HAMILTON, Bermuda & NEW YORK -- (Business Wire)

Primus Guaranty, Ltd. (NYSE:PRS) today announced it has completed the sale of CypressTree Investment Management, LLC (CypressTree), its third-party asset management subsidiary, to Commercial Industrial Finance Corp. (CIFC). Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

“The completion of this transaction enables us to further sharpen our focus on our key goal: preserving the value of our credit protection business in amortization,” said Richard Claiden, Primus Guaranty’s chief executive officer. “At the same time, it ensures our CLO investors will continue to be well served by the top-notch professionals at CIFC.”

Peter Gleysteen, CIFC’s chief executive officer, stated, “Effective immediately, CypressTree’s activities will be operationally integrated within CIFC’s existing investment model, which we believe will benefit all investors in these funds. CIFC has implemented a plan to ensure a smooth, seamless transition of the management of the CLOs and other funds and their underlying investments into CIFC’s platform.”

CypressTree manages or subadvises approximately $2.6 billion of high yield and leveraged loan assets in seven collateralized loan obligations (CLOs) and two other funds. The collateral management contracts for the CLOs, as well as the two other funds, were included in the sale.

Primus Guaranty’s credit protection business, which consists of Primus Financial Products’ $11.8 billion portfolio of credit default swaps, is not affected by the sale. Primus Financial Products will remain part of Primus Guaranty and will continue to be managed by Primus Financial portfolio managers.

Berkshire Capital Securities LLC acted as advisor to Primus on the sale of the CLO business.

CLO Investor Questions

Investors in the Hewett’s Island and Primus CLOs with questions are encouraged to contact Ms. Nga Tran, CIFC’s Head of Institutional Relationships, at 212/624-1204 or ntran@cifc.com.

About Primus Guaranty

Primus Guaranty, Ltd. is a Bermuda company with offices in New York. Through its subsidiary, Primus Financial Products, LLC, the Company provides protection against the risk of default on primarily investment grade corporate and sovereign reference entities.

About CIFC

CIFC is a premier corporate credit asset management business, combining the best investment disciplines of banks and asset managers. Pro forma for this acquisition, CIFC will manage $6.2 billion of assets. CIFC is a proactive, fundamentals-based manager with best-in-class processes and controls, high transparency to investors and a proprietary credit technology platform. CIFC is based in New York and is an SEC registered investment adviser.

CIFC is in the top decile of U.S. large bank loan managers by virtue of its highly consistent performance and uninterrupted compliance with the overcollateralization tests in all of its funds, which has enabled it to make distributions to equity investors at every payment date of every fund. CIFC is committed to responsible and even-handed stewardship on behalf of all investor classes of the funds it manages.

Forward-Looking Statements

Some of the statements included in this press release and other statements Primus Guaranty may make, particularly those anticipating future financial performance, business prospects, growth and operating strategies, market performance, valuations and similar matters, are forward-looking statements that involve a number of assumptions, risks and uncertainties, which change over time. Any such statements speak only as of the date they are made, and Primus Guaranty assumes no duty to, and does not undertake to, update any forward-looking statements. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in forward-looking statements, and future results could differ materially from historical performance. For a discussion of the factors that could affect the Company's actual results please refer to the risk factors identified from time to time in the Company's SEC reports, including, but not limited to, Primus Guaranty's Annual Report on Form 10-K, as filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

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Contacts:

Primus:
Primus Guaranty, Ltd.
Nicole Stansell, 212-697-1992
investorrelations@primusguaranty.com
or
Media:
Kennedy & Company
Steven Kennedy, 914-961-2436 ext. 13
steven@kennedycom.com
or
CIFC:
CIFC
Nga Tran, 212-624-1204
ntran@cifc.com

Source: Primus Guaranty, Ltd.