Alternative Investments

11 important questions on Alternative Investments

Give the formula of Sharpe ratio in names?

SR = average excess return / standard deviation of return

What does the Sharpe ratio answer?

  1. How much reward the strategy gives for one unit of standard deviation. That is: where is the strategy in the expected return-standard deviation space.
  2. Is it wise to invest all your wealth by means of this strategy.

What is the downside of using the Sharpe ratio?

  1. Short sample periods make these estimates noisy
  2. It does not provide a direct comparison with alternative strategies or a benchmark
  3. Most portfolio managers prefer to be compared against a (well-selected) benchmark. This makes sense even with short sample periods.
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What is the ratio used when comparison with a benchmark is made, and name the formula?

Information ratio (IR).
IR = average active return / active risk

What is Active risk also known as?

Tracking Error (TE)

What is the difference between comparison with benchmark and static strategy?

The difference is determined endogenously. This means that the benchmark is chosen that is as similar as possible to the investment strategy. Chosen means "estimated from the data".

What does the intercept a means?

  1. It denotes the average difference in return between the strategy and the "endogenously" determined benchmark.
  2. It is a measure of risk-adjusted performance.

What does a positive Alpha means?

  1. The strategy provides a higher return (on average) than a passive benchmark (determined by b)

What does a positive Alpha not necessarily mean?

  1. It does not necessarily mean that the strategy itself provides a better risk-return trade off than the
    benchmark.
  2. But it does mean that you can achieve a better
    risk-return trade off by investing at least some part of
    your money according to the strategy.

Give 3 examples of an asset pricing model

  1. Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM)
  2. Fama & French three factor model
  3. Carhart four factor model

What is beta according to the CAPM?

Beta is a measure of the sensitivity of the asset to the market risk

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