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8-K - CURRENT REPORT - FIRST TRUST/ABERDEEN GLOBAL OPPORTUNITY INCOME FUNDfam_8k.txt

MARCH 11, 2014 BROKER CALL TRANSCRIPT

FAM/FEO EMERGING MARKET DEBT

FUND REVIEW
The emerging market debt (EMD) component of each Fund outperformed the J.P.
Morgan Emerging Markets Bond Index - Global Diversified over the quarter ended
December 31, 2013. Selection and allocation effects both positively impacted
performance, while currency effects were negative for the Fund. Overweight
exposure to Mexico was the largest contributor to performance in hard currency
debt, while overweight exposure to Honduras and Ukraine also positively impacted
performance. Underweight exposure to Argentina, Lebanon and Hungary negatively
impacted performance. In local currency space, an off-benchmark position in
Serbia treasury bills, as well as currency exposure to the Indian rupee
contributed the most to performance, as did an underweight position in Turkey.
An overweight position in Brazil and an underweight to Poland were the largest
detractors from performance.

During the quarter, we increased our position in Ukraine, believing that much of
the bad news surrounding the credit was priced in; on the other side we reduced
our position in Venezuela. We also participated in the new 10 year Gabon
Eurobond and initiated a switch from Serbia to Croatia on valuation reasons. We
also looked to increase the duration of the Fund by purchasing the long-end
bonds of Pertamina, Indonesia's state-owned oil company. In the currency space,
we reduced our exposure to the Peruvian sol. In the corporate space, we
participated in new issues from Guatemalan cement producer Cementos Progreso and
Tullow Oil, which has significant exposure in Ghana.

JAN-FEB MARKET REVIEW

EMD has had a good start to the year with the J.P. Morgan Emerging Markets Bond
Index - Global Diversified up 2% until the end of February. However, within this
index there has been a large dispersion of performance amongst the countries.
Countries where performance has been weak have been in Ukraine and Venezuela.
The situation in Ukraine remains precarious and the fund remains underweight
sovereign bonds compared to the index. News flow is coming out on a daily basis
from the country, but there has been some positive news recently with the
formation of an interim government which the International Monetary Fund (IMF)
is happy to work with. The IMF is expected to arrive in Kiev in the beginning of
March to negotiate bailout terms. It is still unclear if the IMF will require a
private sector bail from investors, as it appears that the Ukraine government
has left that decision to the IMF. The current debt in stock is fairly low so
forcing investors to take a haircut on their Ukraine bonds isn't our base case
should the IMF require a private sector bail in. The more likely outcome would
be an extension of maturities. However, I should add that we don't believe the
IMF will require a private sector bail in and multi-lateral and bi-lateral loans
will be sufficient to ease Ukraine's liquidity problem. The situation in the
Crimean region remains very unclear and Russia's reaction to events in Kiev is
still unknown.

Recent policy actions from Venezuela has been more positive after the government
announced measures that companies, individuals and Petroleum of Venezuela can
now obtain dollars in a regulated market. This should help reduce shortages of
everything from food to medicine that have fuelled the demonstrations and help
slow the world's fastest inflation. The decision will create a new exchange
rate, getting the official exchange rate more in line with the current black
market exchange rate.

The rest of the majority of EMD has shown positive returns YTD given the strong
performance of US Treasuries and investors taking greater comfort with the U.S.
Federal Reserve's (the Fed) tapering of US asset purchases.

FAM DEVELOPED MARKET DEBT

FUND REVIEW
The Fund's developed market portfolio slightly underperformed the Citigroup
World Government Bond Index over the quarter ended December 31, 2013. The
portfolio continued to have its investments concentrated in Australia, New
Zealand, Canada and the UK relative to underweight positions in Europe, the US
and Japan.

Performance was dominated by currency effects. Japanese yen being the worst
performing currency in the index during the quarter, the large underweight
position was the single biggest contributor to performance. This positive
contribution was reduced by the portfolio's overweight in Australian dollar
denominated assets, the currency being the second worst performer of the quarter
in the benchmark. With the common European currency markedly stronger on the
quarter, the portfolio also suffered from its underweight position in EUR
denominated assets. Smaller detractions came from being overweight in New
Zealand and Canadian dollar as both currencies softened in the period. There
were no big changes in the composition of the portfolio. We reduced short-dated
UK Treasury holdings to cover cash-flows.

