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“Portable Alpha Theory & Practice”: Exclusive chapter downloads at AllAboutAlpha.com8 May 2008
Impressed with what we saw in the book, we called up its author Sabrina Callin and have now arranged to provide you, the loyal AllAboutAlpha.com reader, with two of its chapters for free. Today, we give you chapter one - the introduction by Callin that provides a good summary of the entire book. And next week, we’ll post the Epilogue by Callin’s PIMCO colleague Chris Dialynas. But for those who are totally pressed for time, here’s a “summary of the summary” reflected by the chapter titles and a few key excerpts from chapter one:
Comments »1X0/X0 and the hunt for African alpha1 May 2008
But is it really alpha? To address this question for us, we welcome the following guest contribution from Helena Conradie of major South African money manager Sanlam Investment Management. Helena is the Head of Sanlam Investment Management’s equity quant boutique that manages over R21 billion. She is a CFA charterholder and has an MSc in Applied Mathematics Cum Laude from Stellenbosch University.
In just more than 18 months people all over the world will flock to South Africa to attend the world cup soccer event, paying generously to see amazing flair and display of talent. But would they consider South Africa as the location for amazing alpha? At any given time there is a finite amount of alpha available for fund managers to hunt. And as we all know, it is “all about alpha!” The diversity of stock returns across all sectors (the cross-sectional volatility) is a good indication of the presence of alpha. So does the South African rainbow provide the alpha hunter with enough diversity?
Comments »More media malarkey30 April 2008Canada’s National Post reports that the FBI is now warning of hedge fund fraud (”FBI Warns of Hedge Fund Fraud“). But in actuality, FBI Director Robert Meuller gave a 2,000 word speech last week in which “hedge fund” appeared only once - after a lengthy discussion corporate fraud, public corruption, insider trading, mortgage fraud and Conrad Black. The one reference to hedge funds…
…Not quite the “warning” trumpted by the Post.
Comments »Media turns hostile: 130/30 now “dubious” “overblown” “faddish” “hype”21 April 2008
His April 20th commentary is entitled “Long on shortcomings: Numbers don’t add up for faddish 130/30 funds” and his main argument is that “early returns don’t seem to justify the hype”. While that may indeed be the case, extrapolating from these early returns is premature at best and totally inappropriate at worst. Headline-writers as “dozens of US newspapers” are getting creative with Jaffe’s piece:
Stretching the data Unfortunately, readers in dozens of US cities are now getting the wrong idea about 130/30 funds. For example, Jaffe references research conducted by the UK-based Investment Week magazine:
Comments »European institutions apparently staying the course on hedge funds16 April 2008US hedge fund managers aren’t the only ones bullish on their sector. Mercer recently released the results of a survey of European institutional investors that concluded hedge funds were “targeted for increased exposure” by European institutions.
And State Street Global Advisors reiterated its bullish position on the hedge fund industry in this Thomson Investment News article. Reports Thomson:
Comments »A Reader Responds: Yes, there is Alternative Beta (and Alpha) in Alternative Energy26 March 2008Alternative energy is one of a whole set of new asset classes facing institutional investors. Like portable alpha and 130/30, it has created a new set of opportunities and risks for both investors and managers. So what better way is there to explore an emerging market such as “Clean Tech” than to examine its alpha-generating potential? Thus, last fall we stacked a major alternative energy ETF against an energy ETF. But to our surprise, we found very little sustained outperformance. Several of you wrote in to say we were ignoring the social benefits of clean technology (which we were) or that we were trying to evaluate these technologies solely on the basis of cold hard numbers (which we also were). But one of Canada’s leading clean tech fund managers wrote in to acknowledge our analysis and suggest why there is still alpha potential in alternative energy. What follows is an interesting, and refreshingly dispassionate, perspective on this issue by Greg Payne, the lead portfolio manager at Investeco Financial, an environment sector fund manager.
In a posting on November 26, 2007 (“Is There Alternative Beta in Alternative Energy”) AllAboutAlpha’s “Alpha Male” states that alternative energy returns over the past year have been both significantly correlated to general energy prices, and highly volatile. This is true. But as Alpha Male admits, alternative energy may provide alpha and alternative beta in the future in ways that we have not seen in the past. For good reason, it will. This is precisely why active management will yield significant benefits in this sector.
