Sean Allocca

New York

The Daily Upside | Former: EIC at @etfcom @InvestmentNews, @finpan, @CFO editor. Hates mushrooms, loves mushroom ravioli. [email protected]

Articles

Inside Goldman’s New Private-Public Model Portfolios

1 week ago | thedailyupside.com | Sean Allocca

Public or private? Goldman Sachs just couldn’t decide. The storied Wall Street bank is following in the footsteps of other prominent asset managers by launching new model portfolios that package private investments alongside traditional mutual funds, ETFs, and equity SMAs, according to a statement.
AUM Fees May Shrink Next Year. Do Advisors Care?

1 week ago | thedailyupside.com | Sean Allocca

Sometimes, it’s OK to get a little creepy. Advisors’ traditional AUM fees have remained stubbornly resilient, even as industry experts have been expecting them to drop for the better part of a decade. Now, advisors are also dealing with “service creep,” where clients expect additional services like tax and estate planning at the same price, and that’s starting to eat into bottom lines.
Why Flows Into State Street’s Public-Private ETF Are Drying Up

2 weeks ago | thedailyupside.com | Sean Allocca

Not exactly the “watershed moment” the industry was expecting. The heavily anticipated launch of State Street’s PRIV, the first ETF to package public and private investments into a single product, made waves after its launch in late February. Fast-forward two months, and that enthusiasm is drying up. The SSGA IG Public & Private Credit ETF pulled in just $55 million in assets since Feb. 29 — less than notable for a new product by a storied issuer.
Cap Group, KKR Approved to Launch Public-Private Funds

2 weeks ago | thedailyupside.com | Sean Allocca

Move over, Wall Street: Alternative assets managers are coming for Main Street investors. Two of the world’s largest managers just won approval to launch public-private credit funds, investments that were once the playground of the richest investors. Capital Group and KKR got the greenlight from the Securities and Exchange Commission to launch two new credit interval funds that use both public debt and private credit inside a single product.
Will Vanguard Launch Its Private Investments the ‘Vanguard Way?’

3 weeks ago | thedailyupside.com | Sean Allocca

Vanguard upended investing once. Who’s up for another round? The Malvern, Penn.-based asset manager announced a partnership with Blackstone and Wellington last week to launch new products that package private and public assets into a single investment, which is becoming a hot-button corner of the industry. Their plan puts Vanguard on a collision course with other heavyweight partnerships like State Street and Apollo, as well as Capital Group and KKR.
Behind the Vanguard, Blackstone, Wellington Plan to Launch Private Investments

4 weeks ago | thedailyupside.com | Sean Allocca

There’s a new private-markets tag team in town. Vanguard and Wellington Management are teaming up with Blackstone to launch private and public assets inside a single investment, a hot-button strategy that has been at the forefront of new launches in the asset management industry this year.
Direct Indexing’s Not Exactly an ‘ETF Killer’

1 month ago | thedailyupside.com | Sean Allocca

It turns out the “ETF killer” thing might have been a stretch. Direct indexing, an investment strategy that buys and holds stocks for clients directly in separately managed accounts, was expected to go toe-to-toe with the exchange-traded fund industry and even undercut much of the value of indexed products. By owning the underlying securities directly, the strategy gives clients the increased benefits of creating their own customized indexes and tailoring tax strategies.
Advisors Sift Through Tariff Turmoil as Uncertainty Lingers

1 month ago | thedailyupside.com | Sean Allocca

The tariff announcements spared almost no one last week — not even those adorable little penguins on uninhabited Heard and McDonald islands. But as the dust began to settle over the weekend, advisors started contemplating what a prolonged trade war might mean for client portfolios. Sure, advisors are in it for the long haul and timing markets especially around politics can be dicey.
Rob Arnott on Deep Value and ‘Running Towards Lions’

1 month ago | thedailyupside.com | Sean Allocca

Coming off a bad break-up? Famed investor Rob Arnott is here to help. The founder of Research Affiliates, and an early pioneer in smart beta investing, Arnott launched a new index fund last year that attempts to turn underperforming stocks — that were literally kicked to the curb by other indexes — into profitable investments. Called NIXT, the deep-value exchange-traded fund relies on cheap valuations and poor recent performance of deleted stocks to find the best deals.
RIAs Warm Up to ETFs Not Labeled Vanguard, BlackRock or State Street

1 month ago | thedailyupside.com | Sean Allocca

There’s more to life than just the Big 3. BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street have long dominated the asset management industry with the three largest exchange-traded funds in the world — namely, IVV, VOO, and SPY, respectively — weighing in at around $600 billion in AUM apiece. All told, the fearsome threesome accounted for a combined 74% of the entire equity ETF market last year, according to a US News & World report. Independent advisors’ collective response?