Neuberger Berman's Wai Lee Wins 2012 Peter L. Bernstein Award

NEW YORK, Nov. 30, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Neuberger Berman Group LLC, one of the world's leading employee-controlled money managers, is pleased to announce that Wai Lee, chief investment officer and director of research of the firm's Quantitative Investment Group, has been named the winner of the 2012 Peter L. Bernstein Award for his article "Risk-Based Asset Allocation: A New Answer to An Old Question?" The article appeared in the summer 2011 issue of The Journal of Portfolio Management, published by Institutional Investor Journals.

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The award is named for Peter L. Bernstein, the celebrated economic historian, author, and founding editor of The Journal of Portfolio Management. The Peter L. Bernstein Award honors extraordinary and compelling research published in any of Institutional Investor's 10 highly regarded journals over the previous 12 months. Earlier this year, this same article won Best Article in the 13^th Annual Bernstein Fabozzi/Jacobs Levy Award of The Journal of Portfolio Management. 

Lee's winning paper was chosen through a blind review process by an independent committee comprised of Gary Gastineau of ETF Consultants LLC, William Goetzmann of the Yale School of Management, and BlackRock's Ronald Kahn. Lee's paper is "an insightful analysis of various new approaches to portfolio construction—from minimum variance to risk parity to maximum diversification to equal weighting—showing the underlying assumptions required to make each one optimal, and comparing each portfolio's important characteristics," Kahn said.

Lee serves as co-manager of the Neuberger Berman Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund (tickers: NRBAX, NRBCX, NRBIX), an active, diversified commodity investment fund designed to generate attractive risk-adjusted returns with low correlation to traditional asset classes.  Lee's research on risk-based investing and asset allocation underpins portfolio construction for the Fund.

Lee also is a senior member of the team managing the Neuberger Berman Global Allocation Fund (tickers: NGLAX, NGLCX, NGLIX), which blends fundamental and quantitative investment analysis to determine asset allocation and security selection.

Lee's award-winning article can be found online at The Journal of Portfolio Management (www.iijpm.com). A summary about the practical implementation of Lee's research findings and the paper's potential impact on the institutional investing and scholarly research communities can be found online at Institutional Investor Journals (www.iijournals.com/page/wai_lee).

About Neuberger Berman

Neuberger Berman is a private, independent, employee-controlled investment manager. It partners with institutions, advisors and individuals throughout the world to customize solutions that address their needs for income, growth and capital preservation. With more than 1,700 professionals focused exclusively on asset management, it offers an investment culture of independent thinking.  Founded in 1939, the company provides solutions across equities, fixed income, hedge funds and private equity, and had $203 billion in assets under management as of September 30, 2012. For more information, please visit our website at www.nb.com.

The Journal of Portfolio Management named the 13th Annual Bernstein Fabozzi/Jacobs Levy Awards from a group of 54 articles published by The Journal of Portfolio Management from Winter 2011 through Fall 2011, as well as a separate Real Estate issue dated September 2011. The "Best Article" and three "Outstanding Article" awards were determined based on subscriber voting. The awards are academic in nature and are not reflective of the investment management capabilities of the authors or their respective firms.

An investor should consider each fund's investment objectives, risks and fees and expenses carefully before investing. This and other important information can be found in each fund's prospectus or summary prospectus, which you can obtain by calling 877.628.2583. Please read the prospectus or, if available, summary prospectus carefully before making an investment.

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Stock markets are volatile and may decline significantly in response to adverse issuer, political, regulatory, market or economic developments. To the extent that the fund sells stocks before they reach their market peak, it may miss out on opportunities for higher performance. Small- and mid-capitalization stocks trade less frequently and in lower volume than larger company stocks and thus may be more volatile and more vulnerable to financial and other risks. Investing in foreign securities may involve greater risks than investing in securities of U.S. issuers, such as currency fluctuations, potential social, political or economic instability, restrictions on foreign investors, less stringent regulation and less market liquidity. Securities issued in emerging market countries may be more volatile and less liquid than securities issued in foreign countries with more developed economies or markets as such governments may be less stable and more likely to impose capital controls as well as impose additional taxes and liquidity restrictions.

Exchange rate exposure and currency fluctuations could erase or augment investment results. Funds may hedge currency risks when available though the hedging instruments may not always perform as expected. Derivatives contracts on non-U.S. currencies are subject to exchange rate movements. The risks involved in seeking capital appreciation from investments primarily in companies based outside the United States are set forth in the prospectus. Shares in a fund may fluctuate based on interest rates, market condition, credit quality and other factors. In a rising interest rate environment, the value of a fund's fixed income investments is likely to fall. Derivatives may involve risks different from, or greater than, those associated with more traditional investments. Investments in the over-the-counter ("OTC") market introduces counterparty risk due to the possibility that the dealer providing the derivative may fail to timely satisfy its obligations. Investments in the futures markets also introduce the risk that its futures commission merchant ("FCM") may default on its obligations including the FCM's obligation to return margin posted in connection with a fund's futures contracts. Short sales, selling a security a fund does not own in anticipation that the security's price will decline, theoretically presents unlimited risk on an individual stock basis, since a fund may be required to buy the security sold short at a time when the security has appreciated in value. Leverage may amplify changes in a fund's net asset value. ETFs are subject to tracking error and may be unable to sell poorly performing stocks that are included in their index. ETFs may trade in the secondary market at prices below the value of their underlying portfolios and may not be liquid. The use of options involves investment strategies and risks different from those associated with ordinary securities transactions. A "covered call" involves selling a call option while simultaneously holding an equivalent position in the underlying security. A put option involves buying the right to sell a security at a specific price within a given time period.

