Expertise, leadership in the alternatives space
00:00 the cander is really the service. But if the money isn’t compounding, you failed at your actual job and the relationship doesn’t pay for anyone’s retirement. So
00:08 service in the absence of returns is hospitality. Um, and we’re here to manage capital and manage outcomes for
00:15 our clients. [music] Hello and welcome to this special episode of WPTV. My name is David Katy, senior editor at Wealth Professional.
00:24 [music] In the wake of our 2026 Wealth Professional Awards, WP is highlighting a few of our excellence awardees.
00:29 showcasing the insights and approaches that earned them their place at the award show. Today we have one of the excellence awardees for the Centurion Asset Management Award for Adviser of
00:38 the Year, Alternative Investments, Chad Larson, partner and senior portfolio manager at MLDD Wealth. Chad, welcome to WPTV.
00:46 Thanks, David. Uh, it’s great to be here and congratulations to everyone that WP recognizes here. It’s uh, it’s been a great room to be in. Well, a special
00:55 congratulations to you uh for this excellence awardee and some of your other victories on the night. But let’s start with with this category in particular. Why why do you think you
01:03 were named an excellence awardee in in this category?
01:07 I think it’s because we actually manage alternatives. Um we don’t just sell them. And then that’s a real difference.
01:14 A lot of this category is product distribution. You know, here’s a private fund, here’s an idea, here’s a structured note sign on the line. and
01:22 and we treat alternatives as an act of discipline uh matched to clients real liquidity needs really driven by a macro
01:30 view and and rebalanced as that view shifts and I think maybe the rarer part is the straddle I came up you know as a
01:38 retail adviser and crossed into running money like an institution and most people only ever live on one side of that line you know bringing the
01:46 institutional toolkit to private clients and actually piloting it rather than parking it and I I think that’s what really got noticed and is noticed by our
01:55 clients. So the awards a byproduct of doing that work properly year after year, not the goal.
02:01 Mhm. So I think you’ve already hinted at this, but but let’s get a sense of your practice overall. What exactly do you provide to clients?
02:09 Sure. Um, so I run a multif family office here at um in partnership with Canacor Genuity. Um, and I think the
02:17 simplest way I describe it is, you know, on the money side of things. Now we do everything full cycle from estate planning, taxation, insurance and and
02:26 retirement income planning. But the on the money side I say the simplest way is that we run money like an outsourced
02:32 CIO. You we’re not a stock picking shop chasing tickers. We manage the whole allocation the way an institution would.
02:40 Um, so I manage about a $ 1.7 billion dollars across the MLDD platform uh for private clients, families and business
02:47 owners and also manage a perspectus cleared uh fund externally at the firm as well. So what clients actually get is
02:54 two things. One, it’s an institutional toolkit, real assets, private markets, alternative uh packaged for people who’d
03:01 normally never get access to it. So, I spent a career straddling those two worlds, the retail advisor’s relationship and the institutional
03:09 manager’s toolbox. And most people only get one or the other, and we give them both. And and two is they get honesty about risk. Um, we’ll tell you, you
03:19 know, when we’re being patient and when we’re carrying cash and when we don’t love the price, the cander is really the service.
03:27 Let’s go a little deeper on that asset allocation side of things. you know what what is your overall approach to asset allocation and then how do you weave you
03:34 know your private asset allocations into what you’re you’re giving to your clients overall.
03:40 Yeah, listen I think if there was a perfect algorithm or a slider um you know Google or someone would have um solved for it right now and everyone
03:47 would would figure this all out. The honest framing is that in alternatives, most of the time you’re capturing two things, an illquidity premium and a
03:56 complexity premium. And you get paid for tying capital up and for doing work that most people won’t do or can’t do. Which
04:03 means the most important question isn’t what’s the return, it’s what are your clients actual liquidity needs. Match
04:10 the lock up to the life. Get that wrong and the premium that you’re trying to capture really becomes a trap. And I
04:17 push back, you know, I think largely from tailwinds or headwinds that some of the parts of the the sector are getting
04:25 um in alternatives in general and credit especially that that there’s some structural problem with it. And the headwind isn’t really structural. It’s
04:33 the structure kind of a wave of easy money and poorly allocated capital chased the theme and poured into badly designed funds. You know, people buying
04:42 with the rearview mirror. And that’s not the asset class failing. That’s bad construction failing. We do it differently. We allocate off our macro
04:50 view and when the macro shifts, we react and tactically rebalance. You don’t just collect a pile of alternative investments or funds and call it
04:58 diversification. That’s a closet, not a portfolio.
