A Look at Managed Futures
In a recent article on Bloomberg.com, Ye Xie discusses one winner in the Brexit rout. Over the past few days, managed futures funds were one of the few investment classes to boast positive returns. One fund, AQR Managed Futures Strategy Fund, rallied 6.3% over the past 2 days (as of June 27, 2016). What are […]
More Collective Investment Trusts Being Added to DC Plans
There are now over 3,200 collective investment trusts (CITs) tracked in the Morningstar CIT database, collectively holding nearly $2 trillion according to a recent article that appeared on WealthManagement.com. That’s up from $896 billion in 2008. Callan Associates estimates that 71% of DC include at least one CIT in their plan up from 60% and […]
DC Plans Slow to Adopt Liquid Alts…But Why?
A recent article on Wealth Management.com titled “Liquid Alts in DC Plans? Don’t Hold Your Breath” discusses the relatively slow adoption of Liquid Alts by defined contribution (DC) Plans relative to what Defined Benefit Plans (DB) have done. The arguments for liquid alts, as the article presents, include managing return and risk management, managing volatility, […]
Prateek Mehrotra discusses the Endowment Model of Investing with Institutional Real Estate Inc
Prateek Mehrotra, CIO of ETF Model SolutionsTM,and our affiliate, Endowment Wealth ManagementTM, was interviewed this week by Institutional Real Estate Inc. In the discussion, Prateek talks about the history of the Endowment Model and how the Endowment IndexTM was constructed. Listen to the podcast. The podcast is for information purposes only and should not be considered […]
Real assets a crucial component in endowment portfolios
Real Assets, which consist of real estate, commodities, energy, infrastructure, natural resources and master limited partnerships are utilized by many of the nation’s wealthiest endowments, but individual investors can also benefit from incorporating real assets into their portfolios. Prateek Mehrotra MBA, CFA, CAIA, CIO of ETF Model SolutionsTM outlines how real assets can provide greater […]
Global ETF/ETP Assets Forecast to Surpass Hedge Funds During Second Quarter
According to ETFGI, global assets in ETFs/ETPs are expected to exceed those in hedge funds. At the end of the first quarter, ETFGI estimates that hedge funds contained just $13 billion less than ETFs/ETPs globally. In Q1 alone, ETFs/ETPs gained $US96 trillion, compared to just US$18 trillion for hedge funds. Reasons for this growth include […]
Algorithmic Hedge Strategies Outperform Human Managers in 2014
According to an article on CNBC this morning, systematic hedge strategies outperformed their human counterparts in 2014. The best performing category within the segment was managed futures strategies, which gained 15.2% for 2014. Falling oil prices, the climbing U.S. Dollar, and declining U.S. government bond prices were cited as trends that these funds were able to […]
Whitepaper Provides Understanding into Various Alternative Asset Categories
A new whitepaper from Invesco discusses the difficulties in managing risk with strictly a 60-40 stock-bond portfolio and highlights some of the new alternative asset classes that advisors can use to help reduce risk in client portfolios. This is especially important for advisors, since 44% of advisors see managing risk for client portfolios as their […]
Investment News: “Alternatives: Key Piece of the Puzzle”
The case for traditional long-only allocations to stocks and bonds is getting weaker by the day, and that’s putting the financial advice industry, if somewhat reluctantly, on the junction of major change And so starts an extensive front-page article in a recent issue of Investment News. The article goes on to provide a basic background of […]
Study Sheds Light on Private Equity Holdings of Public Pension Funds
The annual Private Equity Growth Capital examining private equity investments of over 150 U.S. public pension funds has been released recently. The report contains tables and charts, organizing data collected by Bison. A few highlights: U.S. public pension funds invest 9.4% of their portfolio in private equity (on a dollar-weighted basis) Based upon the four […]