Authored by Alexis Maubourguet, CIO, and Clément Mary-Dauphin, CEO of Adapt Investment Managers,
RISK ACTUALLY
A holistic review of the recent changes in the distribution of risk across the financial system and their consequences for market structure in general and Liquidity Dynamics in particular.
INTRODUCTION
After a year in which “everyone won,” it would have been natural to start the new year with confidence, if not outright greed. As natural sceptics, we have always found that difficult. More recently, however, something has changed that makes it even harder: market structure.
Our primary concern is the impact these structural shifts may have on liquidity. Because this is, in our view, the most critical risk, we focus this paper on analyzing how market structure has evolved, rather than speculating on the potential catalysts that could trigger a systemic shock. In any case, regardless of the trigger, the consequences for asset prices are likely to be similar.
It is also more robust to analyze observable, existing dynamics and draw conclusions from them than to attempt to predict specific future events in an increasingly uncertain and rapidly changing world. That said, there is no shortage of potential catalysts. As of March 2026, we remain cautious on AI, private credit, energy shocks, loss of confidence in central banks, major cyberattacks, and, of course, the unknown unknowns.
Our central thesis is that the past five years have seen seven unprecedented trends that together have dramatically changed the face of global markets. In this paper we identify these trends and study their consequences for market structure. One feature of the