Comments »Lendex aims for transparency - mostly24 March 2008
(former SEC Chairman Harvey Pitt, Forbes, July 11, 2006) For a company that aims to lift the vale on the opaque world of securities lending, New Jersey-based Lendex LLC has so far been pretty tight-lipped about its own service. In January, HedgeWorld learned that the firm was planning to launch an electronic exchange that would match securities lenders and borrowers. But little had been heard from the firm until Global Pensions recently reported that Lendex is expecting to launch its service in Q2 of this year. They’re not the only game in town, though. Venture-backed Quadriserv launched Aquas, a “technology portal to the securities lending industry last August. But Lendex is of particular interest because one of its founders is Harvey Pitt, former SEC Chairman (or more specifically, his consulting company).
Comments »Hate the dentist? Then you’ll be happy about this story…20 March 2008
Jerry Seinfeld would be pleased to read the latest news from the crossroads of hedge funds and the oral care profession. FINalternatives reports today that a former dentist has been ordered by the Colorado Division of Securities to stop marketing his hedge fund in that state. According to the Denver Post, the state wasn’t impressed that several individuals who were not technically qualified to buy hedge funds were invited to a reception featuring the hedge fund.
Comments »Weekly AAA Newsreel20 March 2008
Lawrence Cohen, a NY lawyer, dives deeper into the legal issues surrounding the Bulldog Investors case. Says Cohen, “The tension between freedom of speech and non-public offerings may come down to a determination of the meaning of the term ‘offering.’ Some would argue that the availability on a hedge fund’s Web site of a document that can be read by anyone constitutes a ‘public offering,’…” Is it any wonder hedge funds aren’t clamoring to voluntarily register with the SEC? Bloomberg reports that the regulator has only just abandoned its efforts to get hedge funds to fill out a 27 page questionnaire. The European head of investment consulting at Watson Wyatt tells Pensions & Investments that, “We’re only in the early stages, but (alternative beta) is attracting a lot of interest at the moment…Right now, those who are looking at this are the very big clients with a lot of resources. But in time, (alternative beta) should attract the smaller to medium-size funds interested in diversifying away from the equity risk premium.” A new study finds that 80% of investment consultants will focus on alternative investments this year - prompting one of its authors to say “We knew alternatives would be important…We did not know the extent to which this would drive flows.” Paul Sarbanes and Michael Oxley tell Indian media that “The only way to get a regulatory regime for hedge funds is a huge scandal.” After being blamed for sparking the whole sub-prime mess in the first place, it now appears that hedge funds might be “riding to the rescue” of at least one wounded mortgage company. Similarly ironic are recent reports that several hedge funds cleaned up on Bear’s collapse - a downfall precipitated by the collapse of Bear’s own hedge fund last summer. Which all goes to show that hedge funds defy blanket characterizations.
Comments »The End of (asset management) History?12 March 2008
To a great extent the history of investment management (at least, since Markowitz) can be described as similarly bipolar struggle - this one between active and passive management. Efficient market theorists would argue that the final pitched battles between the two sides are being fought in the mutual fund and ETF industries - with ETF’s destined to triumph. However, proponents of active management point to the hedge fund industry as proof that active management is not only alive and well, but is consolidating its forces. Are either of these the final epic battles in the history of asset management? A couple of news items yesterday suggest the balance of power is tilting toward the efficient market theorists. First, Mark Hulbert writes about Kenneth French’s latest paper, “The Cost of Active Management” in the New York Times. As far as we can see, the paper has not yet been released to the public. So Hulbert’s interpretation is all we have to go on for now.
Comments »Emotion + “Radical Neuroscience” = Alpha6 March 2008If alpha is defined as the element of returns that results from pure human skill and creativity, then it follows that alpha is - in part - the result of a quintessentially human characteristic: emotion. Denise K. Shull, M.A. is President of Trader Psyches Inc., a consulting firm specializing in both market and trader psychology. In today’s guest posting, she cites new neuroscientific studies that suggest, in her words, ”emotion is a critical source of alpha”. How science is showing that emotion, feelings and intuition can lead to alpha
If 485 respondents to a recent Watson Wyatt/Financial Times Survey should be believed, we face a protracted shortage of alpha. Despite slicing and dicing portable alpha, alternative beta, returns or holdings-based alpha, excess returns remain elusive. Where can we find more? Has anything - or anywhere - been overlooked? Infused within our market analyses and woven into our models, lies the quest to bet correctly on the future price of an asset. Alpha materializes when we figure out before the next guy what he or she will want or need to buy next week, next month or next year. Does this fortune-telling aspect suggest buying The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Psychic Awareness? Before anyone runs to Barnes & Noble, let’s re-examine this decision making process. No, I don’t mean the morning trade desk meeting or the endless crunching of scenarios with variable implied volatilities. I mean a human being using their brain to evaluate information, draw conclusions and execute a trade. But how exactly does a brain do that?
