Key Takeaways
- • Top1000funds.com's coverage of the FIS 2026 conference at Harvard University features a panel of CIOs, including Amanda White of Conexus Financial, Michael Trotsky, Dianne Sandoval, Mark Walker and Farouki Majeed, discussing how to build portfolios for an unpredictable world marked by opposing macroeconomic and geopolitical forces.
- • Impact investing has grown into a $1.5 trillion industry but still faces barriers to institutional scale, including a lack of products and insufficient evidence of outperformance in some segments.
- • MassPRIM chair and state Treasurer Deborah Goldberg says responsible investing remains "common sense" for the $116 billion fund, though accessing ESG-related information from managers and companies has become harder.
- • Macquarie Asset Management's Ben Way says deglobalisation is the next inflection point in real assets, with constrained public balance sheets increasingly relying on private capital for infrastructure.
- • Related conference sessions address the total portfolio approach, LP-GP relationships during the Blue Owl Capital redemption pressure, Fed independence as an inflation variable, and public equity skepticism toward private equity returns.
Summary
The publisher's summary highlights a panel titled "How CIOs are building portfolios for an unpredictable world" from the FIS 2026 event at Harvard University. The featured speakers include Amanda White of Conexus Financial, Michael Trotsky, Dianne Sandoval, Mark Walker and Farouki Majeed. The source text itself is limited to the headline, participant list and a teaser describing the discussion of opposing macroeconomic and geopolitical forces, so the specific positions taken by panelists are not detailed in the available material.
The surrounding Top1000funds.com coverage points to several adjacent themes. Impact investing has grown from a niche strategy over the past two decades into a $1.5 trillion industry, yet it still faces obstacles to reaching institutional scale, including limited product availability and insufficient evidence of outperformance in some parts of the market. Responsible investing, according to Massachusetts PRIM chair and state Treasurer Deborah Goldberg, remains "common sense" for the $116 billion fund, though she said it has become harder to obtain some ESG-related information from managers and companies.
On real assets, Ben Way, global head of Macquarie Asset Management, said governments are partnering with private investors to strengthen domestic infrastructure and reduce reliance on foreign supply chains in a geopolitically fragmented world. He argued that constrained public balance sheets increasingly depend on private capital to meet infrastructure needs.
Other coverage in the same feed includes the Future Fund's total portfolio approach, where director of thought leadership Craig Thorburn said scaling the approach is difficult; RSIC chief executive Michael Hitchcock's view that crises reveal more about managers than due diligence does, in the context of redemption pressure at Blue Owl Capital's private credit funds; Jason Furman's warning that Fed independence is a key variable for US inflation; and Loomis Sayles' Aziz Hamzaogullari's challenge to the case for private equity returns.
The surrounding Top1000funds.com coverage points to several adjacent themes. Impact investing has grown from a niche strategy over the past two decades into a $1.5 trillion industry, yet it still faces obstacles to reaching institutional scale, including limited product availability and insufficient evidence of outperformance in some parts of the market. Responsible investing, according to Massachusetts PRIM chair and state Treasurer Deborah Goldberg, remains "common sense" for the $116 billion fund, though she said it has become harder to obtain some ESG-related information from managers and companies.
On real assets, Ben Way, global head of Macquarie Asset Management, said governments are partnering with private investors to strengthen domestic infrastructure and reduce reliance on foreign supply chains in a geopolitically fragmented world. He argued that constrained public balance sheets increasingly depend on private capital to meet infrastructure needs.
Other coverage in the same feed includes the Future Fund's total portfolio approach, where director of thought leadership Craig Thorburn said scaling the approach is difficult; RSIC chief executive Michael Hitchcock's view that crises reveal more about managers than due diligence does, in the context of redemption pressure at Blue Owl Capital's private credit funds; Jason Furman's warning that Fed independence is a key variable for US inflation; and Loomis Sayles' Aziz Hamzaogullari's challenge to the case for private equity returns.
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