Folks looking to properly balance their portfolios should include alternative investments — but aren’t offered them by financial advisers, more than half of whom say such alternatives are too difficult to understand.
Not only that, 75 percent of advisers surveyed by Natixis Global Asset Management admit they themselves need more education when it comes to understanding and explaining alternative investments such as hedge funds and long/short equity funds.
“As an industry, we need to do a better job of helping advisers understand these investments so they in turn can better educate their clients,” said Natixis’ Matt Coldren.
Until recently, alternative investments were mainly accessible only to wealthy investors, but there has been a recent proliferation of Liquid Alternatives, structured as 40 Act hedge funds, and other products that allow the average retail investor to take advantage of alternative strategies.