2026年一季度分配器解决方案：风险投资是改善了投资组合结果还是使其复杂化？（英）

Does VC ImprovePortfolio Outcomesor Complicate Them? An Allocator Solutions report assessingventure’s performance and implicationsfor portfolios Contents Key takeaways3 Institutional Research Group Kaidi GaoSenior Research Analyst,Venture Capitalkaidi.gao@pitchbook.com Introduction4 Assessing historical VC performance5 Nathan Schwartz, CFASenior QuantitativeResearch Analystnathan.schwartz@pitchbook.com Drivers of VC risk and return8 VC’s contribution to portfolio-level outcomes13 pbinstitutionalresearch@pitchbook.comPublished on January 13, 2026 VC’s role in portfolio construction16 Key takeaways •VC as an asset class has delivered mid-tier returns withinprivate markets rather than persistent outperformance.Over the long run, aggregate VC returns have broadlyaligned with private capital benchmarks, with periods ofstrong relative performance concentrated around favorablemacroeconomic and exit cycles. •Liquidity dynamics remain a structural challenge forallocations. VC distributions are persistently lower and morevolatile than those of other private market strategies, drivenby reliance on outsized exits, highlighting the importance ofliquidity-planning considerations for LPs. •Average portfolios with VC allocations haveunderperformed portfolios that instead invested in publicgrowth equities. Our portfolio simulation framework showsthat, on average, substituting public growth equities forVC reduced returns and increased volatility, challengingthe assumption that adding VC exposure automaticallyimproves total portfolio efficiency. •Diversification benefits from VC are more limited thancommonly perceived. VC’s correlation with public equities—particularly growth-oriented benchmarks—has remainedelevated in recent years, reflecting shared exposure tomacro conditions and IPO markets, which constrains itseffectiveness as a diversifier in equity-heavy portfolios. •Reported VC returns materially understate volatility.After adjusting for appraisal-based effects, VC exhibitsthe highest estimated volatility across public and privateasset classes we analyzed, underscoring that allocatorsmay be assuming substantially more risk than headlinereturns suggest. •Manager selection is a key determinant of whether VC addsor detracts from portfolio outcomes. Power-law dynamicsmean a small subset of funds drives a large portion of valuecreation. Simulations show that even modest selectionskill or underperformer avoidance can generate meaningfulportfolio-level alpha, while exposure to average managerstends to dilute performance. Introduction The pursuit of diversified and uncorrelated sources of returnshas long been a central motivation for allocating to privatemarkets. Periods in which US public equity returns becomeheavily concentrated in a narrow set of themes or individualnames, combined with the influence of passive investmentvehicles that channel capital toward index constituents, canreduce the diversification available through public marketequities. Allocators have responded by seeking broader andmore differentiated exposure in private markets, with VCserving as one potential avenue for diversification. risk premiums in the past decade, which encouraged investorsto seek higher-risk-premium assets. These trends suggestthat allocators view private equity, including VC, as a way toenhance overall portfolio outcomes through alpha generation,improved diversification, or a combination of both. When incorporating VC allocations into portfolios, however,there is often a gap between what investors expect VCto provide and what investors actually experience. Thisreport offers a VC-focused review of several PitchBookresearch pieces aimed at allocators and examines how VC’sperformance and risk characteristics affect portfolios.2Weassess historical VC returns, the hidden volatility embeddedin the asset class, and the underlying drivers of returns andrisk. We also discuss what investors should expect whenintegrating a VC allocation into their portfolios and highlightthe critical role of manager selection in achieving desired totalportfolio outcomes. According to data from Public Plans Data,1over the past 20years, pension plans have steadily increased their allocationsto private equity, which, depending on plan reporting, mayinclude VC. The average allocation to private market equityexposure for pension plans increased to 13.7% in 2024 from3.6% in 2004. Over the same period, their average exposureto public equities declined from 61.9% to 42.4%. This shiftoccurred alongside a general compression of public equity Assessing historical VCperformance valuations, and an unprecedented IPO and exit cycle. In 2021,US VC-backed exits generated $864.2 billion—an exceptionalhigh-water mark—across 2,060 transactions, with deal valueand count rising 154.2% and 58.8% YoY, respectively. VC is often associated with outsized successes and high-flyingreturns, though those outcomes tend to overrepresent a smallsubset of realized result