is supportive, but a firmer dollar and higher oil prices create challenges for importers, and major central banks remaining on hold weaken the duration argument. Yields are inside our neutral range, but only marginally.
Hard-currency emerging markets: The backdrop that had been supportive for this asset class- cooling inflation, a softer dollar and lower US yields- has stalled. Spreads have widened but remain below the long-run median, and the premium over single-B US high yield is thin. Yields remain high enough to justify consideration, but the long duration remains a material concern if energy prices continue to push inflation higher.
Growth
Equities: Earnings forecasts are still being revised upwards, which is supportive, but valuations remain stretched on a longer-term view. The March sell-off improved headline P / Es without materially changing the underlying picture. If either multiples or earnings weaken from here, the return outlook becomes less attractive quite quickly. We are not exiting the asset class, but nor are we inclined to add aggressively at current levels.
Property: Progress here is likely to remain gradual. Reversionary yields look attractive on paper but realising that uplift requires active management and a cooperative market. At present, occupational demand is soft, rental growth expectations are easing, and landlords are having to offer more to fill space. Some parts of the market face structural challenges that are likely to persist.
Decumulation considerations
This is where the market backdrop starts to matter more directly. Accumulation can be more forgiving, decumulation is not. Sequencing risk is the obvious issue. A poor run of returns in the first few years of drawdown can do permanent damage to a portfolio that might have been manageable in accumulation. With equities stretched, gilts repricing, and an energydriven inflation shock in the background, the shape of the next two or three years matters more than the long-run average. That is one reason return smoothing is receiving more attention. In this context, we mean approaches intended to reduce the volatility of the income experience for a client drawing benefits, even when the underlying assets have not materially changed. in the conversation, and rightly so. They can address a problem that drawdown alone may not solve.
The Committee ' s role in all of this is unchanged. We document and explain how each of these mechanisms works so that you can evidence why you have used them to the client, and to anyone reviewing the file later. What we do not do is make the decision for you. We do not tell you when an annuity is more appropriate than drawdown, or when smoothing is the right answer for a specific client. That remains your judgement, as it should.
Implications for advisers
For most directly authorised firms, the economics of doing all of this in-house are difficult. Macro analysis, manager research, fund screening, due diligence and ongoing monitoring require time, expertise and resource. Even a well-resourced advice firm is unlikely to replicate a dedicated team working on this full-time. As a result, many advisers either outsource the investment committee function or access one through a support service, allowing them to focus their time on the areas where they add most value: client conversations, suitability work, and planning.
The value the Committee offers to your processes comes down to two things. We can bring rigour and resource that an individual firm may struggle to match on its own due to time and resource constraints. Additionally, we can provide a documented process that links the advice to the outcome. That second point, defensibility, has become increasingly important. In practice, regulators will expect firms to show that the process behind a recommendation was sound.
The knock-on effect, which many advisers underrate, is the time this can return to the business. Instead of repeatedly revisiting and defending historic fund choices, advisers can spend more time on the client conversations that support retention and good outcomes.
A shortlist on its own can create risk but a framework creates evidence and distinction matters.
Annuities, which were written off for years, are also back
June 2026 | 11