Over the past four decades, institutional investors have implemented newer and more dynamic strategies in their portfolios in an effort to boost investment returns. During the same period, many investors reduced allocations to fixed income while increasing allocations to equities and alternative investments, including private investments (PI), hedge funds, and commodities. Private equity (PE) investments […]
May 2023
Private equity (PE) secondary funds can provide several benefits to investors, including an accelerated pace of distributions relative to traditional primary PE fund investments. In addition, they can help investors enter new strategies, access top managers, and reduce blind pool risk. In this piece, we review secondary funds and their benefits by answering seven key […]
May 2023
No. We argue that after macro conditions helped propel the private investment industry to temporary heights, today’s environment has ushered in a “back to normal” era. Let’s back up a bit. In the COVID-19 period (defined as July 2020 through June 2022), all facets of the US private investment “ecosystem” were in overdrive. During that […]
April 2023
Following no US bank failures in the last two years, two banks failed in the last three days—Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and Signature Bank. As the situation evolved last week, investors, businesses, and regulators became increasingly concerned about SVB and risks to the broader economy. Over the weekend, US officials from the Federal Reserve, Treasury, […]
March 2023
According to Cambridge Associates (CA) indexes, private equity and venture capital (PE/VC) in the developed markets underperformed those in emerging markets in first half 2022. The Cambridge Associates LLC Developed Markets ex US PE/VC Index returned -11.1% in the period, in USD terms, and -3.3% in euros. Because returns are measured in US dollars, the […]
January 2023
In first half 2022, US private equity and venture capital broke their trend of sustained positive performance as the downturn in the public markets spilled over to privates. For the six months ended June 30, 2022, the Cambridge Associates LLC US Private Equity Index® returned -5.3% (-0.4% and -5.0% in first and second quarters, respectively) […]
January 2023
Ten years ago, we were emerging from the Global Financial Crisis (GFC); the worst recession and market crash experienced in decades. With increased commitment activity and growing exposures to private investments, institutional investors needed new tools to understand the impacts on and implications for their portfolios. In response to this need, Cambridge Associates issued our […]
November 2022
Most defined benefit plans—including public, multi-employer, and even frozen corporate plans—can benefit from private investment (PI) strategies. It is fairly common knowledge that private investments offer important value in the form of increased expected investment returns, and that they can be instrumental in improving funded status and achieving other plan goals. Despite this, many plan […]
September 2022