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The fund, which was launched in July 2007, just in time for liquidity to freeze its target asset class, has so far been sold to institutional investors and pension funds, although it does have a retail share class.

Positioned in the IMA Absolute Return sector, Henderson Credit Alpha targets Libor plus 3 per cent and uses Ucits III powers to take both long and short positions on credit.

Stephen Thariyan, head of credit at Henderson New Star and lead manager of the fund, said: "Because of its launch date, in terms of credit markets falling over, we wanted to see how well the strategies would work and what would happen in the markets before marketing it beyond institutional investors."

A further consideration was that Henderson had an established retail bond franchise under John Patullo.

Mr Thariyan added: "We didn't want to start impacting their reputation with a fund that wasn't under them."

But now that the fund is approaching its two-year anniversary with an attractive track record, and the retail bond franchise has been shaken up with the arrival of New Star managers, the merged company would like to promote Credit Alpha more actively.

The fund has grown 7.5 per cent since launch - less than Libor, but better than long-only credit strategies or equity funds. This includes a loss of 3.8 per cent for 2008.