We manage balanced portfolios consisting of assets from a global cross market universe including equities, bonds and alternatives such as properties, commodities and hedge funds. Our aim is to optimize risk-adjusted returns by combining customized strategic asset allocation for individual clients and by focusing on top-down tactical asset allocation using the agreed investment limits.
We work highly disciplined and primarily invest in liquid markets and are therefore able to adjust portfolio risks quickly in order to optimize risk and performance. Investment decisions are based on the analytical conclusions from our internal Investment Committee.
Focus on top-down asset allocation. In short, our investment philosophy rests on the basis that it is more important to own (or not to own) risky assets (equities for example) at the right points in time, rather than being able to pick the best individual securities/companies. Put differently, the total risk and return of a portfolio is more influenced by the relative allocations to the various asset classes and geographical regions, than it is by the individual stocks or bonds, which have been selected. By allocating ‘top down’ we have considerable cost savings, as most of these types of investments can be implemented via indices or futures. In comparison, single name and manager selection is both expensive in terms of transaction costs, and often reduces the liquidity of the portfolio.
Our Investment Research and Investment Processes are easy to understand (also for ‘non-economists’), down to earth, and based on practical and old-fashioned merchant skills.
We do not solely focus on complicated macroeconomic theories, but have reached the conclusion that markets from time to time are driven by irrational euphoria/panic, extreme (cheap/expensive) pricing of various asset classes, and severely skewed return distributions – and that these factors in themselves are worth spending analytical power on. We have built qualitative and quantitative models, which measure these ‘psychological’ aspects of the market, and find these to be of great use in determining the 3-4 large annual turning points in the market. We consider ourselves a contrarian investor, and prefer buying when everyone else is panicking, and selling when all others in euphoria are screaming ‘buy!’
