Asset Allocation Flashcards
Asset Allocation Approaches
- Asset-Only: manage risk/ return of assets
- Liability-Relative: manage assets in relation to liabilities
- Goals-Based: manage subportfolios to meet goals
Factor Portfolio
isolate systematic risk exposure
Risk Budgeting
where/ how much risk to take
- specify how risk is distributed regardless of expected returns
- how much additional risk the investor is willing to take relative to benchmark
Rebalancing
when to rebalances to benchmark; calendar or percentage-range based
drift corridor width based on
- transaction costs (+)
- risk tolerance (+)
- correlation w/ porfolio (+)
- volatility of portfolio (-)
Mean Variance Optimization
- approach to determining AA
- lowest standard deviation for a given level of expected return
- constraints: budget, no non-neg weights, client constraints
- find optimal weights: max utility, efficient frontier, min return, max SD
MVO Criticisms
- GIGO
- concentrated AA
- diversification
- ignores liabilities
- single period
- ignores skewness/ kurtosis of returns
MVO Improvements
- reverse opt - derive weights from expected return of global market port
- Black-Litterman model - reverse opt adjusted for investor exp
- add more constraints
- resample MVO - Monte Carlo Sim; less extreme weights, includes all asset classes
- include skewness/ kurtosis in utility function; use an asymmetric definition of risk (conditional VAR)
Utility Maximization Equation
Um = E(r) - 0.5 * λ * Var
Roy’s Safety First Criterion
probability of portfolio exceeing min threshold return (want highest)
SF ratio = [E(RP) - RL ]/ σP
RL = min level of portfolio return
Sharpe Ratio
excess return per unit of risk (want highest)
( Rm - Rf )/ σm
ERPm / σm
Illiquid Assets and MVO
- calc MVO w/o illiquid assets classes, include in portfolio w/ set specific allocations for illiquid assets
- calc MVO w/ illiquid assets
- calc MVO w/ illiquid asset classes, include in portfolio w/ alt inv indexes
Incorporating Client Risk Pref in AA
- specifying additional constraints
- specifying a risk aversion factor for the investor
- monte carlo simulation
Factor-Based AA
multi-factor regression to derive return w/ MVO
- use risk factors instead of asset classes
- corr btwn factors typically lower than corr btwn asset classes
Contribution to Total Risk
MCTR (marginal): βac*σp
ACTR (abs): w*MCTR
opt allocation: excess return/ MCTR for each asset class = portfolio Sharpe Ratio
ALM
asset liability management
- surplus optimization (pension funds)
- hedging/ return-seeking approach (insurance companies, overfunded pensions) > mimics the liabilities it’s funding (fully hedge = conservative)
- integrated asset-liability approach (banks)