Alt Goes Mainstream: The Latest on Alternative Investments, WealthTech, & Private Markets – Details, episodes & analysis

Welcome back to the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast.

Today’s episode is with Alex Chaloff, the CIO of a large and sophisticated private wealth management firm that is very active in private markets.

Alex is Chief Investment Officer of Bernstein’s $125B+ private wealth management unit within $725B AUM AllianceBernstein. He was previously the Head of Alternative Asset Strategies. Prior to joining Bernstein in 2005, he was a MD for Wilshire Associates, serving on the firm’s investment committee. Prior to that, he worked in fund accounting operations at a global custodian in Boston.

Alex and I had a fascinating conversation about: 

• How to approach private markets asset allocation.
• Why he’s doing the job that he always wanted to do.
• How to think about portfolio construction.
• The importance of patience.
• The questions about liquidity.
• Why structure matters.

Thanks Alex for coming on the show to share your wisdom and views.

A word from AGM podcast sponsor, Ultimus Fund Solutions

This episode of Alt Goes Mainstream is brought to you by Ultimus Fund Solutions, a leading full-service fund administrator for asset managers in private and public markets. As private markets continue to move into the mainstream, the industry requires infrastructure solutions that help funds and investors keep pace. In an increasingly sophisticated financial marketplace, investment managers must navigate a growing array of challenges: elaborate fund structures, specialized strategies, evolving compliance requirements, a growing need for sophisticated reporting, and intensifying demands for transparency. 

To assist with these challenging opportunities, more and more fund sponsors and asset managers are turning to Ultimus, a leading service provider that blends high tech and high touch in unique and customized fund administration and middle office solutions for a diverse and growing universe of over 450 clients and 1,800 funds, representing $500 billion assets under administration, all handled by a team of over 1,000 professionals. Ultimus offers a wide range of capabilities across registered funds, private funds and public plans, as well as outsourced middle office services. Delivering operational excellence, Ultimus helps firms manage the ever-changing regulatory environment while meeting the needs of their institutional and retail investors. Ultimus provides comprehensive operational support and fund governance services to help managers successfully launch retail alternative products. 

Visit www.ultimusfundsolutions.com to learn more about Ultimus’ technology enhanced services and solutions or contact Ultimus Executive Vice President of Business Development Gary Harris on email at [email protected].

We thank Ultimus for their support of alts going mainstream.

Show Notes
00:00 Introduction and Sponsor Message

01:18 Podcast Theme Song

01:35 Welcome to the Podcast

01:59 Introducing Alex Chaloff

03:01 Alex Chaloff's Career Jurney

03:49 Transition to Bernstein

04:16 Current Role and Responsibilities

05:26 Investment Strategy and Market Insights

06:58 Active vs Passive Investment

11:35 Middle Market Focus

14:26 Evaluating Fund Managers

18:28 Lessons Learned in Fund Management

20:51 Allocating to Private Markets

22:38 Liquidity and Risk Management

27:01 Current Market Opportunities

31:01 The Perception of Infrequent Reporting

31:38 Private Wealth and Market Fluctuations

32:21 Understanding Liquidity Concerns

32:54 The Future of Private Market Investments

33:38 Challenges in Public Market Benchmarks

34:45 GP and LP Dynamics in Private Markets

36:58 Product Innovation in Private Markets

38:30 Evergreen Structures and Asset Allocation

39:20 Vintage Diversification Strategy

42:07 Lessons from the Current Market Cycle

42:30 Next Generation Investors and Impact Investing

46:13 Double Bottom Line Investing

48:24 Concerns in Private Debt Markets

51:33 Opportunities in Venture Capital

54:36 Favorite Alternative Investments and Future Trends

I went into The Compound and came out alive.

Recently, I joined Michael Batnick and Ben Carlson of Ritholtz Wealth Management on their Animal Spirits podcast by The Compound. It is a fantastic show that produces frank and thoughtful conversations on markets and the wealth management world. They invited me on their show to discuss why alts are going mainstream.

We had a great conversation on the animal spirits of alts and we unpacked the opportunities and challenges ahead for private markets, wealth managers, and the alternative asset managers looking to work with the wealth channel.

