Analysis

During the Great Moderation, the mantra was “be long and don’t touch”. But with a wave of transformation sweeping through markets, BlackRock thinks it’s time for investors to switch things up.

Global pension funds returned to growth mode in 2023 following sharp losses the previous year but participants will need to update investment models amid more complex systemic challenges, a new survey of the sector has found.

The New Zealand Superannuation Fund “stands out among global peers”, according to WTW, but should consider its approach to systemic risk and greater insourcing of its private markets investments, as well as establishing an overseas presence to improve access to deals and talent.

Family offices are set to manage more than $5.4 trillion come 2030 – but how (and where) they manage it will change, with more and more “becoming institutionalised”, adopting independent governance structures and heading overseas.

Strong performance in the Future Fund’s hedge fund portfolio helped with some of the heavy lifting on its return this year, while it continues to eye “higher and more volatile inflation” and the opportunities to generate excess returns in Japan.

Australian small cap managers are some of the most successful active managers in the world – and charge like it. But their apparently anomalous outcomes might have a relatively simple explanation, according to Invesco.

Illiquidity isn’t without its tradeoffs in a more volatile investment order, according to Future Fund CIO Ben Samild, and neither is the total portfolio approach that’s made Australia’s sovereign wealth fund so successful in it.

Falling inflation, the prospect of interest rate cuts and a budding recovery in the world’s second-largest economy have seen family offices move out of cash to chase the returns on offer in equities and hedge funds, according to Citi Private Bank.

Everybody knows about infrastructure’s inflation hedging properties, but not everybody understands just how unique that hedge is. Meanwhile, the world is going mad for power, and renewables are set to supply it.

Victor Smorgon Group is one of the rare family offices that manage external funds. Doing that required modifying some of the investment principles that it holds dear.

There’s 20 different ways the world could end. But while market risks remain, the higher for longer rate mantra seems less convincing than it once did.

There’s no crisis yet, but private wealth CIOs and asset consultants are keeping a close eye on markets after their sudden August selloff. Their advice: stay nimble, stay unconstrained, and look out for “the unbelievable opportunity to invest in a dislocation”.