Heading 2 - The data droids have crunched mounds of readership data and come back with the following insight about blogging: Readers like fewer longer posts much more than they like frequent short posts.

Heading 3 - In sum, the data is telling us that less is more when it comes to making you happy. (So ... twitter?)

Heading 4 - Anyway, with this powerful insight in hand, the boss men and women of II Magazine have asked me if I'd be willing to adapt my own blog to this approach. And, because I'm a team player, I've agreed. (Ok fine. I agreed because it's easier.)

Heading 5 - So, from here on out, you can expect the following: The Daily Briefs ... are gone. What will remain are long(ish) posts, which will dig into specific giant-related topics, and 'weekend readings', which will recap news from the prior week as well as flag up interesting papers to read. And that's really it.
Heading 6 - If you have any questions, criticisms or (dare I hope) kudos, send 'em over. In the meantime, here's hoping the droids know where they're taking us...

The majority of institutional investors are less concerned about the passive vs. active debate than they are about optimizing the risk-return trade off in their portfolios. 

The Cerulli Associates research found that 57 percent of institutional asset owners are focused on this approach in management decision making.

This demonstrates a willingness to stick to a strategy even if the market conditions suggest it is not the ideal approach at the time, as evidenced by the market sea change in recent months. Passive strategies proved successful in 2024 until the market volatility led many to suggest it had evolved into “a stock pickers market.”

Cost proved fundamental in the decision to choose passive strategies, according to the research, with the lower prices associated with these funds often pushing many in that direction. A quarter of respondents suggested they would opt into an active strategy in certain areas regardless of the high costs it would bring. The research found that in this case investors will offset this cost with lower risk, lower price passive strategies.

Three quarters were reported as including passive ETFs in their portfolio, although this number grew to over 90 percent for corporate and endowments.

Family offices are tending to go public too, in the current environment, and reducing exposure to private equity because of the backlog there. According to Charles Otton, head of Global Family & Institutional Wealth at UBS, “families can see the ocean is going to be a bit choppy, and they are not trying to determine or chart a course they are riding the waves, because they know almost whatever they do is going to be insignificant vicissitudes of the market."

US families are reducing exposure to private equity and increasing it to trade in equities, with about 53 percent of that coming in the form of passive equity exposure, according to UBS' annual Global Family Office Report.