Private Equity Is No Safe Haven

As investors continue to flounder in this sideways market, financial institutions are doing a bit of flopping themselves in an effort to offer products that keep their clients happy.

Closed-end funds, hedge funds, exchange-traded funds -- all are attempting to reinvent themselves. At the same time, private equity firms are looking for ways to draw new funds into the anemic market. Sound like a serendipitous match?

Hardly. The one area that fund companies are backing away from is private equity.

Vanguard is just the latest to scuttle plans to offer accredited investors access to private equity investments. Investors for certain products are required to be accredited by the Securities and Exchange Commission. An accredited investor must have a net worth of more than $1 million, or have earned more than $200,000 in the past two years with a reasonable expectation that this will continue.

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