Structured Forms of Investment Strategies in Institutional Investors’ Portfolios

Institutional investors in general and pension funds in particular have been dramatically affected by recent market downturns. This seems to be surprising given that an increasingly thorough range of structured products has been developed over the past few years, which allows investors to tailor the risk-return profile of their portfolio in a more efficient way than simple linear exposure to traditional asset classes. The salient characteristic of structured products is the repackaging of strategies that involve long and short positions in derivatives and the underlying or a risk-free asset into an investment vehicle that is easily accessible by investors.