Comments »CIO of the North Dakota State Investment Board on why he chose 130/3027 February 2008We talk a lot about the theory behind 1X0/X0 strategies. But given the nascence of this sub-sector, it has been difficult to come up with any real-life examples about which to write. Today, however, we welcome guest contributor and 130/30 investor, Steve Cochrane, the Chief Investment Officer of the North Dakota State Investment Board (NDSIB). With over 26 years of institutional investment experience Steve is responsible for the administration of the agency as well as overseeing a $5.4 billion diversified investment portfolio. The NDSIB was selected as a nominee for Money Management Letter’s 2007 Savviest Public Plan of the Year and is a speaker at Terrapinn’s upcoming 130/30 conference in Santa Monica. 130/30: How it works for North Dakota State Retirement Scheme
After twenty years in the institutional investment management business, I came to a monumental realization that what I had learned in business school is true: large cap securities that are actively traded in major financial markets are most likely efficiently priced. It has now been eight years since that awakening. The efficient markets hypothesis (EMH) was originally developed in the late 1960’s. It states that market prices should reflect all information known about a security. After forty-five years of research and testing, most agree that this hypothesis is increasingly correct as capitalization and liquidity increase. When it comes to the Large Cap Domestic Equity asset class in the United States, theory converges with reality. I arrived in North Dakota to assume the CIO role in January of 1997. Awaiting me was a US$2 billion pension fund with an array of active managers who were benchmarked against the S&P500 index of large cap stocks, as well as S&P500 style benchmarks. While some were growth oriented and others pursued value and yield investing, they all had one thing in common: underperformance relative to benchmark.
Comments »Jaeger Replies to Kat’s Scepticism on Alternative Beta26 February 2008Lars Jaeger’s recent commentary on “alternative beta” (see posting) raised the ire of Professor Harry Kat (see posting). Today, Dr. Jaeger responds to Kat’s protests by highlighting the “inconsistencies” in his arguments.
In his reply to my recent contribution at AllAboutAlpha.com, Harry Kat says that he agrees with “several points” in my argument (I only made a few key points anyway). Specifically, Kat seemed to agree that factor models capture mostly the “traditional beta” in hedge funds. Further, he seemed to agree with my argument that “hedge fund replication isn’t really about replicating hedge funds. It is about replicating hedge fund indices.” And he goes on to re-state many of my original points. We seem to be in agreement on some very fundamental points. That is good news to me, as Harry has not always agreed with much what I have said in the past. However, he then suggests that there is a need to “fill in the picture” as my comments were only “part of the hedge fund replication story.” I surely never claimed to know the entire hedge fund replication “story”. But what he actually provides us with - in order to “fill in the picture” - is merely a performance comparison between the ART Index (Goldman Sachs’ replication product) and the PG ABS Index (the Partners Group Alternative Beta Strategies). In doing so, Harry is inconsistent in at least three ways. Firstly, he is inconsistent in the way he applies fees in his analysis. While he compares the PG ABS net of fees, he chooses to report the performance of the ART index gross of fees, a rather important difference as hedge fund investors surely understand.
Comments »No Country for Old Men25 February 2008
But there are a few factors that can’t easily be hedged. Chief among them is “longevity risk” - the risk that retirees live longer than the pension plan had expected. This has put the spotlight on the mortality assumptions underpinning pension plans. Apparently, since we stopped smoking during pregnancy and allowing our kinds to eat lead paint, we’re all living a lot longer. Still, predicting the future of the human lifespan has been devilishly hard and remains open to opinion. Last week British pension regulators tried to standardize things a little - and, it hopes, prevent pension plans from using overly pessimistic mortality predictions in order to reduce funding shortfalls. This article on the British Telecom pension plan says that the new regulations would immediately put the plan into hawk - knocking it from a slight surplus to a 2 billion pound deficit:
Specifically, the UK pension regulator (known officially as “TPR” for “The…Pension…Regulator”) said it would now keep a closer eye on plans that use over pessimistic mortality assumptions or that assume the century-long rise in longevity will eventually come to an end. Warned the regulator:
Comments »“Appetite for alpha to rise” according to institutional survey12 February 2008
Perhaps strangely then, survey respondents have ranked hedge funds, funds of funds, large consultants (Watson Wyatt?) and buy-out firms as “industry losers” in terms of revenue growth. Multi-strategy funds, fiduciary management, niche consultants and investment banks were judged to be likely “industry winners” according to the survey. (Hedge fund blogs, in case you were wondering, were not included in this particular survey). Specifically, 73% of nearly 500 respondents (mostly European) agreed or “strongly agreed” with the statement, “Appetite for alpha will grow significantly due to the need for higher returns”. Conversely, only 12% agreed or strongly agreed that “Appetite for alpha will be modest, reflecting doubts about its sustainability and likely impact.”
