Insurance general accounts do not get to treat multi-asset outlooks as discretionary. Duration, cash-flow matching, capital charges and accounting volatility set the feasible set. In that constraint set, the ordering for the current tape is straightforward. Where government yields remain elevated relative to the post-crisis decade, long high-quality rates still do work: they lock income and support resilience against liability discount-rate moves. Where credit spreads are compressed, the burden shifts from allocation slogans to underwriting. Quality and seniority matter more than an extra slice of yield.

Equities and thematic risk assets can still earn a place. Structural demand linked to technology investment, digital infrastructure and related supply chains supports selective Asia and global equity exposure. That support does not rewrite the liability schedule. A general account that confuses a thematic equity cycle with an income solution will discover the difference when rates, spreads or lapse assumptions move together.

Private credit and infrastructure debt have been widely offered into insurance channels as public spreads tightened. Those assets can fit a GA when capital treatment, cash-flow transparency and ALM committee rules allow. They do not replace a liquid rates and investment-grade core that can be rebalanced when liabilities move. The test is not whether private credit yields more than a corporate index. The test is whether the asset survives the insurer’s solvency and matching framework.

For wholesale coverage the practical dual brief holds. Bring long government and high-quality credit ideas that help lock the income line. Bring private and infrastructure credit only with the capital and cash-flow detail an ALM committee will actually use. Thematic equity is a third conversation, sized to risk budget.

What would change this analysis is a sharp drop in long government yields that removes the lock-in case, or a solvency rule change that materially improves the treatment of a specific private-credit structure. Until then, the hierarchy stands: use the public income available; stay selective in spread products; treat thematic equity as satellite.