Curtis Arledge just lined up a deal to buy an institutional fixed income shop with $23 billion in assets under management, and they subadvise a mutual fund, too.

On Monday BNY Mellon [profile] unveiled a deal to buy Armonk, New York-based Cutwater Asset Management from MBIA. The terms of the deal, which is slated to close in the first quarter of next year, have not been disclosed.

Cutwater's clients include consultants, corporations, governments, insurers, pension funds, unions and other financial institutions. Cutwater also subadvises an open-end mutual fund, Advisors Asset Management's AAM Cutwater Select Income Fund. Morningstar estimates that the fund has $26.4 million in assets. Gerard Berrigan of MBIA and Gautam Khanna of Cutwater PM the fund.

BNY Mellon spokesman Mike Dunn told MFWire that it's premature to comment on whether or not Cutwater will be doing more mutual fund related work as part of BNY Mellon once the deal closes.

BNY's Insight Investment will administer Cutwater. Based in London, Insight offers absolute return, currency management and liability driven investment strategies, as well as fixed income ones. BNY bought Insight five years ago, and Insight now manages $495 billion (as of June 30), almost one-third of BNY Mellon Investment Management's $1.6 trillion in total AUM. Abdallah Nauphal is Insight's CEO and chief investment officer.

"Cutwater brings an impressive performance history, strong intellectual capital and an investment culture consistent with BNY Mellon's," states Arledge, CEO of BNY Mellon Investment Management. "Given the unprecedented interest in the fixed income market at this time, we are excited by the opportunity to expand our investment offerings for clients as a result of this combination of fixed income capabilities."

Clifford Corso, CEO and chief investment officer at Cutwater, calls the deal "a logical next step for Cutwater."

Dunn confirms that Cutwater has 80 total staff, including about 33 investment professionals.

"It's our intention to retain key staff members," Dunn tells MFWire. 

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