Nest – Interview


the chief investment officer if yields reached a certain level so that he could put an order into the market for execu- tion. That was going on alongside my European equity day job.


I also worked on USS’ first private market deals, so I have had fingers in many pies over the years.


You joined Nest as head of long-term investment strategy. What did that entail? My core role is looking at the long-term risks and opportunities that underlie our


asset allocations. It is trying to identify when the tide is changing and that is what we should be reacting to. We do not react to every wave in the sea, that would be too short term. But if the tide changes, then we jolly well ought to be positioned for that.


What long-term investment trends are you looking at? We did a piece of work earlier this year on how asset allocations would need to change if we were in a sustained higher or


more volatile inflationary environment. It looked at what happens to asset class cor- relations during such a period compared to the one we have been in for the past 20 years. We have also been thinking about our investment objectives, about what we are trying to achieve and how our assets should be allocated to deliver that. We have looked at central bank digital currencies, too. There is nothing we can do with that right now, but it is interesting to look at what it could mean for the financial services industry.


Issue 116 | September 2022 | portfolio institutional | 13


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