One of the most common questions we hear when meeting with advisors is pretty straightforward: “What is everyone else doing right now?”
It’s a fair question, and also one that the industry rarely has an answer to – other than flow data, of course, but that’s highly impacted by much larger institutions. Portfolios tend to live behind closed doors; very few want to compare notes, and no one wants to be the one who overshares and loses any perceived edge.
With 2025 coming to a close, we pulled together the data from the 47 portfolios we provide insights for through the Partnership Program and took a deeper look at how the group is positioned. When you line them up side by side, clear patterns emerge, and you get a view of the industry that most people never see.
This month’s edition is a bit more chart-heavy than usual. The data tells the story better than most commentary will. Think of this as a snapshot of how the industry is positioned heading into 2026. The short answer is there’s a decent amount of consistency, a few tilts and an overall sense of cautious optimism.
Here are a few key themes that stood out.
The Backbone Remains Balanced
Across the group, the core asset mix has not shifted all that much. Equities remain the primary engine. Cash sits a bit higher than the baseline at around 5%, expressing a bit of comfort with yield levels and maintaining some dry powder. It’s not a big enough tilt to consider an elevated level of bearishness, but it does signal a subtle level of caution that has been there for much of the year.
Alternatives continue to have a firm seat at the table at roughly 11% on average. Most of that exposure is income-focused, which plays directly into the biggest underweight we see across advisor models: traditional fixed income.
To us, that doesn’t signal that advisors are abandoning bonds. Instead, it reflects two forces at play. First, many are reshuffling income sources after years of low yields. Second, there’s a clear attempt to diversify the defensive side of the portfolio as bond and equity correlations have remained persistent.
The U.S. Retains the Heaviest Lean
The clearest tilt across advisor portfolios is the preference for U.S. equities. It stands out immediately in the geographic look-through. Nearly every portfolio holds more U.S. exposure than either our baseline or the Purpose Balanced portfolio, making it the largest collective overweight in the dataset. The spread is wide, but the direction is consistent; advisors continue to lean into the strength of the U.S. market.
The broad overweight becomes even clearer when you look at how individual allocations are distributed. The histogram shows U.S. weights clustering between the high 30s and low 60s, with only a handful of portfolios sitting above or below that range. Advisors continue to express the same core belief that U.S. leadership will continue.
If the U.S. represents the largest overweight, Developed International remains the most notable underweight. Even with strong international performance this year, many have not meaningfully increased international exposure. There has certainly been some addition of international, but most remain around that 20% weight. This is well below the Purpose Balanced average of 33%, suggesting that familiarity and momentum still drive much of the geographic mix.
Emerging Markets remains the smallest allocation across the group, despite EM being one of the better performers this year. The setup continues to improve, and we have seen more interest and inflows following our increase in EM exposure. But despite the positive backdrop, the data shows that EM remains underrepresented. There may be a little recency bias at play (can it be recency bias if we are talking about a decade?), as not many people have positive experiences investing in EM historically, which has affected their place in multi-asset portfolios.
Costs, Income, and the Role of Active Management
When looking at some of the attributes, one of the first things that stands out across advisor portfolios is the average MER. It’s higher than what many might assume at a glance, but the underlying exposures explain it clearly.
Advisors favour active managers at the core of their portfolios, supported by a wide range of alternative strategies. Both naturally carry higher fees, and the overall profile simply reflects how most advisors prefer to build. It’s a deliberate approach, shaped by the belief that manager selection helps navigate a more complex market environment.
The Purpose Balanced portfolio reflects a bit more of a neutral stance, but it still currently relies on active managers for roughly 40% of the holdings, where we find it best adds value. The point is not to compare or rank different philosophies. It’s simply to understand that the higher MER profile across portfolios is a direct byproduct of how advisors choose to express views and manage risk for their clients.
At the same time, yields across advisor portfolios remain healthy and wide-ranging. Higher bond yields than in years past have lifted the baseline, and many advisors round out their income profile with income-oriented alternative strategies. There has certainly been a theme this year of looking for ways to increase the yield of portfolios. This has been a consistent client demand, but it does seem to have been elevated recently, perhaps associated with the demographics of some of the clients looking for income in retirement.
Boring Bonds are Back
Even though advisors remain underweight traditional fixed income relative to the historical “40%” level, the part they do hold is put together in an uncomplicated way. Investment Grade makes up a majority of exposure, given the reasonable yields available. And with credit spreads where they are, most portfolios have high-yield playing a small supporting role.
One of the most notable shifts over the past year has been the return of duration. For a long stretch, duration was something that was avoided, with good reason. That fear has faded. Today, even with a lighter overall allocation to fixed income, most portfolios sit in a healthy mid-range of duration that looks far closer to a normal cycle than the ultra-defensive positioning we saw a few years ago.
This mirrors what we have done internally as well. Instead of treating duration as something to sidestep, both advisors and Purpose have built balanced, higher-quality fixed income sleeves that support the portfolio as they were intended to.
Final Thoughts
Stepping back from the data, the broader tone across these portfolios is one of balance and flexibility. Each advisor brings their own style to construction, but the overall direction shows a clear intent to stay invested while keeping portfolios adaptable as conditions shift.
It’s worth noting that this perspective reflects the group of advisors connected to the Partnership Program. It’s not meant to describe the entire industry. These observations come from the ongoing conversations and model discussions we have throughout the year.
Within this group, a few trends emerge for 2026. Advisors expect U.S. equities to remain a reliable source of strength; they continue to lean on active managers where it fits their process; and they see a need for alternative ballasts in portfolios outside of traditional fixed income.
— Brett Gustafson is an Associate Portfolio Manager at Purpose Investments
Sources: Charts are sourced to Bloomberg L.P.
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