Hugo Eduardo Benedetti Espinoza, director of the economics and finance department of the ESE Business School at the University of the Andes in Chile: “The substantial growth in the assets under management of private debt funds in Chile can be explained by four main factors. First is the global increase in the appetite for alternative assets. Just as we have seen worldwide, there is strong growth in the asset class, driven mostly by the need for diversification and increased risk-return ratio of alternative assets. Second is the underdevelopment of alternative assets at a local level, with long-term institutional investors such as pension funds and insurance companies lagging in the adoption of alternative assets in their portfolios, as compared to their international counterparts. Third is the increasing credit restrictions from the traditional banking sector, with a rise in interest rates, shorter loan maturities and more restrictive covenants. This trend has forced companies into…”