1 / 21

BRIDGEWATER ASSOCIATES

BRIDGEWATER ASSOCIATES. Alpha Wars: Survival of the Fittest. Bob Prince Co-Chief Investment Officer. October 2005. One Glendinning Place Westport, CT 06880 (203) 226-3030 www.bwater.com. TWO WAYS TO MAKE MONEY. Hold Assets (risk premium). Make Bets (timing). Beta. Alpha.

lana
Download Presentation

BRIDGEWATER ASSOCIATES

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript


  1. BRIDGEWATER ASSOCIATES Alpha Wars: Survival of the Fittest Bob Prince Co-Chief Investment Officer October 2005 One Glendinning Place Westport, CT 06880 (203) 226-3030 www.bwater.com

  2. TWO WAYS TO MAKE MONEY Hold Assets(risk premium) Make Bets (timing) Beta Alpha

  3. Alpha vs. Beta Beta Alpha + Type of risk: Systematic Unsystematic Source of risk: Asset class Manager skill Return/Risk ratios: 0.2 to 0.3 Unlimited Correlation: High Low Difficulty: Easy Hard Cost: Cheap Expensive

  4. THE ALPHA WORLDS ARE CONVERGING • Alpha is a zero sum game, no matter what you call it. • Weaker players will lose to stronger players. Alpha Overlay Hedge Funds Active Management Traditional

  5. THE WINNERS WILL BE… SMARTEST Make good bets BEST RISK MANAGERS Portfolio theory applied to alpha

  6. APPLYING PORTFOLIO THEORY Ones and Threes Portfolio of 5 Portfolio of 10 Portfolio of 40 Return … 1.0% 1.0% … 1.0% … 1.0% … 1.0% Risk … 3.0% 3.0% … 1.4% … 1.1% … 0.8% Ratio … 0.3 0.3 … 0.7 … 0.9 … 1.3

  7. Information Ratio: US Bond Alpha = 0.65 JPY/USD Alpha = 0.55 Combined = 0.87 EXAMPLE OF COMBINING ALPHAS US Bond Alpha JPY/USD Alpha Combined 200% 175% 150% 125% 100% 75% 50% 25% 0% -25% 70 72 74 76 78 80 82 84 86 88 90 92 94 96 98 00 02

  8. DIVERSIFIED ALPHA IS BETTER THAN NONDIVERSIFIED ALPHA Traditional Fixed Income Mandate Fully Diversified Pure Alpha Sources of Value Added: 6 Average correlation: 0.25 IR per slice: 0.35 Implied IR: 0.56 Sources of Value Added: 77 Average Correlation: 0.04 IR per slice: 0.35 Implied IR: 1.40

  9. SCALABILITY OF OVERLAY Scaling an Information Ratio of 1.0 20% 18% GTAA 16% 14% 12% Alpha/Return 10% 8% 6% 4% Enhanced Cash Active Active Hedge Funds 2% Equity Bonds 0% 0% 2% 4% 6% 8% 10% 12% 14% 16% 18% 20% Tracking Error/Volatility Source: Bridgewater analysis

  10. OPTIMAL ALPHA REQUIRES • Positive Expected Return • No systematic risk • High sample size • Risk targeting ability • Integration with benchmarks

  11. Hedge Funds: Alpha or Beta?

  12. HEDGE FUND CORRELATIONS Average Managers’ Correlations Within Style

  13. BW Simple Fixed Income Arbitrage Replication Fixed Income Arbitrage Strategy Hedge Funds BETAS IN HEDGE FUNDS Fixed Income Arbitrage Rolling 6-Month Excess Returns Correlation: 77% Cumulative Excess Return

  14. Merger Arbitrage Strategy Hedge Funds BW Simple Merger Arbitrage Replication BETAS IN HEDGE FUNDS Merger Arbitrage Rolling 6-Month Excess Returns Correlation: 56% Cumulative Excess Return

  15. Emerging Markets Strategy Hedge Funds BW Emerging Markets Strategy Replication BETAS IN HEDGE FUNDS Emerging Markets Rolling 6-Month Excess Returns Correlation: 79% Cumulative Excess Return

  16. Managed Futures Strategy Hedge Funds BW Simple Managed Futures Strategy Replication BETAS IN HEDGE FUNDS Managed Futures Rolling 6-Month Excess Returns Correlation since Jan. 1999: 90% Cumulative Excess Return

  17. APPLYING HEDGE FUNDS • Are you getting alpha or beta? • Diversify. • Allocate based on alpha/beta targets. • Overlay HF alpha onto optimal beta.

  18. MONEY MIGRATION

  19. MANAGER MIGRATION • Traditional Fund Mangers Who Switched to HF/Alpha Overlay: • Jack Meyer Harvard Mgt Alpha Overlay • Brian Posner Warburg Pincus Hygrove Partners • Michael DiCarlo John Hancock DFS Advisors HF • Leon Cooperman Goldman Omega HF • Jeffrey Vinik Fidelity Vinik Asset Mgmt • Rob Donahue Solomon Brothers Own fund • Greg Jackson Oakmark Global Blum Capital HF • David Glancy Fidelity Own fund • Peter Trapp Needham Own fund • Warren Lammert Janus Granite Point Capital • Nicholas Tiller Fidelity Hedge fund • Chirstopher Zepf Fidelity Hedge fund • Dan Szemis Merrill Lynch Hedge fund • Gary Schlarbaum Morgan Stanley Schlarbaum Capital

  20. Global Macro Developed Bonds vs. Emerging Market Debt Nominal vs. Inflation- Indexed Bonds Relative Country Inflation Indexed Bonds Relative Country Duration (diffs) Relative Country & Sector Equity Outright Duration Outright Equity Commodities Exposure Currency D World Interest Rates D Relative Interest Rates • EMD Credit Spreads • Breakeven Inflation Rates D Relative Real Yields D Currency Forwards D World Equity Prices D Relative Equity Prices D Commodity Prices Global Macro Funds • Global macro managers take views on a variety of asset classes (e.g., equities, fixed income, currencies, commodities, etc.) by studying cause-effect relationships between macro economic variables and assessing how these are being (mis)priced in markets • Example of macro economic variables: growth, inflation, central bank policy (e.g., intervention), political events, balance of payments, capital flows • The implementation of these views takes many different shapes and forms: • Systematic – cause-effect are studied and programmed into a logical code • Discretionary – views are typically implemented through directional and concentrated bets Process Example:

  21. Fixed Income Arbitrage • Fixed Income Arbitrage managers are trying to capture spreads and positive carry in various forms, from simple strategies to more complex ones: • Emerging market credit spread - the managers try to time exposure to EMD spreads (duration hedged spread against US treasury), with bias towards being long the spread • Mortgage-backed securities - similar to EMD spreads, the managers are biased towards capturing the spread between MBS/ABS/CMBS and US treasuries by applying models for calculating prepayment risk (the option embedded in MBS). They tend to take the exposure in the less liquid/traded CMO trenches were they think mis-pricing of the prepayment option exists • Volatility trading - the managers take views on volatility and skews and are biased towards being short options and collecting the difference between implied and actual volatility • Carry/yield curve trades - try to capture positive carry (the difference between cash and longer-term rates) and implement views on the shape of the yield curve applying interest-rate models.  These views are applied to the short-end of the curve (Euro$) and the long-end (Bonds) • Currency - managers take some active views on currencies, primarily based on interest rate diffs between countries  

More Related