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The Biggest Failure in Investment Management: How Smart Beta Can Make It Better or Worse

The biggest failure in investment management—the gap between the returns realized by the investor and the returns earned by the strategy or fund the investor owns—typically remains in the shadows with the glare of the spotlights focused on alpha. Smart beta is no exception. We propose two ways to reframe the client performance review that we believe will result in better long-term outcomes.

Chris Brightman on CNBC’s Squawk Box Listen to Chris explain why he is worried about slowing US economic momentum as a result of fading fiscal stimulus. Chris believes emerging market equities remain a good bargain for investors. (October 18, 2018)
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Ignored Risks of Factor Investing

Long-only factor investing, often called smart beta, can be a valuable way for investors to achieve their long-term return targets. To achieve the best outcomes, investors should have realistic expectations about the risks factors pose and be prepared to weather potentially prolonged periods of material underperformance.

Buy High and Sell Low with Index Funds!

 

Buy High and Sell Low with Index Funds! Traditional index funds match market performance and have negligible trading costs with low tracking error—or do they? Not actually—they routinely buy after high price appreciation and sell after high price depreciation.
Webinar Replay

 

Rob Arnott on Bloomberg TV

July 16, 2018

 

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Alternative Risk Premia: Valuable Benefits for Traditional Portfolios

An alternative risk premia strategy that relies on robust factors within a liquid, transparent, and disciplined framework has the potential to improve the long-term return prospects of traditional portfolios and to reduce their downside risk.

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Bloomberg TV, August 17, 2018

Rob Arnott on Short-Termism
in the Stock Market

Bloomberg TV, August 17, 2018

Rob Arnott on Turkey
and Emerging Markets
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Where Is the Global Economy Going? Evidence shows that the yield-curve slope and equity returns provide signals of similar direction in the economy, allowing investors to nowcast with relative confidence. Today, those signals indicate that several developed markets—in particular, Japan, Germany, and the United States—are ominously close to entering a correction phase.
TDF Hero
Are Our TDFs Massively Underweight Inflation-Fighting Assets? Allocations to inflation-fighting assets in target-date funds are simply too low in relation to the benefit these asset classes offer investors who are planning for retirement.
Food for Thought Picture
Food for Thought: Integrating vs. Mixing Although a naïve comparison appears to favor the integrating approach to multi-factor strategy construction, after taking into account both quantitative and qualitative considerations, many investors—those seeking transparency, diversification, minimal governance oversight, and low fees—may find mixing is a more sensible choice.
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Pundits Predicting Panic in Emerging Markets A rational analysis of the emerging markets affirms our belief that now is the time to buy, not sell. The panic being peddled by pundits today is simply not justified.
Yes. It's a Bubble. So What?

The relentless rise in the US stock market since its low in 2009 has been dramatic. US stock market valuations now exceed all historical valuation levels, except for those hit at the peak of the dot-com craze. This raises an obvious question for investors: Today, in early 2018, and has been the case over the last year, is the US stock market in another bubble? Yes. The more important question then becomes: How should investors react?
Environmental / Social / Governance

 

Unlocking the Performance Potential in ESG Investing By combining a tilt toward companies that display financial discipline and that embrace corporate diversity with the return engine of a fundamentally weighted portfolio, we believe investors in environmental, social, and governance (ESG)–related strategies have the opportunity to earn superior long-term risk-adjusted returns.
Cape Fear

 

CAPE Fear: Why CAPE Naysayers Are Wrong Beware the consequences of assuming that elevated CAPE ratios are here to stay, but if they are the “new normal,” low future returns are likely to be the “new normal” as well.
Webinar Replay

 

Rob Arnott on Bloomberg TV

January 11, 2018

 

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