Now offering access to style factors, portfolio insurance, target-date bonds and alternative assets
Factor investing involves targeting specific drivers of returns across asset classes
Protect your portfolio from downturns without liquidating your positions
Guard against interest rate risk and protect your principal by investing in bonds the safe way
Understand the role of bitcoin, gold, and real estate in your portfolio
* If you’re an Investment Management client, our onboarding process will cover the integration of the components above into your portfolio.
Style Factors are specific investment characteristics that have at times outperformed the broader market. You’re probably familiar with at least a few of these, but here are the primary Style Factors that drive equity returns.
Invest in stocks that have exhibited lower historical volatility than the broader market
Dampens overall portfolio volatility and improves risk-adjusted returns
Invest in companies with healthy balance sheets
Minimizes potential drawdowns and portfolio volatility
Invest in stocks that are inexpensive relative to their earnings
Reduces portfolio volatility and downside risk
Invest in stocks that are outperforming the broader market
Increases expected returns
Invest in smaller companies with stronger growth prospects
Increases expected returns
Done correctly, adding factor exposure to your portfolio can offset risk while enhancing returns. But it’s important to understand that all factors exhibit cyclicality. That is, each one is right for a different type of market environment.
Get in touch with us today to find out your level of exposure, and if you have the right factors working in your corner.
Would you ever consider not having homeowners insurance? Or car insurance? Or health insurance? Probably not. We all recognize the risks associated with these types of events, and so we mitigate that risk through the use of insurance.
This same risk-mitigation technique can be applied to your investment portfolio, but there are some caveats. Depending on market conditions, this type of protection can be expensive, and therefore it should not be in place at all times (only when financial conditions dictate).
Portfolio insurance is also not something you can simply call an insurance broker to purchase. It must be done through the unique application of options contracts to your portfolio.
One of the other primary benefits of portfolio insurance is that it allows you to protect your portfolio without selling assets. This can be particularly advantageous in taxable accounts.
Bonds play an integral role in a portfolio, but how you own bonds can have a major impact on the safety of your investment. Investors who own bonds through a typical bond fund are sacrificing one of the primary benefits that bonds provide: the almost-assured return of principal (assuming the issuer doesn't default).
This is because bond funds never mature. Instead, as certain bonds inside the fund mature, they are replaced with newer issues to maintain a target average maturity for the fund. The unfortunate result is that investors in these types of bond funds have less assurance that their principal is protected.
But thankfully, there are set of new products on the market that deliver the safety of individual bonds, but with the ease and customization of ETFs. These products provide final distribution at maturity, the liquidity and transparency of an ETF, and the ability to precisely control maturity, yield and credit quality.
You owe it to yourself to make sure that your principal is truly protected.
Stocks and bonds are the foundational elements of a portfolio, but they represent only two of many available asset classes. The inclusion of so called "alternative assets" can improve the risk and return characteristics of a portfolio to help achieve a variety of desired outcomes.
This is where assets such as bitcoin (and other crypto-based assets), gold, and residential and commercial real estate come into play. Each one offers a unique risk-reward profile that when integrated with your core holdings, creates a resilient portfolio that can withstand nearly anything.