FINANCE 330:
Investment Management: Asset Allocation and Asset/Manager Selection
This course covers strategic and tactical asset allocation in investment portfolios as well as specific asset and manager selection issues. We consider challenges that are unique to the various asset classes that comprise broad-based portfolios, including: public equities, fixed income securities, private equity (both buyout and venture capital), hedge funds, and real assets (real estate, energy, timber, and commodities). We also consider challenges that are specific to various geographies (e.g., domestic, developed international and emerging markets) across the various asset classes. The portfolio optimization framework employed considers the perspective of different types of investors that vary along such dimensions as risk preference, investment horizon, tolerance for illiquidity, tax status, social objectives, and special asset-specific relationship, information or skill advantages. More specifically, our framework considers: tradeoffs between seeking diversification to control risks, and making concentrated bets where there appears to be outsized return prospects (whether due to one-off proprietary investment opportunities or the market appearing to value certain sectors improperly); tradeoffs between passive investment (at low administrative cost and complexity) and active investment designed to produce premium returns (despite the incremental cost and complexity); distinctions between investing as principals and delegating to managers, and the importance of aligning incentives among all parties; the importance of liquidity in driving the pricing, risk and expected returns to various asset classes and the importance of identifying which parties are natural suppliers of liquidity and which the natural demanders; the importance of effective underwriting and ongoing monitoring of investment opportunities; the importance of tax considerations in the pricing and expected returns to various asset classes; and the importance of identifying which parties form the natural clienteles in each asset class. For a number of the sessions, we will invite domain experts to add spice and depth to a portion of the class discussion.
| Units: 4