05:02 It’s funny, you know, I think you’ve already kind of addressed this question implied, but it’s it’s interesting talking about alts this year when public markets and public assets generally have
05:11 done so well. So, so how do you kind of balance the client FOMO around why am I in this when the S&P is ripping?
05:19 So, it’s it’s great, you know, kind of um intangentally is that parts of the market, you know, are are ripping. And I
05:27 think if you you know, if you were in the hyperscalers, you know, if you caught gold, right, you know, I think a lot of it thematically, sure, indices
05:36 have been driven higher, but there’s just small gig sectors that really been doing a lot of the heavy lifting. So indexing has worked uh largely in line
05:45 with client’s goals and expectations. Um but you’re just you’re kind of just sitting in the hot tub expecting that your you know lower back doesn’t hurt as
05:53 much and that’s generally worked for now. But some real cracks in the armors you’re starting to see obviously like the software trade started coming apart
06:00 but we really start by building a defensible core. Um, and I think that’s where a lot of people get things wrong is they look they’ve looked to
06:08 alternatives, you know, to to do the magic or the satellite exposures to do the magic because largely and generally what we’ve seen in, you know, in a
06:17 balanced 60/40 world or where a lot of the general capital ends up uh where people have a lot of their exposure has been fair to middling average results.
06:25 So start by building a defensible core and then satellite you can actually have conviction but sizing it honestly and I think the contribution from those high
06:33 conviction positions can be real um and but so is the risk. So with respect to the FOMO trade is that we’re also that’s
06:41 not all we do as alternatives. We do have a um core business you know and 80% of what we do I always said is within uh
06:49 within the uh within the fairway of earning our fair share of public market returns. Um, so it’s not a case where
06:57 FOMO is is creeping into the client discussions because we’re, you know, hitting singles in our alternatives and I’m having to defend, well, look at our
07:06 correlation, look at our low volatility, look at all of these things that, you know, they’re not paying me now, but they might. I haven’t had to have those
07:13 conversations because we’re performing on both sides, you know, of the coin. So um the rule I kind of hold you is that
07:20 you know you fund additional you know risk you know out of surplus gains not out of a need to make up loss ground. So
07:28 when we have strong moves within the marketplace you know we’re capturing you know those profits. So the moment you start sizing up to claw back a loss you
07:37 know you’ve stepped you’ve stopped investing and really started gambling.
07:40 So you got to really make sure that the core is doing its job and let the wins accumulate and take bigger swings with house money and never with the rent if
07:48 that makes sense. So conviction earns you the right to size things up. It doesn’t entitle you to ignore downside.
07:56 I don’t know if you ever played rugby.
07:58 There’s a uh I did. Yeah.
08:00 So there’s the there’s the line that every rugby commentator says which is you know you have to earn the right to play wide. you have your your forwards, your big bruisers who are doing the
08:07 damage and and winning the ball for you, and then you’ve got your fast guys out on the wings, and once the forwards have done their work, those guys can take over. And it seems like there’s maybe a
08:16 bit of a rugby team metaphor to be uh applied in in your approach. Well, it’s a team, you know, you hit it.
08:23 can’t just I think Canadians in general have have accepted average across the board um you know with respect to their
08:31 kind of their core capital and just say well that just is what it is you know I’m supposed to get these you know mid
08:39 singledigit like returns in my 6040 and and that just that’s where I’m supposed to put most of my money because that’s
08:46 what mom and dad taught me to do you know and then I’ll like you know play around the edges expecting that these
08:53 more exotic parts of the portfolio are going to help me. Um, and I I think that’s just the wrong way. Like it takes
09:01 a team, but but everyone you’re the winger is never going to get the ball, you know, unless the the big guys do their job, too. So, the whole team has to work to win.
09:10 Mhm. So, talk to me about the MLDD core fund, uh, which is that fund that you manage. You know, you led your first answer was about how you manage alternatives. talk to me about the MLDD
09:18 core fund and what it is and and the role that it can play specifically in a portfolio.
