Emergency

Northwestern Mutual's approach to the coronavirus (COVID-19) Find out more ›

Equity Style Box

The equity style box categorizes the size and management style of the various equity offerings for Variable Life insurance.

On the horizontal axis, funds are separated into one of three categories — value, blend or growth, depending upon the management style of the portfolio. On the vertical axis, funds are separated into either their market capitalization, the general size of companies that it invests in, or international.

  Value Blend Growth
Large Cap Large Company Value (Mason Street Advisors/American Century)

Domestic Equity (Mason Street Advisors/Delaware)

Equity Income (Mason Street Advisors/T. Rowe Price)
Large Cap Blend (Mason Street Advisors/Fiduciary Management)

Index 500 Stock (Mason Street Advisors)

Large Cap Core Stock (Mason Street Advisors/Wellington Management)

Neuberger Berman AMT Sustainable Equity

U.S. Strategic Equity (Russell Investments)

Fidelity® VIP Contrafund® Portfolio Initial Class
Growth Stock (Mason Street Advisors/T. Rowe Price)

Focused Appreciation (Mason Street Advisors/Loomis Sayles Company)
Mid Cap Mid Cap Value (Mason Street Advisors/American Century) Fidelity® VIP Mid Cap Portfolio, Initial Class

Index 400 Stock (Mason Street Advisors)
Mid Cap Growth Stock (Mason Street Advisors/Wellington Management)
Small Cap Small Cap Value (Mason Street Advisors/T. Rowe Price) Index 600 Stock (Mason Street Advisors)

U.S. Small Cap Equity (Russell Investments)
Small Cap Growth Stock (Mason Street Advisors/Wellington Management)
International International Equity (Mason Street Advisors/Templeton) Emerging Markets Equity Portfolio (MSA/Aberdeen Asset Managers)

Research International Core (Mason Street Advisors/MFS®)

International Developed Markets (Russell Investments)
International Growth (Mason Street Advisors/FIAM LLC)

Equity Style Box Definitions

Specialty and Hybrid Funds

Type Name
Real Estate Global Real Estate Securities (Russell Investments)
Commodities Credit Suisse Trust Commodity Return Strategy Class 2
Hybrid Funds Asset Allocation (Mason Street Advisors)

Balanced (Mason Street Advisors)

LifePoints® Moderate Strategy (Russell Investments)

LifePoints® Balanced Strategy (Russell Investments)

LifePoints® Growth Strategy (Russell Investments)

LifePoints® Equity Growth Strategy (Russell Investments)

Fixed Income Style Box

The fixed income style box demonstrates the two most important and distinguishing characteristics of fixed income funds: credit quality and interest rate sensitivity.

For fixed-income funds, the vertical axis shows the credit quality of the bonds owned and the horizontal axis shows interest rate sensitivity as measured by a bond's effective duration.

 

Interest Rate Sensitivity

Credit Quality Limited Moderate Extensive
High-Quality Short-Term Bond (Mason Street Advisors/T. Rowe Price) Inflation Protection (Mason Street Advisors/American Century)

Strategic Bond (Russell Investments)

Select Bond (Mason Street Advisors/Wells Cap)
Long-Term U.S. Government Bond (Mason Street Advisors/PIMCO)
Mid-Quality   Multi-Sector Bond (Mason Street Advisors/PIMCO)  
Low-Quality   High Yield Bond (Mason Street Advisors/Federated)  

Other
Government Money Market (Mason Street Advisors/BlackRock Advisors)