JAN-FEB MARKET REVIEW

After the Fed's decision to begin tapering their asset purchases at their
December meeting, yields in the US began the year at 2-year highs; just north of
3% on the benchmark 10 year bond. However since that time, a combination of
softer data in the US, partly explained by extreme weather conditions and risk
asset price volatility stemming from concerns over certain emerging markets,
have led yields down around 30bp. The suggestion from new Fed Chair Janet Yellen
seems to be that the bar for them to change course on their planned wind down of
large scale asset purchases is fairly high and thus for now, they continue to
taper by USD 10bn at each meeting, split evenly between treasury and mortgage
security purchases. The dollar mainly traded sideways as it fluctuated between
acting as a risk on and risk off currency.

On the contrary, and somewhat ironically, Europe has remained somewhat more
stable during this period in terms of financial markets. Credit rating agencies
have assisted in this regard with the period seeing upgrades by Moody's for
Ireland and Spain as well as the move to a stable outlook for Italy. Italy has
not been without its problems however as a leadership challenge emerged in
February resulting in Enrico Letta's replacement as Prime Minister with
democratic party leader, and mayor of Florence, Matteo Renzi. Markets, by now
used to political volatility in Italy, took this in their stride. Peripheral
spreads ultimately performed very well during January and February with the
Spanish 10 year spread over German Bunds narrowing by around 45 bps. Gross
domestic product data from the region continued to show progress, with all major
economies now showing positive growth meaning the region as a whole is tracking
at around a 1% rate per annum. This good news as well as the continued asset
allocation shift back into European bonds and equities helped keep the Euro at
its relatively elevated levels at around 1.37 versus the dollar.

From an economic perspective the UK remained one of the most encouraging
stories. Data continued to show significant progress with jobs data once again
painting an encouraging picture. This did give the Monetary Policy Committee
(MPC) a mild headache given the speed with which the unemployment figure headed
towards the 7% figure which had previously been used by the MPC as their target
for so called "forward guidance". This resulted in them having to abandon the
hard target at their February meeting, instead proposing the use of a multitude
of measures to monitor for signs of labour market tightness and the inflationary
pressures that tend to go with it. The market is now pricing hikes as early as
December 2014 and as yet this is not something the committee has significantly
lent against. As a result of this GBP tended to be very well supported rising by
around 1% versus the dollar.

Japanese assets continued to be well supported by the abundant supply of
liquidity via Governor Kuroda's policy of QE, making up the first of Prime
Minister Abe's 3 arrows. Unfortunately progress on the other arrows continues to
be slow with arguably the most important of the arrows - structural reform -
still some way off. The lack of progress on the more long-term aspects of the
strategy aimed at ending deflation, some dampening of expectations surrounding
further monetary stimulus as well as disappointing growth data allowed the Yen
to perform in this post-new year period posting an appreciation of around 3%
versus the dollar.

In Australia. the Reserve Bank of Australia removed their mild easing bias at
their February meeting citing the growing influence of previous policy easing as
well as concern over the higher than expected December inflation print. Data
received since that meeting including a worse than expected employment reported
has kept Australian bonds well supported and the Aussie dollar bounced off its
pre Feb meeting recent lows to end the period roughly flat versus the US dollar.
Data in New Zealand continues to paint a positive picture there with the market
now fully discounting hikes at 3 of the next 4 meetings of the Reserve Bank of
New Zealand.

FEO EQUITY

FUND REVIEW
The equity portion of the Fund underperformed the MSCI Emerging Markets Index
over the fourth quarter ended December 31, 2013. The underperformance was
largely due to our overweight to Turkey which fell sharply on political concerns
and poor performance from our South African retail stocks. Massmart and
Truworths continued to suffer from a lacklustre domestic economic environment;
Truworths was pulled lower by a disappointing trading update.

The overweight to Brazil and the Philippines also hurt the Fund's performance,
with our holdings declining along with the respective stockmarkets. The lack of
transparency over the new pricing formula weighed on oil and gas company
Petrobras while tobacco company Souza Cruz's quarterly earnings were hurt by
lower export volumes. Philippine property developer Ayala Land and lender Bank
of the Philippine Islands fell along with other domestic shares owing to
concerns over the economic fallout from typhoon Haiyan. Meanwhile, some of our
Indian consumer holdings failed to participate in the local market rebound.
Indian stocks recovered from the previous quarter's sell-off, helped by
generally better-than-expected corporate earnings and the prospect of opposition
BJP candidate Narendra Modi forming a government in the upcoming elections.

However, good performance from our holdings in Korea, Hungary and Russia
mitigated the losses. South Korea's Samsung Electronics posted solid quarterly
earnings. Hungarian pharmaceutical company Gedeon Richter was buoyed by results
which showed signs of a rebound while Russian food retailer Magnit maintained
its earnings momentum over the quarter. Our Mexican holdings also fared well;
Fomento Economico Mexicano, S.A.B. de C.V. and Banco Mercantil del Norte
announced they would pay out more cash owing to a tax ruling. The overweight to
Mexico further aided the Fund's performance as progress on the energy reform
lifted the stockmarket.

