"What assets should we invest in for the next five years and what returns should we expect?" was the straightforward question posed by the moderator during an entertaining panel discussion at an event I participated in this month.
Some of the answers given were anything but straightforward reflecting that the investment outlook today is perhaps the most challenging in living memory. For the last four decades, five-year investment returns have been relatively consistent from period-to-period. With the unprecedented levels of real return available from most asset classes during this time, it has served to make asset allocation far easier than it might be in the years ahead.
History has taught that a particular asset class exhibits reasonably consistent return expectations over time: