ALO31: What If the Illiquidity Premium Was Never Real? ft. Richard Tomlinson
Richard Tomlinson joins Alan Dunne for a conversation shaped by experience, not theory. As CIO of LPPI, Richard is responsible for £27 billion in pension assets - but what stands out here is the clarity with which he navigates complexity. From the fading utility of labels like “illiquidity premium” and “hedge fund” to the trade-offs between cost, alignment, and control, this episode is about building portfolios that work in the real world - not just in a model. They explore inflation’s structural drivers, the quiet rise of fiscal dominance, and why some of the industry’s most comfortable assumptions no longer hold. It’s not about being contrarian - it’s about being clear-eyed.
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Episode TimeStamps:
02:14 - Introduction to Richard Tomlinson
07:07 - What makes Tomlinson and LPPI stand out from their peers?
11:52 - Who are LPPI's clients?
13:26 - The investment philosophy behind LPPI's work
18:06 - How LPPI's allocators work together
19:05 - Getting the allocation right
21:29 - Are they worried about the decline of equities?
23:37 - Tomlinson perspective on global macro
26:55 - Public vs private markets
29:05 - Their approach to allocating domestically
31:15 - How their allocation is distributed
