Fund Evaluator:

DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst Overview

DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst (SZEIX) is an actively managed Taxable Bond Emerging Markets Bond fund. DWS launched the fund in 2008.

The investment seeks to provide high current income and, secondarily, long-term capital appreciation. Under normal circumstances, the fund invests at least 80% of net assets, plus the amount of any borrowings for investment purposes, in high yield bonds and other debt securities issued by governments and corporations in emerging market countries (i.e., the issuer is traded mainly in an emerging market, is organized under the laws of an emerging market country or is a company with more than half of its business in emerging markets) or the return on which is derived primarily from emerging markets. The fund is non-diversified.

About DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst (SZEIX)

There are 3 members of the management team with an average tenure of 6.02 years: Nicolas Schlotthauer (2017), Roland Gabert (2018), Stephan-C Schumann (2025). Management tenure is more important for actively managed funds than passive index funds.

The fund has 2 primary benchmarks: Bloomberg Global Aggregate TR USD index with a weighting of 100% and JPM EMBI Global Div ex CCC TR USD index with a weighting of 100%. DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst has 108 securities in its portfolio. The top 10 holdings constitute 23.5% of the fund’s assets. The fund meets the SEC requirement of being classified as a nondiversified fund. The fund is not considered to have an ESG focus with its investment selection and management.

DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst is part of the Fixed Income global asset class and is within the Taxable Bond fund group. DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst has 93.2% of its portfolio invested in foreign issues. The overall assets allocated to domestic stock is 0.0%. There is 0.0% allocated to foreign stock, and 0.0% is allocated to preferred stocks. The bond allocation as a percentage of total assets is 93.8% (0.6% domestic bond, 93.2% foreign bond and 0.0% convertible bond). DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst has 6.2% of the portfolio in cash.

Assets Under Management

The fund has $14 million in total assets, which is below the $325 million average for the Emerging Markets Bond category. Normally, lower assets under management translates to higher average expense ratios, and greater total assets are desired. However, for some investment categories, such as small-cap investing, it may be difficult for the manager to fully employ the desired active strategy if assets grow too large or too quickly.

SZEIX Performance and Fees

The expense ratio measures how much of a fund’s assets are used for administrative expenses and operating expenses, including adviser fees and fees for the transfer agent and custodial services. The DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst expense ratio is high compared to funds in the Emerging Markets Bond category. DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst has an expense ratio of 0.91%, which is 10% lower than its category average, making the fund expense ratio grade a C. While it is difficult to predict returns, it is known that high annual expense ratios reduce your rate of return, and excessive fees are difficult to overcome. Active management normally comes with higher expense ratios than passive index management. Certain investment categories such as small company and foreign also normally have higher expense ratios. It is best to compare fund expense ratios against the category averages for meaningful assessments.

High portfolio turnover can translate to higher expenses and lower aftertax returns. DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst has a portfolio turnover rate of 110%, indicating that holds its assets around 0.0 years. By way of comparison, the average portfolio turnover is 83% for the Emerging Markets Bond category.

Recently, in the month of July 2026, DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst returned -1.7%, which earned it a grade of F, as the Emerging Markets Bond category had an average return of -0.9%. The letter grades of A, B, C, D and F are based upon relative rankings within the investment category. A grade of A, for example, would indicate that the return is in the highest 20% for that time period compared to all funds in that category.

DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst has a trailing yield of 7.89%, which is above the 5.99% category average. The fund normally distributes its income quarterly and its capital gains annually.

It’s natural to seek the best-performing investments, but you must consider the relationship between risk and return and the impact of costs and taxes on your realized returns.

DWS Emerging Markets Fixed Income Inst Grades

Year to date, the fund has returned 1.4%, 1.1 percentage points worse than the category, which translates into a grade of D. The fund has returned 7.6% over the past year (grade of D), 10.9% over the past three years (grade of A) and 2.1% per year over the past five years (grade of D) and 3.3% per year over the past 10 years (grade of C).

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