Partners Capital Insights 2024 Executive Summary

Stay the course in a global economy that bends but does not break.

We expect continued elevated volatility from rising political and geopolitical risks with roughly 50% of the world’s population voting in 2024 and multiple high-risk geopolitical conflicts including Ukraine and the Middle East with potentially another brewing in Taiwan. The economic resilience of 2023 will likely also be challenged by the delayed impact of monetary tightening, lower household excess savings, and reduced scope for fiscal stimulus given rising deficit levels. This context creates a complex environment for investing where binary outcomes of events can impact markets significantly over the short term.

We advocate ‘staying the course’ and avoiding the temptation to time markets in anticipation of events. It has never been more important for long-term oriented portfolios to stay well diversified across multiple asset classes, with capital deployed via high-quality asset manager partnerships. The uncertain environment is likely to generate market dislocations that should present an additional source of return to investors able to allocate nimbly to exploit them.