Even after this year’s rally, credit remains one of the more appealing sources of income in financial markets.

PIMCO believes now is the right time for investors to consider a move into higher-quality credit as well as select high yield and bank loan sectors.

Three reasons why the outlook for developed credit markets remains constructive.

Persistent trends in economies around the world are providing opportunities for focused, long-term investors in the credit markets. Mark Kiesel, Chief Investment Officer Global Credit, discusses promising themes PIMCO sees over the next three to five years, including the U.S. energy revolution, the rising Asian consumer, the ramifications of global banking regulation and latent demand in the U.S. housing market. PIMCO’s global investment professionals gathered in May at our annual Secular Forum to discuss our long-term, or secular, views of economies and markets around the world.

Many powerful forces are driving markets and asset prices; chief among them are global monetary policy, technicals and fundamentals. We use rigorous top-down and bottom-up analysis to identify the best sectors and companies around the world. We see opportunities in the U.S. (cyclical consumer and housing sectors), Europe (equities, bank capital securities, high yield bonds and corporate hybrids), China (property, technology and Macau) and Japan (cyclical industries, exporters and financials).

?We believe we are moving into an extended period of lower oil prices, and we are actively managing our clients? energy exposure with an eye toward benefiting from recent events. Differentiation between the winners and losers across countries, sectors and individual companies is essential. We currently favor subsectors and companies with strong asset quality, high barriers to entry, solid production profiles and strong balance sheets and liquidity profiles.

The combination of fundamentals, technicals, valuations and global central bank policies drives our overall constructive outlook for global credit in 2015. Economic growth dynamics, including an improving outlook in the U.S., along with likely changes in global central bank policies, continued energy price volatility and the potential for more shareholder-friendly actions by companies inform our credit views and strategies.

The U.S. is finally enjoying a self-sustaining economic recovery, but slow global growth remains a concern and financial markets are bouncing up and down by the day. So what exactly does this U.S. recovery mean for investors?

?We believe select investors looking to reposition portfolios may benefit from a move to senior secured floating rate loans. CLOs have been an important source of demand in the market, and even with more strict risk retention rules just announced under Dodd Frank, we think demand will remain strong. While the Fed has criticized some banks for not following their leveraged lending guidelines, Fed members themselves, in our view, do not appear concerned about loans having a major impact on financial stability.

We see many bottom-up investment opportunities in the global credit markets, particularly in industries with high barriers to entry. We view healthcare, lodging, Asian gaming, master limited partnerships/pipelines, energy, wireless telecom, cell towers, cable, satellite, media and U.S. banks as attractive industries. Companies unique patents, licenses, brands, content and intellectual property, among other advantages, can help support investment returns in both bull and bear markets.

Secular Outlook Series: Mark Kiesel discusses long-term themes that underpin opportunities and risks in global credit markets.

Emerging markets have underperformed expectations, but the longer-term secular outlook remains constructive for many regions. Highly negative investor sentiment and outflows have sharply reduced prices, significantly improving relative value in emerging markets. We see opportunities in emerging markets in interest rates, sovereign credit and select companies for investors with a longer-term investment horizon. ?

PIMCO has significant top-down and bottom-up expertise dedicated to understanding the U.S. housing market cycle. In 2006, we warned U.S. housing prices were significantly overvalued, which led to our defensive positioning heading into the recession. In 2011, we turned bullish on real estate and added investments such as non-agency mortgage-backed securities, banks and homebuilders that we felt would benefit from an eventual recovery in housing prices.

An improving outlook for U.S. housing will be constructive for consumer spending, confidence and jobs. There are many ways to invest directly and indirectly in companies that should benefit from higher housing prices, a pickup in home repairs and remodeling, and residential investment spending. We continue to favor select investments in homebuilders, building materials, appliance manufacturers, lumber, home improvement, banks, title insurance, mortgage origination and servicing, and non-Agency mortgage-backed securities.

While developed market growth in several regions is picking up cyclically from low levels, overall global economic growth should remain subdued over the next several years. We believe credit spread tightening and rating upgrades are most likely for specific companies in industries and areas with strong growth. We see these "rising star" companies in the U.S. and European auto sector, the gaming, energy and chemical industries and in sectors tied to the U.S. housing market.

Given the markets newfound risk appetite for credit and less attractive valuations, we are taking advantage of global credit market liquidity in an effort to reduce our overall risk posture. In our selective offense approach, we continue to favor U.S. housing and housing-related areas, in addition to select investments in the energy, pipeline, specialty finance, gaming, hospitals, and airline and auto industries, given the more positive fundamental outlook for these sectors.

Where is the investment sweet spot in todays global financial markets? The uneven global growth outlook means there are opportunities and risks for both credit and equity investors.

There are still good opportunities for yield and total return in the credit markets, but there has been a shift in where and how investors can find them. A "diamond in the rough" is a credit that is under-covered, or not actively followed or researched by many investors. At PIMCO, we identify these opportunities through our top-down and bottom-up investment process. We've identified a number of sectors that appear poised for above-average growth.

The demand for most high-quality, income-producing assets continues to exceed supply due to a weaker growth outlook and aggressive policy action by global central banks. Yet we are still finding numerous opportunities globally through our bottom-up research that targets areas around the world where fundamentals are supportive and the outlook remains constructive.

U.S. housing may be a decent place to put money over the next several years due to improved absolute and relative valuations. U.S. housing fundamentals have improved significantly, led by lower prices, record low mortgage rates, improving inventory and delinquency trends and a gradually improving labor market, which in combination are helping homebuyer confidence and potential demand. While the outlook for U.S. housing has improved, several headwinds remain, including tight credit, potential supply from the shadow inventory and weak household formation due to a subpar economic recovery.

In addition to strong secular tailwinds supporting the energy sector, highly expansionary global monetary policies from many central banks are adding cyclical support to globally traded commodities like oil. In the U.S. energy sector, we believe that onshore natural gas shale and oil shale developments are creating opportunities to invest in energy companies that may grow significantly faster than the overall U.S. economy.

Without a more forceful and coordinated policy response, Europe now faces an increasing risk of a hard landing. In this uncertain environment, volatility will likely remain high, liquidity poor, risk premiums wide and the global economy fragile as financial and credit conditions tighten. Easier monetary policy as well as the potential for more balance sheet support from a larger consortium of global central banks is now needed over our cyclical horizon. If these actions are coordinated and timely, investors and risk takers would be more likely to move off the sidelines.

The longer policymakers wait, the more likely Europes financial crisis will deteriorate. The risk of a global liquidity trap has also increased as many healthy balance sheets around the world are also refusing to engage. Germany and other strong sovereign nations in Europe have to make a choice: continue to provide financial assistance to countries with more debt and assist in helping to restructure the debt of some European peripheral countries, or potentially move forward with a smaller, stronger group of countries-or at the extreme walk away from the Euro and the EU all together.

Among global banks, we believe U.S. banks are in a stronger position to absorb deterioration in the macroeconomic environment in Europe. U.S. banks also look attractive given their profitability, improving asset quality and capital position. Global banks vary dramatically in their asset quality and ability to meet capital requirements over time. As a result, we believe financial markets will continue to reward the strongest and safest banks and penalize the weakest. While we remain cautious on the U.S. housing market, U.S. banks appear to have the resources to manage further weakness.