09:23 Sure. So the MLDD core fund um I launched over 8 years ago. Um now it’s a
09:30 perspectus cleared fund liquid daily. Um it’s got a 6040 mandate like it’s about as vanilla as it gets. So you know call
09:39 it it’s outside of call it what the reason we’re talking with respect to allocating to alternatives but it’s it’s thematic and topical about how we’re
09:47 able to size things appropriately. So it’s perspectus it’s a tactical balance fund fully liquid multiasset. I launched
09:54 that when you know when I joined the firm and it was it wasn’t a catch-all way but it was a simplest way for me to express you know my views of capital
10:03 markets. I think you know in real estate it’s location location when it comes to investing I believe it’s allocation
10:11 allocation allocation and I think 80% of the decision you know uh the result is is kind of is done before you get down
10:19 to start picking the things I think you know I I tried to make some analogies around like racing a car was you got to size the car up for the terrain that
10:28 you’re in you know Ferrari is a phenomenal vehicle but if you’ve got to go do some off-roading it’s the wrong choice. So allocating across economic
10:36 cycles into different geography, styles, currencies. So you know it is a tactical fund. It can hold cash when cash is the
10:43 right call. It can rotate globally. It can own gold. It can go real assets.
10:48 Anything that trades, you know, within what a perspectus cleared fund in a 60/40 landscape um is what I do. And it’s all
10:57 large upcap and and largely, you know, it’s the ballast of portfolio. So it’s it is pinned to a 60/40 but has the
11:04 ability within the perspectus to tilt up to se to 70/30. So it has to ride whatever the index gives it. But the
11:11 role that it plays is it’s a true anchor holding the disciplined all-weather center of our portfolios which are built to navigate regime changes rather than
11:20 participate in the last one. So and and the record really backs it up. Listen, it is the number one fund in uh in
11:28 Canada over a 1, two, and threeear period. not just first quartile but the number one ranked fund out of over 300 mutual funds in the country um within
11:36 its uh within its segment that was as of May 31st as per fund data. So it’s the proof of a concept for everything that I say about allocation when allocation is
11:45 the engine a vehicle that can actually move the allocation is where was really where the edge shows up. So, and you you
11:53 I think you laid it out in some ways in describing the fund itself, but what drove that outperformance? What is what is going on within this fund that really
12:01 caused it to be that top performing fund in Canada?
12:05 So, I you know, I answered this in a different interview or in a podcast recently and I don’t want to oversimplify it and make this sound, you
12:12 know, like that that the fund is, you know, is is managed like a hedge fund.
12:16 Like this is um I want to say it’s as boring as it gets. You know, tea bills are much more boring, but it what’s
12:23 driven it isn’t a single hot call. You know, it’s a process repeated through some generally hard tape. Tariff shocks,
12:31 rate hikes, a pandemic. The same discipline held through all of it.
12:35 Allocate first. Respect the price you pay. Carry dry powder when the math doesn’t justify being fully deployed.
12:43 And own real things with scarcity value as the anchor. You don’t sit at number one over three years and first quartile over seven by getting lucky. It’s a
12:52 philosophy that’s executed consistently in good markets and ugly one. So listen, that’s a bit of a a banner and and you
12:58 know a good uh tagline to say, but people want to know how I did it. I think you know I’m an economist by
13:05 background. Um so what really drove a lot of the attribution last year uh was precious metals. um was not down in the
13:12 weeds finding a good mine in Sri Lanka or some obscure part of the world. Um you know when we saw M2 and money supply
13:20 growing, the economist told me that you know central banks would be forced to acquire more boolean um to keep the
13:28 ratio of boolean to foreign reserves at a certain level. Like to me that that I always said I’ve had a great career out
13:35 of having a very strong IQ and it’s not intelligence quotient, it’s implementation quotient. It’s if money supply is going up, we generally know
13:44 that gold prices will track those much like when interest rates go up, bonds go down. So it’s actually having the
13:51 conviction um and I guess doing my job that I’m supposed to do as a as a capital allocator and as a money
13:59 manager. So, precious metals did a lot of the heavy lifting, but when we started seeing, you know, interest rates were high, we were carrying a lot of
14:06 cash, uh, we were getting paid very well for it from a risk-free rate, uh, perspective. Boolean was was cheap. We started picking away at boolean. When
14:15 the boolean trade started to happen, we said, okay, we want to own some large caps because they’re selling a product with a higher commodity, which will
14:24 translate into higher earnings. So, you know, how do I allocate with, you know, almost $2 billion? I I I can’t go get
14:31 smart on on a gold name real fast, but I can allocate to a sector through an ETF.