We covered:

• Why I don’t like the term “downstreaming of alts.”
• The size and scale of the opportunity with the wealth channel.
• Why and how it can make sense for the wealth channel to allocate to alts.
• The changing nature of asset allocation from slices of a pie to buckets and spectrums.
• The concept of liquidity.
• The attractiveness of evergreen funds for both GPs and LPs.
• Are private markets in a bubble?
• Why GP stakes are a compelling investment opportunity given structural trends in private markets.
• Can private markets be indexed (and should they be)?

Thanks Michael and Ben for having me on the show. Really enjoyed the conversation and it was a pleasure to join you.

Michael and Ben are fantastic and thoughtful asset allocators and commentators in investing and wealth management. If you don’t already listen to their podcast or read their commentary on markets, you can check out their blogs below:

Michael Batnick’s The Irrelevant Investor.

Ben Carlson’s A Wealth of Common Sense.

Welcome back to the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast.

On today’s show, we turned the tables. We welcomed famed podcast co-host of Animal Spirits and The Compound and Friends and writer at The Irrelevant Investor, and Managing Partner and Director of Research at $4B AUM Ritholtz Wealth Management Michael Batnick to come on the show to share a wealth manager’s perspective on private markets.

Michael’s career has taken a number of fascinating turns. He started selling insurance, before a chance meeting on the platform of the subway station with Josh Brown of Ritholtz Wealth Management after a New York Knicks loss led to a job offer to work with Josh at RWM. At Ritholtz, Michael has been an integral part of the team that has helped to drive the firm’s growth, leading with content and education. Each of the firm’s Partners have built impressive content platforms across blogs, books, and podcasts. Their thoughtful approaches to investing come through in their work — and it’s translated to how they think about private markets. Michael provided interesting viewpoints on why alternatives have yet to be adopted by many advisors and the challenges with adopting alternatives products.

Michael and I had a fascinating discussion at the intersection of wealth and alts. Michael and I covered:

• His journey into wealth management and the lessons he has learned along the way.
• The importance of education and networking in the wealth management industry.
• How he thinks about risk in public and private markets.
• The evolution of wealth management as a business.
• Why alternatives products are still sold and not bought.
• The importance of staying focused on fundamentals and long-term investing.
• The workflow challenges that alternative investments have for a wealth management firm.
• How and why content can develop views, educate, and build brand in wealth management and private markets.

Thanks Michael for coming on the show to share your thoughts and wisdom on investing.

Show Notes

02:03 Introduction to Alt Goes Mainstream 

02:43 Guest Introduction: Michael Batnick 

03:00 Michael's Early Career and Challenges 

07:26 Meeting Josh Brown and Career Breakthrough 

08:35 Lessons from the Insurance World 

09:20 Creating Content and Building a Brand 

10:58 Investing Philosophy and Market Insights 

14:27 Young Investors and Market Psychology 

19:13 Public vs. Private Markets 

29:25 Advisors and Private Investments 

34:21 Customization and Differentiation in Private Markets 

34:50 Challenges in Pitching Investments to Clients 

35:09 Operational Hurdles in Alternative Investments 

35:34 The Role of Relationship Managers 

36:16 Building and Managing Alts Portfolios 

43:04 Market Dynamics and Investment Strategies 

53:43 Content Creation in Wealth Management 

58:53 The Future of Wealth Management with AI 

01:01:46 Quick Fire Round: Market Predictions and Insights 

01:05:19 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

A word from AGM podcast sponsor, Ultimus Fund Solutions

This episode of Alt Goes Mainstream is brought to you by Ultimus Fund Solutions, a leading full-service fund administrator for asset managers in private and public markets. As private markets continue to move into the mainstream, the industry requires infrastructure solutions that help funds and investors keep pace. In an increasingly sophisticated financial marketplace, investment managers must navigate a growing array of challenges: elaborate fund structures, specialized strategies, evolving compliance requirements, a growing need for sophisticated reporting, and intensifying demands for transparency. 

To assist with these challenging opportunities, more and more fund sponsors and asset managers are turning to Ultimus, a leading service provider that blends high tech and high touch in unique and customized fund administration and middle office solutions for a diverse and growing universe of over 450 clients and 1,800 funds, representing $500 billion assets under administration, all handled by a team of over 1,000 professionals. Ultimus offers a wide range of capabilities across registered funds, private funds and public plans, as well as outsourced middle office services. Delivering operational excellence, Ultimus helps firms manage the ever-changing regulatory environment while meeting the needs of their institutional and retail investors. Ultimus provides comprehensive operational support and fund governance services to help managers successfully launch retail alternative products. 