Comments »Alternative Viewpoints: Réplication de fonds de couverture4 February 2008As we pointed out in a posting a couple of weeks ago, there seems to be a little je ne sais quoi in the water in Montreal that breeds hedge fund replication providers. Today, Montreal-based Pierre Saint-Laurent, head of the Canadian chapter of the CAIA Association weighs in on why the city founded by sailors in 1642 is now making waves in the hedge fund world. Why Montreal is such a hotbed of hedge fund replication research
Special to AllAboutAlpha.com by: Pierre Saint-Laurent, CFA, CAIA, president of AssetCounsel Inc. and head of the Canadian chapter of the CAIA Association Alternative investments, and hedge funds in particular, have raked in the assets so far in the 21st century because of low returns from traditional strategies, pension fund deficits, an urge to diversify (and maintain low correlations even when all traditional asset classes spike, such as in the tech meltdown) and somewhat of a ‘nothing works anymore’ mindset. Indeed, investors seem to like alternatives so much that they are willing to deal with lower transparency, hard-to-explain strategies, and (arguably) higher fees. There’s a reason for all that: alternative asset managers, and hedge fund managers in particular, need the secrecy and privacy to move quickly and efficiently.
Comments »Public Service Announcement: Our monthly email was sent out today (Feb. 4)4 February 2008
Comments »SocGen named “Equity Derivatives House of the Year”25 January 2008
A senior SocGen executive tells Risk about the importance of client relationships over short-term performance:
The article goes into detail about a myriad of “innovative” derivatives and structured products (volatility smiles, “CrossRoads”, structured products, vega-negative strategies…). The question on everyone’s mind: Is this innovation the key to becoming the world’s hottest equity derivatives house?
Comments »New research illustrates wide-ranging implications of the ubiquitous “high water mark”21 January 2008
Now a new academic study by Sugata Ray and Indraneel Chakraborty at Wharton reveals that messing around with performance fees can have a material impact on the manager’s effort, the fund’s volatility and even the manager’s propensity to “walk away” from the fund altogether. As the authors acknowledge, their findings support common intuition - that managers are more likely to buckle down when the high water mark (”HWM”) is in sight, more likely to swing for the fences when it’s not, and more likely to walk away when they feel it’s totally out of reach. We’ll get into these effects below. But first, here is the authors’ take on the Goldman situation we discussed in August. It clearly illustrates the mechanics by which a seemingly benign metric can have such wide-ranging implications:
Comments »Your Interview with Author Richard Bookstaber6 January 2008
To keep you, our loyal readers, on the cutting edge of asset management trends, AllAboutAlpha’s Alpha Male will be conducting an in-person interview with Bookstaber (along with two other asset management commentators Tris Lett - see related postings and John Ilkiw - see related posting) this Tuesday, January 8th. But in the spirit of interactivity that underpins all we do at AllAboutAlpha.com, we are asking you to submit the questions that you would like him to ask. If you’ve read his book and have a follow-up question or just have a query about something on his blog, please drop us an email at alphamale(at)allaboutalpha(dot)com. The interview is scheduled for Tuesday evening, so you have until 5pm Tuesday to send us your questions.
