Events for Thursday, May 8 - February 20, 2024 › Alternative Investments

The secondary market began in the 1980’s as a method to provide liquidity to investors in illiquid private equity and other pools of alternative assets. Secondary funds build exposure to illiquid portfolios by acquiring existing positions in single funds or a portfolio of funds from limited partners (“LPs”) seeking early liquidity often at a discount to recent valuations.

Combining meaningful information and insights into a portfolio investment process is a challenging task for any investor. Fortunately, advances in academia and improvements in technology have provided a number of methods and tools to help investors visualize key information quickly, accurately and easily.

Deleveraging and newly imposed regulatory restrictions have hindered traditional bank lenders activity, and in turn restricted the capital available to many segments of the US and global economies. This has created a tremendous opportunity for alternative lenders to step in to fill the void. Attracted by the enhanced yield profile available in the private credit market, alternative lenders, such as specialty lenders, hedge funds, BDCs and other private pools of capital have helped to re-introduce market liquidity.

Sometimes referred to as “secured income” or “alternative credit”, Trade Finance, is a generic term that covers the financing of international trade and commerce. This includes loans that finance the cross-border export of goods and services. Trade Finance differs from other types of lending, as transactions must have an identifiable source of repayment - cash payments when goods have been delivered or title to the underlying goods when they have not yet been delivered. During this event, we will hear from a panel of industry experts on how Trade Finance has evolved as an investment class and where such strategies may fit into an investors’ portfolio.