Visit www.ultimusfundsolutions.com to learn more about Ultimus’ technology enhanced services and solutions or contact Ultimus Executive Vice President of Business Development Gary Harris on email at [email protected].

We thank Ultimus for their support of alts going mainstream.

Today on the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast we have a guest who may be young in age, but has already done more and lived through more than many people twice his age.

Anthony Zhang recently turned 26 but has already successfully built and sold two companies, secured funding from Mark Cuban, and received a Thiel Fellowship grant before starting Vinovest, his third company, which is making it easier to access fine wine as an investment product.

He also has an admirable and awe-inspiring personal story, working hard to come back from a devastating accident that left him paralyzed from the neck down. He was in the middle of running his second company, EnvoyNow, when this accident happened and, despite the tremendous adversity he faced, was able to continue to build the business and achieve a successful sale.

Anthony recently founded Vinovest, a platform that has been described as the Robinhood of wine investing. He’s built an investment platform that is unlocking wine investing to the masses. 

We had a fascinating conversation. We talked about: 

• Anthony’s background as an entrepreneur.
• Some of the lessons learned from starting 3 companies by the ripe old age of 26.
• How fine wine can be a compelling investment during periods of volatility.
• How to identify an investment-grade wine
• Some of his favorite wines (that he drinks and invests into!).

Wine as an investment has been largely inaccessible to the individual investor due to high account minimums, a lack of wine expertise, concerns about fraud, and the excessive costs associated with storing and insuring wine. Vinovest is abstracting away many of these issues with their automated investment platform that helps investors invest into fine wine as an asset class.

Thanks Anthony for coming on the AGM podcast. We hope you enjoy this episode.

Today on the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast we have one of the OGs of the crowdfunding space on to talk about how he’s built platforms that have evolved in tandem with the alts ecosystem.

Slava Rubin is the founder of both Indiegogo, one of the first crowdfunding platforms, and Vincent, a platform that is making discovery and alternative investments easier for investors. He is also the founder of humbition, an early-stage investment firm.

We had a fascinating conversation about the evolution of the alts space – from the early days of equity crowdfunding to now wading through all the different options of investment platforms in the alts space today. We talk about:

• The evolution of the alts space.
• The alts portfolio of the future.
• The need for an aggregator – and how once other industries, like travel, had an aggregator, the space took off.

Slava founded Indiegogo in 2006. He grew Indiegogo from an idea to over 500,000 campaigns and more than $1 billion distributed around the world. While at Indiegogo, Slava represented the crowdfunding industry at the White House during the signing of the JOBS Act and helped navigate bringing equity crowdfunding to the American public.

Slava also pioneered security tokens in the US. He created a way to sell fractionalized ownership of the St. Regis hotel in Aspen, Colorado using blockchain technology.

Slava’s latest work in the alts space is to bring transparency, discovery, and diligence to investors. He’s founded Vincent, which he’s likened to Kayak for alternatives, to enable investors to easily search, discover, and invest into all sorts of alternative assets.

Thanks Slava for coming on the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast. We hope you enjoy.

Today we have a special episode of Alt Goes Mainstream – the co-founders of Rally on to discuss how people can now invest into defining cultural moments and assets that are aligned with their passions.

Chris Bruno and Rob Petrozzo grew up together – and they have combined their respective talents to form what has become one of the symbols for the financialization of all sorts of assets.

Rally, which started as a platform to enable investors to invest into shares of classic cars that would be unattainable to many investors, has become a multi-asset investment platform that allows individual investors to invest into all sorts of exotic, rare assets at low minimums.

Chris, Rob, and I had a fascinating conversation about how Rally built and evolved their concept from classic cars to all sorts of rare, grail assets. We discuss:

• How they got into collectibles themselves.
• How they’ve waded through complex regulatory structures to figure out how to offer these assets to the masses.
• How they grew up together and have now built a company that aligns with their passions.
• And how on earth they were able to IPO a triceratops skull and IPO a rookie card of the United States (hint: the Declaration of Independence).

Chris, Rob, and team have created a leading fractional investing platform for the alternatives space. They recently raised a $30 million round led by Accel, who invested in GOAT, to help propel their marketplace further.