Comments »2007’s Top AllAboutAlpha.com Postings30 December 2007
Category: Most Downloaded Posting Category: Most Downloaded Guest Posting Category: Most Downloads on First Day Category: Most Popular External Link to Off-Beat Humour
The Top 15 Recurring Favorites (ranked by downloads per month)
Comments »November not the new August after all10 December 2007
Here’s a brief history of the past week:
Comments »Remember the days when $1.25 trillion was a lot of money?2 December 2007
In the string of classic movies about a randy, orthodontically-challenged British spy from the 1960’s named Austin Powers, comedian Mike Myers plays the prototypical bad-guy “Doctor Evil.” Frozen in time since the summer of love, Doctor Evil concocts a plan to hold the world of 1997 ransom for the then astronomical sum of one million dollars. When his second in command “Number Two” played by Robert Wagner tells him that one million dollars is wildly out of date, he quickly adjusts the figure upward hoping no one would really notice. In a way, that’s what is happening now in the game of guess-the-size-of-the-hedge-fund-industry. As the Wall Street Journal pointed out last week, some pundits have recently pegged the number at $1.25 trillion (with pinky firmly planted at edge of mouth a la Myers). But without missing a beat, other experts have recently put it at $1.48 trillion and even at $2.48 trillion (see graphic from WSJ below).
Comments »Edhec hedge fund replication research now online2 December 2007Regular readers may recall this story we did on a research study by Edhec, the French business school, last spring. The study contained a comprehensive analysis of various so-called hedge fund replication strategies. At the time we directed you to Edhec if you wanted to buy the whole report since it wasn’t available to the public. Well if you’ve been holding out since June, waiting for it to go on sale, this is your day. In the wake of a highly successful conference in London, Edhec has now released both the white paper and a set of accompanying slides used at the event.
Comments »Is there alternative beta in alternative energy?26 November 2007
We found this article in Forbes late last month exemplified the general level of excitement about alternative energy. It cites impressive YTD growth of several alternative energy ETFs such as the US$660 million PowerShares WilderHill Clean Energy ETF (PBW). This makes immediate sense. After all, clean energy is the next big thing, right? It turns out that PBW daily returns have a 64% correlation to the S&P Energy Select SPDRs (XLE), an ETF containing old-fashioned energy companies (calculated using data available at Google Finance). That’s not really that high. Here’s what the one year scatter plot of PBW and XLE daily returns looks like:
Comments »Casey Quirk’s Brave New ($12 trillion) World20 November 2007In early October, we wrote about a report by consultancy Casey Quirk and Merrill Lynch that heralded a ”brave new world” in the investment management industry. We were particularly interested to see that LDI, Unified Managed Accounts (UMAs) and 130/30 were going to be part of this new world. At the time, the report had not yet been released to the public. Now the report is available online here. The report raises the usual alarm bells about market-to-market regulations making pension funding status more volatile, and about the transfer of retirement risk from corporations and governments to individuals via the closure of defined benefit plans (what the authors call “The Big Put”, but many pensioners refer to as “The Big Screw”). These issues, plus a low-yield environment, will continue to put pressure on the funding status of the world’s pension plans - although thankfully, things appear to have stabilized according the chart below from the report:
Comments »What do AllAboutAlpha.com, John Bogle and Robert Reich have in common?12 November 2007
And once again, AllAboutAlpha.com is ranked near the top of the list (okay, it’s alphabetical) - edged out by perennial winner, our good friend “Abnormal Returns“. Also on the list are bloggers extraordinaire Barry Ritholz (”The Big Picture“), Paul Kedrosky (”Infectious Greed“) and Greg Newton (”Naked Shorts“) along with MSM blogs FT Alphaville, NYT Dealbook and WSJ MarketBeat. In addition, celebrity blogs starring John Bogle (”Bogle eBlog“) and former US Cabinet Secretary Robert Reich (creatively named “Robert Reich’s Blog“) are in the Bank. Why lop such a recalcitrant, iconoclastic and seditious blog as AllAboutAlpha in with such august company? Apparently to mix it up a little. Last month P&I described our editorial committee as the “rabble-rousing, reformed-hedge-fund-manager blog editors“. You can take that to the bank.
Comments »The assets are falling! The assets are falling!11 November 2007
This makes perfect sense, really. According to one report it was because some of them “made losses of more than 30% during the previous month, even though they are intended to move independently of the stock markets.” But it’s often the stories that “make perfect sense” that subsequently go unchallenged and unquestioned. So we thought a sober second thought might be in order…
In fairness, last month was the first time this particular study had been undertaken. And this new data may well be totally accurate this time, but it underscores the danger of rushing to conclusion regarding hedge fund data - especially when that conclusion is so easy to believe.