14:36 So, we would build a position in, you know, large cap gold producers. As that trade really started to take off, you
14:43 know, we realized that these companies would become very much bloated in cash in their balance sheet. So they would start to return capital through enhanced
14:52 dividends or share buybacks and that would continue to feed, you know, feed itself, but eventually they would have to deploy capital and we’d enter an M&A
15:00 cycle. So all along I’m selling the top part of the trade to fund the next leg of it. So as the boolean trade got bloated, we would take those profits and
15:09 buy the large cap trade. And as that trade really the attribution was there and we would kind of come down market cap. And now I’m in a really unique
15:16 place like the funds over 20% cash right now. And I I’m convicted in a in a new thesis of of not owning beta but just
15:25 sticking with alpha is that this market feels a little spongy. It feels albeit the earnings are real. It’s not this hollow market that everyone’s worried
15:33 about. The AI trade, the capex buildout is is translating into real economic activity. But with valuations being of
15:41 concern, I’m saying if if I every day we have far value at risk and capital at risk, we want to make sure that we’re
15:49 there. But if I can deal with as little as capital as possible because I’m nervous or uncertain, my attribution and
15:57 leverage can come from convicted alpha where I don’t have to have as much capital deployed.
16:03 That makes a lot of sense. And and I mean it’s again brings us maybe back to that alts conversation that we started with. So maybe talk to me about your
16:10 view of where the the role alts play and and almost the utility of alts when they’re paired with a an outperforming
16:19 but as you say kind of I mean it’s in the name a core fund like like core.
16:25 Well, it’s that the same. It’s like they do different jobs. And one of the things that we’ve seen, you know, where we would have all studied investing like
16:33 when we were kids, you know, is that you know, your fixed income was supposed to be your goalie and your offense was supposed to be your equities and you would play with a a balance whether it’s
16:42 a 60/40, a 70/30, an 80/20. I’ve seen it all like rules of your age should match your, you know, fixed income waiting. So
16:50 the older you get, the more fixed income. Like again if there was a right way to do this it would have been solved and stamped and made into some law. But
16:59 you know when I look at the intercorrelation or the cor the correlation between asset classes during periods of like like market dislocation
17:07 and shock like it feels like markets kind of they go up like escalators and down like elevators but seeming the correlation between even fixed income
17:15 and equities is is almost one to one now. It’s like when it all not working, it’s all not working. And so I think the
17:23 alternatives in themselves and yes, you know, in the short term, you know, people and pundits would argue that uh the lack of volatility is just a a
17:32 mismatch or gap between price smoothing and and non-discovery of valuations and that it’s all kind of a ruse in that. Um
17:41 but again I would say the core is that liquid all-w weather engine and it’s how we express the macro allocation and clients can move in and out of it and
17:50 private assets or when we add things you simply can’t get. Um and this is that hard asset exposure these contractual
17:57 incomes and returns that aren’t just writing public market price momentum.
18:02 One of the best ways that I can explain uh like an alternative where where so many of these things they almost try like Bay Street Wall Street does a great
18:10 job of trying to create a liquid proxy you know to attract capital whether it’s you know a private credit like adjacent fund or an ETF buying some of these
18:19 BDC’s you’re trying to make adjacency to to create capture fund flow but when I look at like infrastructure exposure I
18:27 say okay if I’m going to go and I won’t pick on any one name more. But if I’m going to buy an infrastructure stock, a
18:34 pipeline company in the public markets, I’m paying between the bid and the ask what the market’s willing to
18:42 bear for that. And it’s going to be a function of, you know, price to cash flow, price to earnings or some metrics, some a multiple of that. So when we look
18:50 at infrastructure at the private level, we are buying that physical asset. Yes, we’re also paying a function of its, you
18:59 know, we’re going to make a valuation thesis of where it moves into it, but the mark on that on the day-to-day basis
19:06 isn’t a function of people being fearful or greedy. It can’t trade up and I can’t
19:13 take a mark because, you know, everyone’s piling out of like the market goes into contagion, everyone’s running for liquidity and they start pounding
19:21 out their liquid names. there’s going to be that dislocation. Uh whereas if I own a toll road or a seapport or an airport or whatever it might be, I still own it.
19:32 And it’s much like the difference between private real estate and public real estate. At the end of the day, we own physical title to irreplaceable, you know, uh assets that are that are key and crucial to, you know, global trade.
19:43 And so I think I’m not just paying a function of a of a multiple of that. And so the, you know, the way I’d frame it is kind of like one’s a toll road and, you know, one is what’s driving on it.
19:53 Both are real or durable and cash generating. But in a market that’s really fallen in love with paper run on cheaper money, like having a meaningful
20:01 slice of our return come from real assets and contractual income rather than just multiple expansion is exactly where I want to be leaning. So the core
20:10 and private sleeve, they’re not competing. You know, one’s liquid, one’s illquid. um they’re just sized appropriately. They do different parts of the job. Back to your rugby analogy.
