Goldman Sachs' Kyle Kniffen - the arc of alternatives at Goldman Sachs: AGM Live at SuperReturn

Welcome back to the Alt Goes Mainstream podcast.

We sat down with Kyle Kniffen, Managing Director, Global Head of Alternatives, Third Party Wealth at Goldman Sachs. 

We were live from Berlin, which becomes the “capital of private capital” in June as private equity industry leaders make the annual pilgrimage to the city for one of the marquee private equity conferences, SuperReturn Berlin.

With Prosek Partners and former Bloomberg TV journalist Deirdre Bolton as my producer, along with her team, we took over a Tiny Space cabin to hold big conversations with some of the industry’s leading alternative asset managers.

A little over two years ago, I wrote on AGM about how, at $456B in AUM in alternatives, Goldman Sachs was a “sleeping giant” in private markets. In reality, Goldman is anything but a sleeping giant in private markets, having started its private equity business in 1984 and earning the distinction of being a top-5 alternatives manager by AUM across both traditional and alternative asset managers.

Today, Goldman has grown its alternatives business to over $625B in AUM.

The firm has expanded its platform with the acquisition of Industry Ventures and a partnership with T. Rowe Price to deliver public and private markets solutions to the wealth channel, and, most recently, the creation of its Alternative Investment Platform to provide HNW clients with direct access to private companies.

The evolution of Goldman’s Alternatives business reflects a thoughtful, measured approach to understanding the needs of wealth channel investors and finding the utility and purpose of strategy, product, and product structure.

That was much of the focus of the conversation Kyle and I had in Berlin. We discussed the objective and utility of private markets in a portfolio. We covered:

The growth of evergreen funds.Why evergreens are the product structure of choice.Why are evergreens also appealing to institutional allocators, insurance companies, and UHNW investors?How GPs and LPs are approaching LP composition to evergreen vehicles.The next wave of product innovation.The build, buy, partner framework Why Goldman is so excited about the GeoWealth partnership and what the future of model portfolios look like.What is not known but should be known about the Goldman Alternatives franchise.

Bio

Kyle Kniffen is a managing director in the Client Solutions Group within Goldman Sachs Asset Management. He serves as global head of Alternatives for Third Party Wealth (TPW), overseeing client strategy for the firm’s TPW clients globally, delivering the power of the Alternatives investing platform to a broad set of individual investors through our partnerships with financial intermediary clients and their advisors, including Private Banks, Broker-Dealers, RIAs and other distribution platforms. Kyle partners closely with leadership across our Alternatives franchise to develop products that meet our clients’ evolving needs. He is also co-chair of the AWM Global Distribution Working Group.

Prior to this role, Kyle was in Alternative Capital Markets (ACM), serving as head of ACM for Goldman Sachs Ayco and leading coverage for One Goldman Sachs financial sponsors globally. He joined Goldman Sachs in 2018 as a vice president in ACM and was named managing director in 2021.

Prior to joining Goldman Sachs, Kyle led a variety of distribution and product management teams for Bank of America’s Alternative Investment Group within their Global Wealth and Investment Management division.

Kyle is a board member for the Institute of Portfolio Alternatives (IPA), and a member of The Economic Club of New York. Kyle earned a BA from Gettysburg College.

Thanks, Kyle, for sharing your wisdom, expertise, and passion about private markets and serving the wealth channel.

Show Notes

00:00 AGM Live from SuperReturn Berlin

00:22 Meet Kyle Kniffin

01:10 Wealth Meets Private Markets

01:37 Big Pools Little Allocation

02:24 Alt Strategies Explosion

03:04 Lessons from Hedge Funds

03:34 Start with Client Goals

03:53 Risk Liquidity Tradeoffs

04:10 Portfolio Utility First

04:25 Holistic Private Markets

04:44 Fit and Terms Matter

05:07 Setting Expectations

05:32 Product Innovation Shift

05:52 Evergreens and Flexibility

06:10 Monthly Access and Tactics

06:39 Evergreen Growth Rates

06:45 Education and Dispersion

07:15 Why Evergreens Exist

07:41 Diversification Lower Minimums

08:04 Operational Simplicity

08:21 Evergreen Nuance Phase One

08:47 Goldman in Third Party Wealth

09:26 Institutions Buying Evergreens

10:31 LP Mix and Liquidity Caps

11:36 Institutionalizing Wealth Platforms

13:29 Goldman Platform Advantage

14:46 Feeding the Evergreen Engine

15:13 GeoWealth and Model Portfolios

15:45 T Rowe Price Collaboration

16:12 Build vs Buy Partner Balance

16:42 Industry Ventures Acquisition

17:33 Goldman Alts Heritage

18:35 Pioneering GP Stakes

19:45 Secondaries Since 1998

20:12 Apex of Private Markets

21:08 Will Secondaries Be Core

21:48 Max Flexibility for Wealth

22:42 Customization vs Scale

23:16 Flagships Then Bespoke

23:49 Lessons from Private Wealth

25:10 Broader Menu of Privates

25:34 Closing Thoughts