Comments »130/30 Quant vs. Fundamental: Quants have a bigger spice cabinet11 November 2007
For more on this topic, we refer you to HedgeWorld’s Emma Trincal, who was covering the same event. Trincal has written an encyclopedia worth of material on the hedge fund industry and has seen it all. In this article, she does a great job of laying out the arguments made by participants in Terrapinn’s “Portable Alpha & 130/30″ conference last week. We tend to agree with those who say quants own the lead in the space because their massive stock ranking systems gave them a head start. Ergo, the story goes, fundamental managers will gradually claw their way back. However, there is one slightly more nuanced argument that we’d like to make in quants’ favour before we leave this topic.
Comments »A Shortage of Shorts?8 November 2007
With the short selling required for 130/30, the 800 pound gorilla in the room was the finite supply of stock actually available to borrow. In a posting last fall, we discussed a report by Goldman Sachs on this topic (see related posting). Speakers here seem to share our skepticism about whether this posed an immediate problem. However, many weren’t so sanguine about the longer term. I asked Deutsche Bank’s Brian Bausano, Co-head of Global Prime Finance for the firm, whether there would someday be a “shortage of shorts”. He replied that, notwithstanding today’s huge excess borrow capacity, potential shortages would be “non-linear” and would likely occur in certain parts of the market first. For example, he suggested that borrow shortages would likely show up in small-cap names first since small cap names are more likely to be shorted by 130/30 managers and since there is simply less stock available in these names.
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Last week, 
Last September, 
Special to AllAboutAlpha.com by: Helena Conradie, SIM Equity Quants
As the footnote to Chuck Jaffe’s recent 
Special to AllAboutAlpha.com by: Greg Payne Investeco Financial
“The securities industry and clearing agencies don’t seem to recognize that it’s only a matter of time before these problems catch up with them and kill off the goose that is, at present, laying very golden eggs. The securities industry needs to seize control and propose effective remedies to increase transparency in stock lending and borrowing.”
“Anti-dentites” out there will no doubt remember this episode from TV’s Seinfeld (
Below is out (shortened) weekly round-up of stories in which you might be interested, but which didn’t graduate to full stories on AllAboutAlpha.com. As usual, all these stories are listed in the scrolling news ticker you see at the top of your screen.
In his famous 1989 essay “The End of History?” (
Special to AllAboutAlpha.com by: Denise Shull, M.A., Founder, 
Special to AllAboutAlpha.com by: Steve Cochrane, Chief Investment Officer, North Dakota State Investment Board
Special to AllAboutAlpha.com by: Lars Jaeger, Ph.D., CFA, FRM, Partner, Partners Group
As we discussed 
According to 
A few of the over 2,000 subscribers to our monthly email update have commented that they aren’t receiving this regular list of most popular postings. For those who want to talk to their IT departments about this problem, here’s a heads-up that a monthly “Alpha Mail” was sent out at about 3pm US Eastern Time on Monday, February 4th. Enjoy.
Earlier this month, Risk Magazine named venerable French bank 
Remember when Goldman Sachs, smarting from mega-losses in its quant hedge funds, offered new investors a one-time opportunity to invest at a reduced fee (1% management fee plus 10% of profits, instead of 2% and 20%)? At the time, we suggested that such a fire sale can have unintended consequences (
Regular readers may remember our 
This is the 360th posting on AllAboutAlpha.com for 2007. For those keeping score at home, here are some of the year’s most popular postings. Enjoy and Happy New Year! 
Well it happened again - big time. The widely quoted “HFRI” index of hedge funds smoked the less-quoted, but more timely investable version, the “HFRX”. Last week we wrote that the HFRX beat the HFRI regularly - but particularly when both indices were down on the month. Well, true to form, both indices were down in November, and the HFRI beat the HFRX by 100 basis points (1.4% vs. 2.4%). Kind of takes the air out of the “November is the new August” storyline. But there are always some 
We’re always on the look-out for new and different market risk factors or betas here at the AllAboutAlpha global headquarters. So with all the talk recently about alternative energy (such as 
Pension & Investments, “The International Newspaper of Money Management” 
Last week, 
On Friday, we reported on the debate about which type of manager was better qualified to execute a 130/30 strategy, a quantitative manager or a manager using fundamental research. 
With 1X0/X0 strategies pegged to draw in trillions over the next decade, the sticky question of the potential market impact was top of mind today in New York at a conference focused on portable alpha and 130/30 strategies. Participants ruminated on portable alpha yesterday. Today was all 130/30.