-term client relationships while supporting research that can improve human health and save lives. Founded in 1958, American Century Investments' 1,300 employees serve investment professionals, institutions, corporations and individual investors from offices in New York; London; Hong Kong; Mountain View, Calif.; and Kansas City, Mo. Jonathan S. Thomas is president and chief executive officer, and Victor Zhang and David MacEwen serve as co-chief investment officers.

Delivering investment results to clients enables American Century Investments to distribute over 40 percent of its dividends to the Stowers Institute for Medical Research, a 500-person, non-profit basic biomedical research organization. The Institute owns more than 40 percent of American Century Investments and has received dividend payments totaling over $1.2 billion since 2000. For more information about American Century Investments, visit www.americancentury.com.

You should consider the fund's investment objectives, risks, charges and expenses carefully before you invest. The fund's prospectus or summary prospectus, which can be obtained by visiting americancentury.com, contains this and other information about the fund, and should be read carefully before investing.

Alternative mutual funds that hold a variety of non-traditional investments also often employ more complex trading strategies than traditional mutual funds. Each of these different alternative asset classes and investment strategies have unique risks making them more suitable for investors with an above average tolerance for risk.

International investing involves special risks, such as political instability and currency fluctuations. Because the fund may invest in securities denominated in foreign currencies, the fund may be subject to currency risk, meaning the fund could experience gains or losses based solely on changes in the exchange rate between foreign currencies and the U.S. dollar. In addition, the lower rated securities in which the fund invests are subject to greater credit risk, default risk and liquidity risk. Investing in emerging markets may accentuate these risks.

Generally, as interest rates rise, the value of the securities held in the fund will decline. The opposite is true when interest rates decline.

The use of derivative instruments involves risks different from, or possibly greater than, the risks associated with investing directly in securities and other traditional instruments. Derivatives can be highly illiquid and difficult to unwind or value, and changes in the value of a derivative held by the fund may not correlate with the value of the underlying instrument. Derivatives are subject to a number of other risks, including interest, market and credit risk.

The fund is classified as nondiversified. Because it is nondiversified, it may hold large positions in a small number of securities. To the extent it maintains such positions; a price change in any one of those securities may have a greater impact on the fund's share price than if it were diversified.

Hard currency is global traded and traditionally has served as a reliable and stable store of value.

Local currency is the home currency of the sovereign nation or corporation issuing debt.

Derivatives are securities whose performance and/or structure is derived from the performance and/or structure of other assets, interest rates, or indexes.

Drawdown is the peak-to-trough decline during a specific recorded period of an investment, fund or commodity. A drawdown is usually quoted as the percentage between the peak and the subsequent trough.

©2016 American Century Proprietary Holdings, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

American Century Investment Services, Inc., Distributor.