20:20 I want to sort of talk about this in the context of the wider industry for just a little bit. Um you know, I think you kind of mentioned it before. Basically,
20:29 a lot of Canadian advisers and Canadian industry leaders have said, yeah, single-digit returns from, you know, a a
20:36 solid 60/40 or whatever fund or maybe they’re shifting away from the 60/40 because of, you know, inflation related correlations. Um but something like that
20:45 is enough and advisers are going to earn their value by providing other things you know the over the the the holistic
20:52 financial planning term right that you see everywhere. So, so how does an approach like yours and what you do in your practice fit in with, you know,
21:00 both the industries call for and the genuine need among clients for services like financial planning, estate planning, tax planning and and a lot of
21:08 those other kind of what what used to not be in the core of an advisor’s work, but is becoming increasingly important.
21:14 I I would kind of chirp back to it is like people are going to gravitate to what they can and can’t do, you know, and if you can’t perform, you’re going to have to do something to be relevant.
21:23 And so if you’re going to play like distract over here and look at the magic bean because I can’t generate you, you know, any meaningful rate of return, you
21:31 know, and and the the industry is, you know, chalk full of underperformance and so is product. You know, I think a lot of us are looked to as, you know, I said
21:39 like it’s that old game of barrel of monkeys like people like me are supposed to just connect people, you know, product to people and have a relationship, you know, somewhere in
21:47 between. And so, you know, while the average adviser has shown a a dismal track record of being able to perform, um, you know, you focus on what you can
21:55 do. So, largely in general, like the Canadian investor has become nently comfortable with fair to average, you
22:04 know, results and so gravitates to who does more things from them and and does more services. So, so I want to push back gently on the idea that you have to
22:12 choose. So, first off, the best service is performance. I don’t lead with performance because listen without a plan and without truly embedding. I
22:21 never say listen I’m the number one performing balance manager like I’m rewarded for this that this like I have I have a CV that’s impressive but I will
22:30 tell you where we where we align is you start with the client’s needs um priorities and and build infrastructure
22:38 and and around that. But I I think the the best service ends up being performance. You can have the warmest relationship in the world and the nice
22:45 quarterly reviews and the best client dinners, but if the money isn’t compounding, you failed at your actual job and the relationship doesn’t pay for
22:53 anyone’s retirement. So, so here’s where the two genuinely connect. Real service is honesty. It’s telling a client and
23:01 but having the confidence and conviction to do your job. And I think that is really aligning, you know, going and I saw that transition from career into,
23:10 you know, I attract now more than pursue. I have a large business. I don’t need more business. So I’m a lot more clear in what a [clears throat] client
23:19 relationship means and what I’m willing to do for it. And so largely, you know, when people have a full service advisor,
23:27 allow it to be full service and allow that advisor to do their job. And I think so many times emotions get involved in it where you know markets
23:35 are challenging. I like I step on rakes all the time. I get bonked in the head all the time. But my clients trust me to
23:42 get up off the mat and keep fighting. I I think a lot of relationships fall apart for clients and fall fall apart
23:49 between the advisor or the adviser doesn’t feel empowered anymore to make those calls and make those decisions and really do their job. So as much as I
23:58 would like to tease the adviserss and say look how great I am. I actually generally feel you know empathy for for what we do go through and I think it’s
24:06 you know when things are going right it’s our job to do that or and but when things go wrong it’s seemingly all fault. Things go wrong all the time but
24:13 you have to allow people you know to to get back up. So um it’s explaining why you own the boring hard asset instead of
24:21 the hot name everyone’s talking about at the dinner party. It’s having the conviction to be a couple laps ahead and the cander to explain why and then pull
24:29 your ego out of the room and protect that.
24:32 And that’s not to separate from performance. It’s how you deliver it over a full cycle. And so again, we don’t pick. We we obsess over
24:40 performance. Um because that’s the promise and but the promise is to earn our fair share of market returns. If you’re going to be taking on systemic
24:49 risk and that is the things we can’t control, you better be compensated for those returns. So, you know, I really obsess
24:56 over honesty because it’s how clients actually stay invested long enough to get the performance. So, service in the absence of returns is hospitality. Um,
25:06 and we’re here to manage capital and manage outcomes for our clients.
25:10 Chad, I think that’s an excellent note to end on putting all this performance conversation into the context of of client service in the industry. So, all I can really say is thank you so much
25:18 for for taking the time and for for sharing your insights with me and with our audience today. A pleasure. Thanks, David.
25:24 And thank you to all of our viewers for WPTV. I’ve been David Katy. Have a great rest of your day.
