Graham Bentley: How suitable are risk-targeted portfolios?

2016 has seen the continued market penetration of multi-asset solutions. These funds are variously described as risk-managed, risk-profiled, risk-rated or risk-targeted. Clearly, when assessing the quality of management of these funds, it is important to understand the terminology involved. ‘Managed' or ‘profiled' promises are worthless marketing-speak. A risk-rated fund meanwhile will have been so designated by an independent source, according to a given volatility scale. The industry ‘standard' is probably Distribution Technology - although I should admit to a potential conflict here s...