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Nationwide Alternatives Allocation Fund

Investment Objective

The Fund seeks to provide total return.

Investment Strategy

The Fund is designed to provide investors with exposure to several categories of alternative investments with investment performance that may have a low correlation to the performance of more traditional investments (i.e., stocks of U.S. and international developed-country issuers and investment-grade bonds issued in the U.S.). These alternative investment asset classes currently consist of:

• Treasury Inflation Protected Securities
• International bonds
• High-yield bonds
• Emerging market bonds
• Emerging market stocks
• Commodities
• Global real estate stocks

International Bonds and Emerging-Market Bonds
International bonds and emerging-market bonds are issued in countries outside of the United States and are in the issuing country’s currency. Like domestic bonds, they pay interest at specific intervals and pay the principal amount back to the bond’s buyer at maturity. Foreign securities may be more volatile, difficult to price and less liquid than U.S. securities. Emerging markets may expose investors to rapid inflation and currency devaluations, sharp and frequent price changes, political unrest and war. These risks may adversely affect investment returns.

High-yield Bonds
High-yield bonds are debt securities typically with greater risk/return potential, but rated below investment-grade corporate bonds by one of the leading credit-rating agencies at the time of purchase. The prices of high-yield bonds tend to be more sensitive to adverse economic and business conditions, including interest rate changes, than are higher-rated corporate bonds. Increased volatility may reduce the market value of high-yield bonds.

Emerging Market Stocks
Developing countries such as those in Eastern Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, the Far East and Asia are classified as “emerging markets.” Some investors believe these emerging markets have more potential for profit. However, there may also be more risks to consider. Emerging markets may expose investors to rapid inflation and currency devaluations, sharp and frequent price changes, political unrest and war. These factors may adversely affect investment returns.

Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities
Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS) are income-generating securities with interest and principal payments adjusted for inflation. TIPS typically have lower yields than conventional fixed-rate bonds.

Global Real Estate
The Fund invests in real estate investment trusts (REITs) and real estate operating companies (REOCs) that manage investment portfolios worldwide. Their holdings might include shopping centers, medical facilities, office buildings, industrial warehouses and other types of real estate. There are special risks associated with real-estate investments originating outside of the United States. These include possible declines in real estate values, scarcity of funding for mortgages, unexpected vacancies and lack of property liquidity.

Commodities
Typically traded on an exchange, commodities are real, tangible goods, such as wheat, corn and rice (grains), copper and silver (metals) and oil. Specific uncertainties associated with commodities investing include changes in supply-and-demand relationships due to environmental, economic and political factors, which may cause increased volatility and decreased liquidity.

The Fund seeks to achieve its objective by investing in a professionally selected mix of these different alternative investment asset classes that the Fund’s investment adviser believes offer the risk and return characteristics that may provide a complement to an investor’s investments in more traditional asset classes.

The Fund is a nondiversified fund, which means that a relatively high percentage of the Fund’s assets may be invested in a limited number of issuers.

Portfolio Management

Subadviser, Goldman Sachs Asset Management, L.P. (“GSAM”)

Jonathan Sheridan and Matthew Hoehn are responsible for the day-to-day management of the Fund, including selection of the Fund’s investments.

Nationwide Fund Distributors LLC is not an affiliate of GSAM.

Fund Documents

You can find more detailed information about the Fund in the summary prospectus, prospectus and other fund documents. You should carefully read the documents before investing.

Important Disclosures

Asset allocation is the process of spreading assets across several different investment styles and asset classes. The Fund is designed to provide asset allocation across several types of alternative investments in an attempt to achieve investment performance that often has a low correlation to the performance of more traditional investments. The Fund consists of separate sleeves to represent the investments in each of the different asset classes.

Each sleeve invests in securities and derivatives with the goal of matching the performance of a specified asset class index. Although each sleeve may invest in the securities included in its respective index, each of the international bonds, high-yield bonds, emerging market bonds and emerging market stocks sleeves invests primarily in derivatives as a substitute for investing in such securities in an attempt to synthetically replicate the performance of the sleeve’s index.

Instead of investing directly in physical commodities, the commodities sleeve invests in commodity-linked notes, commodity futures and commodity-linked swaps, all of which are derivatives. Investing in commodities and commodities-linked investments may expose the Fund to increased volatility and decreased liquidity due to several factors, including changes in supply-and-demand relationships; weather; agriculture; disease; fiscal and exchange control programs; and international economic, political, military and regulatory developments.

Derivatives can increase losses and reduce opportunities for gains when the security or commodity prices, currency values, index values, interest rates or other such measures underlying the instruments change in unexpected ways. Derivatives also present default risks if the counterparty to a derivatives contract fails to fulfill its obligations to the Fund.

In addition, the Fund is subject to specific investment risks such as those associated with: (i) bonds and high-yield bonds, (ii) international and emerging market securities, and (iii) real estate investment trusts (REITs).

The Nationwide Alternatives Allocation Fund is subject to a number of risks and may not be suitable for all investors. The fund is not intended to serve as a complete investment program. There is no assurance that the investment objective of any fund will be achieved.