Seneca's Elston: Specialist investment vehicles hold key to 'decent yields'

If you buy the 30-year inflation protected gilt today and hold it to maturity you are guaranteed to lose 24% of your real capital. Where should you put your money instead?

Where should you put your money instead? Equities? Probably not. Having the large majority of a balanced or retirement portfolio in equities would clearly be reckless. Although it might well turn out in time to be the right thing to do, the risks associated with being wrong in the nearer term far outweigh the risks of being right in the longer term, particularly for those a few years into retirement. The answer, in my opinion, is to allocate a decent proportion of a balanced fund to 'specialist investments', or listed investment vehicles or trusts that provide something useful in rela...