SMAs

Both in the US and at home, the model portfolio market has matured to the point where most advice firms running managed accounts are in the frame to use customised options.

SMAs provide most of the benefits of managed accounts, without the costs and additional investment in asset consultants, 3rd party MDA licensee arrangements, reams of paperwork, and compliance regimes, writes Seneca’s Luke Laretive.

Multi-strategy separately managed accounts (SMAs) are “taking off like you wouldn’t believe”, according to SQM Research CEO Louis Christopher, but the rapid increase in their use could also be creating a regulatory blind spot.

Eschewing the traditional route, Spatium Capital founders Nicholas Quinn and Jesse Moors grew their short-holding, long-only small companies managed fund from the seeds of a separately managed account.