A concise review of past and present hedge fund environments can potentially provide an important context for understanding what the future may hold for hedge fund investing and what the resulting implications could be for qualified investors.
The downturn in the global real estate market ended over-performance and returned property values to more realistic, historic values. But lower prices can be a benefit for investors who had limited real estate holdings or were priced out of the market previously. This report from State Street Global Advisers explores potential opportunities in the current market.
Investors who are looking to reduce risk and increase investment returns may want to consider owning farmland, according to this article from AgraShares. Across the past 40 years, owning and leasing a farm produced an average annual rate of return of 11 percent, comparable to the rate of return from stocks.
Mortgage defaults and the ongoing credit crunch are a challenge, but they have created opportunity for investors in distressed debt. Indeed, 51 percent of the investors surveyed by Debtwire for Bracewell & Giuliani report that say they see bargains in distressed debt.
A new report from Fortigent makes the case for a core/satellite approach to investing. Such an approach, the report says, justifies increased use of passive strategies to capture cost- and tax-effectiveness, creates easy to understand buckets for active core and satellite managers, and helps investors create endowment-like portfolios.
Enviromental sustainability is shifting from an abstract philosophy to a mission for more corporations and private individuals. PricewaterhouseCoopers analyzes 57 industry sectors and 367 companies to identify leading companies and practices. The research points to a statistically significant correlation between corporate commitment to sustainability and positive financial performance.
BNY Mellon chronicles the rapid evolution of exchange-traded funds.
Emerging market equities have become a dedicated asset class, and developing countries are now key contributors to world economic growth. This paper from Parametric explores some portfolio construction concepts that can help investors take advantage of emerging market opportunities to achieve superior long-term returns.
Master Limited Partnerships (MLPs) are publicly listed limited partnerships that trade much like the shares of a public corporation. MLPs are flow through entities whose income stream is taxed in the hands of its unitholders and as such, are not subject to state or federal income tax at the partnership level. The case for MLP ownership is compelling. In its simplest form, an investment in the MLP asset class represents an investment in the future growth of the U.S. energy infrastructure sector.
International investors are showing increased interest in UK residential property as they seek to widen their investment portfolios and asset class mix. A report from Knight Frank Residential Research explores this trend, taking a look at drivers of demand, regulations for cross-border investment and the outlook for 2008 and beyond.