Alternatives – Page 4
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White papersWhen down is up and South is North: Trade finance and tariffs
Tariffs continue to dominate headlines, drawing the focus of policymakers, businesses and consumers alike. These trade barriers, often enacted to shield domestic industries, can have profound effects on global commerce. A well-structured trade finance strategy offers investors the potential ability to seize these emerging opportunities.
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White papersCharting new currents: Top 10 with… Interview with Joe Sciortino on private credit
Amid tighter regulation, macroeconomic uncertainty, and changing bank appetites, investors are increasingly looking to private credit for stability and opportunity.
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White papersCryptocurrencies break into the mainstream
The digital asset landscape is undergoing a profound transformation, partly due to regulatory shifts that are lowering some of the barriers that previously deterred regulated financial institutions from entering the market. After years of being dominated by retail investors and early adopters, institutional interest in crypto assets is now emerging and has the potential to shape how the ecosystem matures, as well as how its credibility evolves.
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White papersBeyond politics: Unlocking the value of diversity and inclusion
While recent political pushback has seen diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) slip down the agenda, we believe there are still significant opportunities for investors in this area. Thembeka Stemela-Dagbo, Sustainable and Impact Equities Fund Manager, explores the key reasons for investors to promote DEI, and the potential risks of failing to do so.
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White papersAlternative realities: Behind the headlines of the private markets megatrend
Alternative investments have transitioned from peripheral allocations to central pillars of institutional and private wealth portfolios. Amid persistent inflation, rising interest rates, and global uncertainty, investors are questioning the viability of traditional 60/40 portfolios. The shift is driven by the need for diversification, durable yield, and reduced reliance on public markets. Structures like multimanager platforms, evergreen formats, and curated fund-of-funds are enabling broader access. Private market AuM reached USD 11.7 trillion in mid-2022, with private wealth expected to contribute up to USD 1.3 trillion by year-end. The focus is now on how best to allocate, not whether to do so.
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White papersHow to construct an alternatives portfolio - Beyond 60/40: Building resilience through diversified alternatives
For decades, the 60/40 portfolio – 60% equities and 40% bonds – was the cornerstone of wealth management. Yet, the traditional model is facing significant headwinds. Changing macroeconomic conditions, inflation uncertainty, and shifting equity-bond correlations have all eroded the reliability of this approach. In this context, alternative investments are gaining attention as a potential complement to traditional strategies.
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White papersAlternative opportunities 2025: outlook and methodology | USD | Q2 update
We remain neutral on how we’re allocating risk within our alternatives portfolio due to elevated downside growth risks, high equity valuations, and benign capital markets activity. In general, we’re more defensive, favoring private debt and hedged strategies versus private equity.
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White papersNatural Capital and Economic Growth
This paper examines the complex relationship between natural capital and long-term economic growth. Specifically, we review resource-based growth theories and various modeling approaches. In most frameworks, natural capital is considered an additional production factor that supplements traditional inputs. However, we highlight a common conceptual confusion between economic wealth (a stock) and economic growth (a flow).
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White papersChasing the sun: China leads global race to build solar power
China has significantly increased its solar power capacity in recent years and it now leads the pack globally, surpassing all other countries combined. As different regions adopt varied approaches to renewable energy, the global energy transition is complex and operates at multiple speeds.
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White papersIn Choppy Waters, Gold Remains a Firm Anchor
The sudden threat of U.S. tariffs on gold bars took markets by surprise—and reaffirmed our enduring investment case for gold.
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White papersThe Red Thread for alternatives – Edition July/August 2025: Our monthly insights into alternatives
The trade situation in the US has developed, with more trade deals being negotiated. The agreement between the US and the EU imposes a 15% tariff on most European imports to the US, which is lower than the 20% originally proposed on ‘liberation day’ in April. Moreover, the US economy has held up well so far, showing strong growth in 2Q25, more than reversing the decline in 1Q25, which had been driven by a jump in imports ahead of tariffs.
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White papersInfrastructure inflows: trickles turn to torrents
A heightened pace has returned to unlisted infrastructure fundraising in the first half of 2025, following a subdued 10 quarters since the rate hiking cycle commenced in mid-2022. The latest indicators show the final closes of closed ended funds raised USD 116 in 1H25. This exceeds the total raised in all of 2024, as well as matching the surge of inflows seen in 1H22, when the asset class benefited from the anticipation of the US Inflation Reduction Act and earlier Infrastructure Investment and Job act. The fact that the fundraising market has managed to match this pace, despite a more challenging monetary and geopolitical backdrop, is testament to investors’ ambitions for greater exposure to the asset class.
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White papersFinding Homes for all Those Zettabytes
As data usage continues to explode, the digital-storage industry is racing to innovate. Here’s a fun fact for summer beachgoers with a taste for tech: Bytes of data now well exceed grains of sand. Thanks to advancements in artificial intelligence (AI), demand for data storage is simply exploding—and the raw numbers are staggering to comprehend.
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White papersRelative-Value Macro: Finding Friends Outside the Trend
Trend-following may struggle in range-bound markets, but it’s not the only macro approach.
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White papersThe future of nuclear energy: Fact, fiction and fission
What role should nuclear power play in the energy mix? Answers to this question have differed across countries and over time. Though policies and uptake across the globe remain varied, there’s now growing interest in both established and new reactor technologies – even in some countries that have historically been wary.
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White papersUnified Global Alternatives – Hedge Fund Bulletin: Monthly Hedge Fund Update – June 2025
Risk assets produced mostly positive performance in June as investors demonstrated renewed focus on AI related themes, the easing of Middle East tension, as well as some market short covering across momentum factors. Expectations for a more dovish US Federal Reserve also provided a boost to market sentiment. The Dow Jones Industrials, S&P500 and the NASDAQ had positive performance. In Equity / Hedged, US Equity Hedged strategies generally produced positive returns.
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White papersPositioning for tomorrow: Top 10 with… Interview with Edoardo Rulli
The hedge fund industry has entered a new chapter. Against a backdrop of elevated volatility, macroeconomic divergence, and shifting liquidity conditions, investors are increasingly turning to hedge funds as a potential source of resilience and return.
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White papers2025 Alternative Credit insights: Advancing diversification
The alternative credit market has seen significant growth since the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), and the increasing appetite for asset classes beyond direct lending demonstrates investors looking for similar growth stories in other markets.
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White papersEM in trade finance: unmet demand and alpha potential
Emerging markets provide an ideal investment environment for trade finance, connecting underserved areas with a vital source of alternative capital, while potentially offering investors a compelling mix of risk and return.
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White papersData center viability requires design flexibility
Data center viability depends on flexible design to meet soaring AI power demands and evolving sustainability rules.