Rally has already achieved an active, engaged, and passionate userbase of over 200,000 investors who have invested in everything from Pele rookie cards to classic cars to dinosaur heads to, soon, the Declaration of Independence, or a rookie card of the United States of America as Rally investor and Upfront Ventures Partner Greg Bettinelli has called it.

Chris, the Co-Founder and President, comes from the VC and startup worlds. 

He was an Associate at Village Ventures before co-founding two companies, Health Guru Media and Spotter. He’s a classic car enthusiast, which ignited his interest in unlocking the asset class to individual investors.

Rob, the Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer, has been the creative inspiration behind Rally.

He has brought his background as the in-house lead designer and creative consultant for Sony BMG, where he worked on the likes of Kanye West’s GOOD music imprint, and as the creative director for a few startups to bring Rally’s brand to life in person and in the digital world. 

Rally has also done some really interesting things with their brand, opening up a showroom to their investors, creating and offering stock certificates to their investors, and creating exclusive merch drops (including the limited edition Michael Jordan rookie card sweatshirt that I wore for today’s podcast). 

Thanks Chris and Rob for coming on the AGM podcast. We hope you enjoy today’s episode.

Today, we have an expert in lending and capital markets on the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast to discuss how his company, Pipe, is building a new asset class.

Michal Cieplinski is the Chief Business Officer for Pipe, a fast growing fintech company.
 

Pipe has seen a rapid rise over the past year. They are one of the fastest fintech companies to reach a $2 billion valuation – and it’s in large part because investors see the potential to build a platform that unlocks recurring revenue as an investable asset class for the world’s largest institutional investors.

Michal deeply understands the inner workings of credit and lending on both the borrower and lender side from his experiences helping to build Fundbox, LendingClub, and now Pipe.

Pipe was born from the idea that entrepreneurs and companies should be able to grow their businesses on their terms – without taking debt or dilution. 

This was a fascinating discussion with someone who has seen the evolution of a number of lending platforms. Michal and I discussed:

• Lessons learned from building marketplace fintech businesses.
• How Pipe is empowering founders to adopt a trader mentality by unlocking recurring revenue as an asset class. 
• How Pipe is creating an efficient way for companies to turn their predictable revenue streams into a way to access capital without sacrificing dilution.
• How Pipe is building out both the buy side and sell side of their marketplace.
• How Pipe handles churn on SaaS contracts of their sell side borrowers.
• How he thinks about the evolution of Pipe as a platform in terms of the types of assets you would "pipe" and how any sort of recurring revenue stream - like ISPs, streaming services, even PE / VC fund management fees could be "piped."

Thanks Michal for coming on the AGM podcast. We hope you enjoy.

Today, we have our first LatAm guest on the AGM podcast. And it was a special one.

Bitso, LatAm’s leading crypto exchange, is fresh off of raising a $250M round led by Tiger Global months after raising a $62M round led by QED and Kaszek - and has been minted as one of LatAm’s newest unicorns.

We had Bitso’s co-founder and CEO Daniel Vogel on to talk about what it has been like to build a leading FinTech company in the region and provide access to investments and financial services.

This was such a fun conversation. We could have gone on for hours. Daniel is such a compelling and fascinating storyteller. We discussed a number of things including:

• How Daniel has dedicated his life to unlocking monetary freedom for people through crypto.
• How a talk with his friend, a janitor at his company in Silicon Valley, opened his eyes to the need for real applications of crypto to help people send money cross-border.
• The origins of Bitso and how Bitso was a pioneer of an online brokerage account in Mexico.
• How Bitso has become the on-ramp for financial services for many consumers across LatAm.
• The meaning behind Bitso’s slogan #makecryptouseful.
• The power of stablecoins and how it’s enabling people in countries with inflation and currency fluctuations to save money.
• How Bitso balances being a centralized company in a decentralized world.
• How religion and community play a unique role in crypto.

Daniel is an early crypto pioneer and a thought leader in the space. He became intrigued by the idea of bitcoin well before many other people had heard of it and really thought of crypto as a way to unlock monetary freedom and access to financial services for the underserved.

After founding the Bitcoin Club at Harvard in 2013 while he was doing his MBA, Daniel founded Bitso with co-founders Pablo Gonzalez and Ben Peters soon after he left Harvard Square. 

