i. Overview

Institutional strategies, increasingly accessible.

Private Assets refers to investments in businesses, debt, and real assets that are not traded on public markets. The category spans private equity (buyouts, growth capital and venture), private debt (direct lending and specialist credit), real assets (real estate and land) and infrastructure (energy, transport, digital).

Historically these strategies were the exclusive preserve of large institutional allocators — sovereign wealth funds, pension schemes, endowments — accessed via closed-end limited partnerships with £10m+ minimums, decade-long lockups and capital call structures. The last decade has seen the emergence of a new generation of semi-liquid, evergreen structures — LTAFs in the UK, ELTIFs in the EU — that bring meaningful private-market exposure within reach of advised private clients.

Why advisers are engaging now

Private markets now represent a materially larger share of the global investable opportunity set than they did twenty years ago — with the number of publicly-listed companies declining and the number of privately-held businesses growing. For clients with genuinely long time horizons, private assets can offer access to return sources and illiquidity premia not available in public-market portfolios.

Private Assets are not tax-efficient in the sense that VCT, EIS or Business Relief are — there are no specific HMRC reliefs. Their role in a client portfolio is diversification and access to differentiated return sources rather than tax optimisation.

ii. Strategy types

Four broad strategy families.

Private Assets is not a single asset class but a spectrum. Each strategy family has a distinct return profile, liquidity characteristic and role in a client portfolio.

i.
PE

Private Equity

Buyout, growth and venture strategies. Equity ownership of privately-held businesses, typically held for 3-7 years. Historically strong long-term returns but with high dispersion between top and bottom quartile managers.

ii.
Debt

Private Debt

Direct lending, specialist credit and structured credit. Typically provides steady income with lower volatility than public credit — though at the cost of illiquidity and concentration risk.

iii.
Real

Real Assets

Real estate, land, natural resources. Return characteristics tied to physical asset values and typically offering some inflation protection. Long horizons; income and capital growth blend depends on strategy.

iv.
Infra

Infrastructure

Energy, transport, telecoms, social infrastructure. Long-duration cash flows often with regulated or contractual pricing — used for inflation-linked income within a diversified portfolio.

iii. Next steps

Ready to compare current offerings?

The Private Assets product page lists all currently distributed funds — with strategy type, structure, dealing frequency and offering documents. The matrix tool provides side-by-side comparison across all current offerings.