Broadening perspectives

We see UGA – Solutions as a one-stop shop for investing in alternatives. A key element of our approach is addressing investment objectives while remaining agnostic to the asset category we employ. For example, an investor focused on stable income should not only consider private credit but also infrastructure and real estate, while a hedge fund may deliver an additional layer of stability.

Therefore, we offer both breadth and depth across over 1,000 specialized investment products identified by our UGA team. These span private equity, private credit, real estate, infrastructure and hedge funds. As UGA – Solutions employs an open-architecture model, we’re not subject to arbitrary constraints or restricted to proprietary products. Instead, we aim to build bespoke solutions using a curated selection of high-quality alternative funds.

Given our global scale and reach, we seek to access preferential terms and opportunities for our clients beyond the primary markets. These include co-investments, separately managed accounts and fund formations.

We primarily serve clients across wealth, institutional and sovereign segments. Within the wealth segment, our relationships include ultra-high-net-worth individuals and family offices. We also work with institutional investors such as pension funds, insurance companies and corporations as well as sovereign entities and similar organizations.

Our focus is on larger, sophisticated clients, where mandates typically exceed USD 100 million, and we work closely to structure investment solutions that align with their long-term objectives.

Private markets have consistently outperformed public markets, offering potentially attractive long-term, risk-adjusted returns through active ownership and value creation. They offer access to a diverse range of growth and income-generating opportunities across multiple asset classes.

Many clients seek a single, well-structured solution that delivers broad exposure to these opportunities while ensuring access to high-quality managers. At the same time, they want diversification across strategies without the complexity of managing multiple relationships. UGA – Solutions addresses these objectives by designing bespoke, multi-asset portfolios that combine depth, quality and efficiency.

Manager selection is critical in private markets, where return dispersion is higher than in traditional asset classes. Success depends on securing access to quality opportunities and partnering with experienced managers who we believe can consistently create value.

While we draw on UGA’s extensive universe of more than 1,000 funds across five main alternative asset classes, our selection process for clients follows a clear rationale: we look for managers with proven expertise, differentiated strategies and strong alignment of interests.

Our approach combines top-down and bottom-up perspectives. From the top down, we incorporate strategic views on asset classes, sectors and geographies provided by our Alternatives CIO and the UGA Macro Forum. From the bottom up, we focus on identifying what we believe to be best-in-class managers in each asset class, those with robust track records and access to compelling deal flow. These shortlists form the foundation for constructing diversified portfolios tailored to client objectives.

UGA – Solutions is designed as a solution-based offering rather than a standardized product, meaning every portfolio is tailored to the client’s specific requirements. We provide flexibility in portfolio construction in order to address individual objectives such as target size, risk/return profile, liquidity needs and desired cash flow characteristics.

In fact, risk allocation is a key concern for our clients, especially as traditional concepts of risk are challenged by the inherent smoothing in private asset valuations. To address this, we use UBS Asset Management`s Global Risk System (GRS) in our portfolio design. GRS is a state-of-the-art risk management systems that has been developed over more than 20 years. It provides top-down risk information, which we combine and enrich with bottom-up qualitative and quantitative risk analysis.

Customization is available across all dimensions of diversification – asset classes, strategies, instruments, deal sizes, geographies and sectors – and can incorporate specific investment constraints or restrictions. Portfolios can also be adjusted over time as client needs evolve.

Solutions vary across client profiles because objectives, constraints and preferences differ widely. Some clients prioritize stable, income-oriented portfolios targeting returns in a specific currency, while others seek balanced or value-driven strategies with higher growth potential.

Key factors influencing differentiation include expected return targets, liquidity requirements and asset class selection. Not all clients require exposure to every market; some focus on private credit and real assets for resilient, income-generating returns, while others complement these with private equity and hedge funds to enhance performance and diversify return drivers.

Currency considerations, regulatory constraints, and sector preferences also play a role in shaping allocations. With our flexibility, experience and wide range of resources, we strive to accommodate a broad range of client requirements.

Diversification and thoughtful strategy selection are at the heart of our portfolio construction approach. Within each asset class, we combine complementary strategies to capture diverse return drivers and mitigate concentration risk.

For example, in private credit, we may blend direct lending, specialty finance and real estate debt to balance income generation with resilience. In private equity, we integrate buyout, growth and secondary strategies to seek diversification across market cycles. Similar principles apply to real assets, infrastructure and hedge funds, where we seek differentiated approaches that align with client objectives.

Liquidity is a critical consideration in private markets and plays a central role in how we design portfolios. Closed-ended funds typically offer limited liquidity, making them suitable for clients with long-term horizons, while open-ended structures provide greater flexibility for those requiring periodic access to capital.

Our approach begins with understanding each client’s liquidity objectives and constraints. We then select funds and structure allocations to align the overall portfolio with these requirements without compromising diversification or potential for return. Striking the right balance between liquidity and strategic goals is essential to creating solutions that remain resilient and relevant over time.

As the prospects for different strategies and asset classes rise and fall, it’s inevitable that we adjust our model portfolios and advise our clients accordingly. At the same time, clients have their own expertise, expectations and allocation requirements, which often leads to requests for individual portfolio adjustments.

Our scale and flexibility allow us to respond efficiently to requests and our approach provides a shortlist of candidate funds to support clients in designing their desired exposures.

We’re seeing a clear shift in how investors approach alternatives. Instead of viewing them as peripheral, they are now considered a core component of portfolio design. This change is driven by the need for resilience and diversification in an environment where traditional models face pressure. For example, look back to 2022, where a traditional balanced portfolio model faced serious challenges, while private markets held up relatively well, especially in a diversified, multi-asset format. Given this experience, we see an increasing appetitive for unconstrained portfolios rather than for single asset class requests.

Private credit continues to attract strong interest, offering flexible financing solutions despite a more complex regulatory backdrop. Infrastructure is gaining momentum as investors seek more stable income streams, while hedge funds are being rediscovered as they seek to manage risk in volatile markets. Looking ahead, we expect growing demand for diversification across alternative strategies, including niche areas such as litigation finance and specialty lending, alongside innovations in liquidity solutions.

At UGA – Solutions, our breadth and flexibility position us to pursue these opportunities while navigating challenges such as liquidity and regulation – always with a focus on building portfolios that align with long-term client objectives.