For years, investment firms and professionals have advocated the need to include a small percentage of high risk and potentially high reward assets into your retirement portfolio. The thinking is that including a small percentage of your overall asset allocation (from 5% - 10%) into these assets can provide high potential returns with only a small impact on your portfolio if the risk becomes too great.

As Brad Zimmerman writes on the Nasdaq.com website, "the general rule of thumb with alternative investing, according to Investopedia, is no more than 10 percent of your portfolio should go towards these investments."

Robert Powell wrote on this site recently of how defined benefit plan managers often go beyond stocks and bonds to achieve high returns by pursuing more "nontraditional strategies".

Mr. Powell points out that a "new white paper suggests that you can boost returns, reduce volatility, and beat inflation by investing — if your 401(k) or 403(b) plan offers such options — in real assets, emerging market equities and debt and liquid alternatives."

For those who have their retirement in defined benefit plans, you may be surprised to find the following: "in March 2012, 29.8% of the average large defined-benefit plan was invested in U.S. equity, 17.6% in international equity, 30.3% in U.S. fixed-income, 2% in international fixed income, 3.2% in cash, 4.5% in real estate, and 10.2% in alternatives, according to Asset Allocation Trends for Defined Plans."

The individual investor is being "pitched" more and more these days by their own adviser and their firm to consider a small percentage of their portfolio into these "nontraditional strategies" and alternative investments.

Also see:Don’t count on luck to fund your retirement

Much is heard on radio these days about the ability to consider gold, silver and commodities as alternatives for your retirement account. Many of the other alternative investment choices for retirement are real estate based or provide you access to hedge fund like management styles through alternative funds.

These alternative investments provide not only the high potential for returns, but having a level of diversification to your portfolio can be effective. However, they come with a caveat.

As Mr.Powell points out in his article, "The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, known as Finra, issued an alert this week advising investors to be aware of the unique characteristics and risks of alternative funds.”

Many of you know of my interest and curiosity about bitcoins. So I have to ask myself: If there's a value in having an "alternative investment" in my retirement portfolio, can bitcoins be discussed as part of that asset class?

The first question to consider is, "are bitcoins really an asset?"

Supply is capped at 21 million bitcoins and managed by a software algorithm embedded into the digital currency’s design. Bloomberg

It seems that even with all of the good and bad publicity surrounding bitcoins, the reality continues to be that anyone can possess bitcoins and in fact, trade them on exchanges. Although every day there seems to be another story about how the demise of bitcoins in imminent, they continue to be an actively traded and valued asset for investors world-wide. In fact, earlier this month, a judge ruled that bitcoins were in fact, money.

The next question is "How will I know what they're worth?"

I come from the school of thought that says that I won't buy an investment if I can't pick up the newspaper and find the price of it in that newspaper. Sure, this thinking has led me to miss many opportunities but it has provided a level of comfort as well.

So before I'm going to considering put money into bitcoins , I want to know that I can get a price for them on an active exchange with real prices. You can buy, sell and price bitcoins on numerous exchanges and even get a quote on bitcoins on Bloomberg workstations and as an add-on for your Chrome browser.

The last question and probably the most important is "Am I truly able to manage this asset or do I need advice and guidance?"

I've written on this site in the past of how owning bitcoins requires an electronic wallet that can become an issue when considering the passing of assets between family members. Although you can buy, sell and hold bitcoins on your own, it does require that you become the sole manager and adviser of these assets. At this point, no financial adviser will advise you on when to buy or sell them. And at this point you can't hold bitcoins in your traditional investment account.

But that may be changing as the Winkelvoss Twins of “The Social Network” notoriety are considering plans to create a bitcoin ETF. The path to this ETF will be a rocky one and there are many people skeptical of its ability to survive scrutiny as it seeks SEC approval. If it does get approved, it will create an investment that will be risky, but with high potential for profit, as bitcoin loyalists believe.

When and if, this does becomes a reality, it will not only elevate the visibility and interest in bitcoins, but it would also create the potential to easily invest in them as part of your overall retirement portfolio.

One day soon, you may actually be hearing these words from your adviser: "Just remember that only a small part of your retirement account should be in bitcoins."

It is certainly a "nontraditional" investment world that we live in these days.