In Bitso, Daniel and his co-founders Pablo and Ben have created the on-ramp for financial services to many consumers in Mexico and across LatAm.

As Daniel said in a recent TechCrunch interview, the growth of the crypto ecosystem in LatAm has been nothing short of remarkable. It took Bitso six years to get their first 1 million clients. And over the course of 2020, Bitso has surpassed the 2 million client mark. They have also doubled their assets on the platform. And their transaction volume during the first quarter of 2021 exceeded transaction volume for all of 2020.

It is clear that Daniel has a passion for building out the cryptoeconomy and for making a difference in people’s lives, so much so that Bitso has made their tagline #makecryptouseful.

Thanks Daniel for coming on the AGM podcast. We hope you enjoy this episode.

Today on the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast we have a domain expert in the world of VC – and someone who has been a visionary when it has come to one of the biggest movements in VC over the past 8 years: emerging managers.

Samir Kaji, the Founder & CEO of Allocate, is a well-respected industry leader in the VC world. He has spent over 20 years partnering with VCs at First Republic Bank and Silicon Valley Bank, where he led the Venture Capital and Private Equity banking efforts. At First Republic, he built out the infrastructure and client base that served the VC and PE community. He’s evaluated over 800 VC fund managers and worked with thousands of LPs at First Republic.

Samir and I had a fascinating conversation about the evolution of venture capital and what's to come for the industry. He’s seen a lot in his career in Silicon Valley that has spanned multiple market cycles. He shared his perspective on:

• The challenges that GPs and LPs face during fundraising.
• Why the structural inefficiencies of allocating to funds - and perceived risks with emerging managers - led so many LPs to miss out on the Fund I’s of now legendary emerging managers Lowercase Capital, K9, and Initialized Capital.
• The case for emerging managers in a venture portfolio and why emerging managers are the future of venture capital.
• The trend of non-institutional capital coming into the venture world.
• How LPs will be able to better discover and allocate to fund managers in the future.

In his time in Silicon Valley, he’s become an unquestioned thought leader in the world of VC, particularly in the emerging manager space. 

He has consistently written seminal thought pieces and instructional guides on the topic – and now talks about the space with his podcast, Venture Unlocked.

His experiences working with many of the top VC funds and LPs globally has culminated in a journey that he’s now starting by founding Allocate.

He has observed a number of inefficiencies with emerging managers when it comes to firm building and capital raising. 

He’s seen many emerging managers struggle with fundraising due to the difficulties finding the right LPs. 

He’s seen the challenges that LPs have with being able to locate and allocate to new emerging managers, many of whom have gone on to outperform benchmarks and become the next generation of brand name firms.

He believes that the ecosystem is ready for a decentralized, democratized, and diverse ecosystem of fund managers. And Allocate is the connective tissue that will solve these challenges for both GPs and LPs alike. 

Thanks Samir for coming on the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast to share your wisdom about the world of venture. 

Today we have a guest who is bringing farmland investing to the masses. 

After working for one of Canada’s largest pension plans, Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, and running Operations and as the CFO at a platform for buying and selling produce, Artem Milinchuk founded FarmTogether to bring an asset that has largely been the domain of institutional investors to individuals. 

Artem and I had a fascinating conversation. We discussed: 

• How farmland deserves a place in all investors’ portfolios – in large part due to its features as a hedge against inflation and a passive income generating investment.
• How to underwrite a farmland asset.
• How he one day envisions the ability to invest into farmland embedded directly into one’s brokerage account.
• He also made a great case for how we can eat our way into supporting farmland investments, like hazelnut farms, which happen to be some of the types of farms that Artem likes to invest into.

FarmTogether is a technology-enabled farmland investment platform that provides investors with direct access to US farmland as an asset class. They have developed an end-to-end investment platform that allows investors to review carefully vetted farmland investments and invest in properties.

Artem has over 10 years of finance experience in food, agriculture, and farmland. Prior to founding FarmTogether, Artem was the first employee and CFO / VP of Operations at Full Harvest Technologies, a post-Series A b2b platform for buying and selling produce.

In addition to working at Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, he also worked at Sprott Resource Holdings, E&Y, and PwC. 

Thanks Artem for coming on the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast. I hope you enjoy the conversation with Artem.