For the Absolute Return Multi-Manager Fund, performance will largely depend on the success of Neuberger Berman's methodology in allocating the Fund's assets to subadvisers, and its selection and oversight of the subadvisers. The subadvisers' investment styles may not always be complementary, which could adversely affect the performance of the Fund. Some subadvisers have little experience managing registered investment companies which, unlike the hedge funds these managers have been managing, are subject to daily inflows and outflows of investor cash and are subject to certain legal and tax-related restrictions on their investments and operations. Please refer to the Fund's prospectus for additional information on the risks associated with each subadvisers' investment strategy.

For the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund and its Subsidiary will have significant investment exposure to the commodities markets and/or a particular sector of the commodities markets, which may subject the Fund and the Subsidiary to greater volatility than investments in traditional securities. The commodities markets may fluctuate widely based on a variety of factors, including changes in overall market movements, domestic and foreign political and economic events and policies, war, acts of terrorism, changes in domestic or foreign interest rates and/or investor expectations concerning interest rates, domestic and foreign inflation rates and investment and trading activities in commodities. Prices of various commodities may also be affected by factors such as drought, floods, weather, livestock disease, embargoes, tariffs and other regulatory developments. The prices of commodities can also fluctuate widely due to supply and demand disruptions in major producing or consuming regions. To the extent the Fund focuses its investments in a particular commodity in the commodities market, the Fund will be more susceptible to risks associated with the particular commodity. No active trading market may exist for certain commodities investments. Because the Fund's and the Subsidiary's performance is linked to the performance of potentially volatile commodities, investors should be willing to assume the risks of significant fluctuations in the value of the Fund's shares.

To qualify as a regulated investment company ("RIC"), funds must derive at least 90% of their gross income for each taxable year from sources treated as "qualifying income" under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended. Although qualifying income does not include income derived directly from commodities, including certain commodity-linked derivative instruments, the Internal Revenue Service ("Service") has issued a large number of private letter rulings (which the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund may not cite as precedent) in recent years that income a RIC derives from a wholly owned foreign subsidiary (such as the Subsidiary) that earns income derived from commodities is qualifying income. The Service suspended the issuance of those rulings in July 2011. The Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund nevertheless has received an opinion of counsel, which is not binding on the Service or the courts, that income the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund derives from the Subsidiary should constitute qualifying income.

The tax treatment of income from commodity-related investments and the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund's income from the Subsidiary may be adversely affected by future legislation, Treasury Regulations, and/or guidance issued by the Service that could affect the character, timing, and/or amount of the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund's taxable income or capital gains and distributions it makes. If the Service were to change its ruling position, such that the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund's income from the Subsidiary was not qualifying income, the Fund could be unable to qualify as a RIC for one or more years. If the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund failed to so qualify for any taxable year but was eligible to and did cure the failure, it would incur potentially significant additional federal income tax expense. If, on the other hand, the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund failed to so qualify for any taxable year, and was ineligible to or otherwise did not cure the failure, it would be subject to federal income tax on its taxable income at corporate rates, with the consequence that its income available for distribution to shareholders would be reduced and all such distributions from earnings and profits would be taxable to them as dividend income. In that event, the Fund's Board of Trustees may authorize a significant change in investment strategy or the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund's liquidation.

Governments, agencies, or other regulatory bodies may adopt or change laws or regulations that could adversely affect the issuer, the market value of the security, or the Funds' performance. Under recent Commodity Futures Trading Commission ("CFTC") rule amendments, the Funds will need to comply with certain disclosure and operational regulations governing commodity pools, which may increase the Fund's regulatory compliance costs. To the extent additional regulations are adopted, the Funds may be compelled to consider significant changes, which could include substantially altering its principal investment strategies or, if deemed necessary, liquidating the Funds.

By investing in the Subsidiary, the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund is indirectly exposed to the risks associated with the Subsidiary's investments. The commodity-linked derivative instruments and other investments held by the Subsidiary are similar to those that are permitted to be held by the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund, and thus, are subject to the same risks whether or not they are held by the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund or the Subsidiary. The Subsidiary is not registered under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended (the "1940 Act"), and, unless otherwise noted in this prospectus, is not subject to all the investor protections of the 1940 Act. Changes in the laws of the United States and/or the Cayman Islands, under which the Fund and the Subsidiary, respectively, are organized, could result in the inability of the Risk Balanced Commodity Strategy Fund and/or the Subsidiary to operate as described in this prospectus and the Statement of Additional Information and could adversely affect the Fund and its shareholders.

The "Neuberger Berman" name and logo are registered service marks of Neuberger Berman Group LLC. "Neuberger Berman Management LLC" and the individual Fund names in this piece are either service marks or registered service marks of Neuberger Berman Management LLC.

© 2012 Neuberger Berman Management LLC, distributor. Member FINRA. All rights reserved.

Media Contact:
Alex Samuelson, 212.476.5392

SOURCE Neuberger Berman Group LLC

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