“Going” Concerns
“When the going gets tough, the tough get going,” or so goes the old saying. It’s a saying with the requisite amount of bravado to stiffen one’s upper lip and shore up one’s resolve as we plough through yet another tough market cycle; a period in which, by all traditional measures, “alternative” investments should be a good place to seek shelter from the storm. This time may be different, of course. Real estate, one of the most popular (at least in terms of its presence in pension portfolios), served to set off most of the recent market tumult, and is still struggling to make its way back (though one should be careful about the level to which one expects it to return). Private equity, writ large, feels a more precarious move at present, and hedge funds—well, many no longer live up to the name, despite their fee structures. There are, of course, a growing number of alternatives to stocks and bonds—the traditional standard against which an investment is deemed to be “alternative”—but...