JANUARY/ FEBRUARY MARKET UPDATE:
Emerging stockmarkets and currencies had a rocky start to 2014. Familiar fears
that China may suffer a sharp slowdown resurfaced following soft local data and
the near-default of a local trust fund. Risk aversion was also fuelled by a
sharp devaluation of the Argentine peso, the Fed's tapering and political
uncertainty in Thailand and Turkey.

The MSCI Emerging Markets Index fell 6.47% in US dollar terms in January while
rebounding slightly with a gain of 3.33% in February amid the volatile backdrop.
Countries with current account deficits, or those perceived to have weaker
external financials, were among the worst-performing markets, led by Latin
America, Turkey and South Africa. Losses were compounded by the depreciation of
their currencies and continued outflow of liquidity. In contrast China, Korea
and Taiwan held up slightly better given their surpluses; indeed they may be
early beneficiaries of a US recovery that could underpin export demand. Monetary
tightening also undermined interest rate-sensitive stocks, such as those in
financials and consumer discretionary.

But the sharp sell-off in emerging markets may be overdone, particularly after
having underperformed their developed market peers over the past few years. To
put things in perspective, the Fed's decision to push ahead with more tapering
was widely expected, and it is doing so at a modest pace. In addition, it has
pledged to maintain a policy rate near zero until the recovery in the labour
market proves sustainable - and this could be some time yet.

Concerns over China's easing growth also seem overblown as there are no clear
signs of a sudden downturn. The recent tightening in credit conditions sends the
signal that policymakers are willing to tolerate lower growth to address the
misallocation of capital and foster a more sustainable consumption-led growth.
And while the mainland's financial sector may be facing increasing difficulties,
we do not expect it to experience serious liquidity problems or contagion
effects. We believe the financial system is sufficiently capitalised to bail out
any internal bank failures, while a closed capital account gives the authorities
a firm handle on the situation. Ultimately the reforms, if implemented, should
provide better investment opportunities in China.

Elsewhere, countries such as Turkey and Argentina were already struggling, even
before things came to a boil last month. Despite suggestions of contagion risks
stemming from Argentina's woes, the peso's devaluation has had little impact on
key developing countries. A growing appetite for US dollars in the face of
creeping inflation, a large current account deficit and a paucity of foreign
currency reserves appears to be the catalyst for the peso's wobbles.

That said, the immediate outlook for emerging markets is likely to remain
clouded as their economies undergo cyclical adjustments. Their cheaper
currencies, however, should help boost exports. And while higher interest rates
will slow domestic growth and imports in the short term, this should eventually
lead to an improvement in current account positions, underpin currencies and
allow interest rates to fall. In addition, the events of recent months have
reminded policymakers that they need to compete for global capital which may
drive further constructive reform. This is encouraging, given that countries
with sounder fundamentals will be more resilient than the structurally deficient
ones. The recent bout of market turbulence has also elicited more decisiveness.
India and South Africa have hiked interest rates; Turkey did the same despite
earlier resistance. Brazil which is already tightening is likely to continue.

Over the longer term, emerging markets' appeal remains undimmed. We believe many
developing economies have better fiscal discipline and sounder banking systems
than their developed peers. Their public and private debt ratios, while rising,
are still low. Imbalances that exist are not as pronounced; economic growth is
healthier, demographics generally positive and companies are in good shape
financially and we believe are well positioned to capitalise on rising consumer
wealth and opportunities in overseas markets. Furthermore, both emerging market
policymakers and corporate management are well experienced in handling these
periodic crises of confidence and we are hopeful that they will rise to this
latest challenge. The current volatility presents opportunities to invest in
good quality companies - a lot is already in the price. We believe this focus on
fundamentals will serve investors well in the long run.

FAM DISTRIBUTION
Since inception of the Fund in November 2004, the Fund has maintained a
distribution rate of $0.13. However, given the broad reduction in market
interest rates since the Fund was launched and expectations of yields in the
foreseeable future, we believe a reduction of the distribution from $0.13 to
$0.11 per share was a prudent step and will be more consistent with the earnings
potential of the Fund at this time. The Fund had paid out capital in the past
and we didn't feel it appropriate to continue doing this given the negative
impact this would have on the Fund's Net Asset Value. Emerging market currencies
are also weaker against the USD so when the coupons are converted into the base
currency of USD, the value of these is lower, negatively impacting the income
generated from our non-USD holdings. We have now witnessed a correction in
emerging markets debt and we believe setting the payout to $0.11 per share is
appropriate at this time