A turning point for the commodities sector?

Pimco's real-return manager, Bransby Whitton, takes a closer look at the advantages of holding commodities in portfolios despite the asset class's recent slump.

Investors typically look to commodities in order to provide three key benefits to their portfolios: diversification, inflation protection, and return potential.  But for many investors, the return benefit of commodities has been difficult to grapple with amid challenging performance in recent years, and the relative performance of a portfolio containing commodities has varied over time, with periods of underperformance occurring during economic downturns.  Commodities as a whole are growth-sensitive assets, especially in recessions that coincide with plentiful commodity supplies and w...