EDHEC Publications
Revisiting the Limits of Hedge Fund Indices: a Comparative Approach
2007
Hedge fund indices have been criticised for a lack of representativity and for their biases, to the point that serious doubts about the usefulness of hedge fund indices have been raised by investors and regulators. This paper examines whether the problems that are outlined for hedge fund indices also exist for other indices that seem to be widely accepted. The drawbacks of hedge fund indices pointed out in the literature do indeed exist. However, in this paper, the authors point out that there are possible solutions to these problems. A revisited version of this paper was published in the...
Optimal Investment Decisions When Time Horizon is Uncertain
2007
Many investors do not know with certainty when their portfolio will be liquidated. Should their portfolio selection be influenced by the uncertainty of exit time? In order to answer this question, we consider a suitable extension of the familiar optimal investment problem of Merton (1971), where we allow the conditional distribution function of an agent’s time horizon to be stochastic and correlated to returns on risky securities. In contrast to existing literature, which has focused on an independent time horizon, we show that the portfolio decision is affected. A revisited version of this...
Trading Strategies in the Current Commodity Market Environment
2007
This brief article suggests three approaches for how to benefit from structural opportunities in the commodity markets, drawing from the recently published book, “Intelligent Commodity Investing.” The author notes how over long time horizons, the term structure of a commodity futures curve becomes the dominant driver of return for individual futures contracts. For shorter time horizon opportunities, the author discusses mean-reverting commodity spread trades that have approximately seasonal frequencies.
The Amaranth Collapse: What Happened and What Have We Learned Thus Far?
2007
On September 18th, 2006, market participants were made aware of a large hedge fund’s distress. On that date, Nick Maounis, the founder of Amaranth Advisors, LLC, had issued a letter to his investors, informing them that the fund had lost an estimated 50% of their assets month-to-date. By the end of September 2006, these losses amounted to $6.6-billion, making Amaranth’s collapse the largest hedge-fund debacle to have thus far occurred. There were (and are) many surprising aspects of this debacle. A revisited version of this paper was published in the Spring 2008 issue of the Journal of...
Assessing and Valuing the Non-Linear Structure of Hedge Fund Returns
2007
Several studies have put forward that hedge fund returns exhibit a non-linear relationship with equity market returns, captured either through constructed portfolios of traded options or piece-wise linear regressions. This paper provides a statistical methodology to unveil such non-linear features with the returns on any selected benchmark index. It estimate a portfolio of options that best approximates the returns of a given hedge fund, accounts for this search in the statistical testing of the contingent claim features, and tests whether the identifed non-linear features have a positive...
The Economic Consequences of Legal Origins
2007
In the last decade, economists have produced a considerable body of research suggesting that the historical origin of a country's laws is highly correlated with a broad range of its legal rules and regulations, as well as with economic outcomes. This paper summarizes this evidence and attempts a unified interpretation. It also addresses several objections to the empirical claim that legal origins matter. Finally, it assesses the implications of this research for economic reform. A revisited version of this paper was published in the June 2008 issue of the Journal of Economic Literature.
How Do Performance Measures Perform?
2007
The relevance of the information ratio and the alpha, two leading performance measures for multi-index models, depends on the type of portfolio held by investors. This paper compares these measures with the generalized treynor ratio (GTR) on the quality of the rankings they produce. A precise measure yields similar rankings with alternative benchmarks. A revisited version of this paper was published in the Summer 2007 issue of the Journal of Portfolio Management.
MiFID: the (in)famous European Directive?
2007
In this study, EDHEC-Risk Institute, while recognising that the directive allows the conditions in which investment companies can operate on the regulated markets or over-the-counter to be harmonised, warns of the eventual adverse effects relating to the obligation of transparency for systematic "internalisers" and the obligation of "best execution". The authors find, in the case of the obligation imposed on systematic “internalisers” to maintain a public spread of prices, that it is prejudicial for this restriction to be removed for the least liquid securities. This provision will lead, in a...
Momentum Profits and Non-Normality Risks
2007
This paper examines the role of non-normality risks in explaining the momentum puzzle of equity returns. It shows that momentum returns are not normally distributed. About 70 basis points of the annual momentum profits can be attributed to systematic skewness risk. This finding is pervasive across nine strategies and is reinforced when time dependencies in abnormal returns and risks are explicitly modeled. The analysis also reveals that the market and skewness risks of momentum portfolios evolve over the business cycle in a manner that is consistent with market timing and risk aversion. A...
Shedding Light on Alternative Beta : A Volatility and Fixed Income Asset Class Comparison
2007
Volatility is an alternative beta—a risk premium captured by hedge fund managers and investment bank proprietary traders—that is today moving closer to the mainstream and should be thought of as a veritable asset class. For many investors, it is difficult to derive intuition as to why volatility should deserve an ongoing allocation within a larger portfolio. If volatility is an asset class, then to what accepted asset class can it be compared?
Approximating Independent Loss Distributions with an Adjusted Binomial Distribution
2007
The author describes an approximation methodology for constructing independent loss distributions based on adjusting the binomial distribution. This method can handle both homogeneous and heterogeneous loss portfolios. He finds that this simple algorithm provides an excellent fit to the exact distribution for a broad range of correlations and portfolio credit quality.
Equity Hedge Fund ABS Models: Choosing the Volatility Factor
2007
The use of asset-based style analysis (ABS) in the context of hedge fund investments continues to take hold within the industry. Many of the factors used in performing this analysis are straightforward and well-accepted—particularly in the area of equity hedge funds, where a long market index factor, a small-minus-large factor, and a value-minus growth factor seem to be well-accepted components of an equity hedge fund ABS model. Little attention, however, has been given to understanding the most relevant volatility factors and the relative merits of various instruments in this context.
New Developments in the Commodity Markets
2007
In 2007, the highly dynamic commodity markets had attracted new classes of participants such as algorithmic high-frequency traders; sophisticated product structurers; and Chinese entrepreneurs. This article will briefly cover the market developments that brought in these new participants.
The Myths and Limits of Passive Hedge Fund Replication: An Attractive Concept… Still a Work-in-Progress
2007
Following recent initiatives by major investment banks such as Merrill Lynch and Goldman Sachs, EDHEC researchers have undertaken a detailed critical analysis of the various methodologies involved in hedge fund replication offers, examining the benefits and limits of the “factor-based” and “pay-off” distribution approaches. In the study, “The Myths and Limits of Passive Hedge Fund Replication,” co-written by Lionel Martellini with Noël Amenc, Walter Géhin and Jean-Christophe Meyfredi, the authors find that overall, one could only possibly hope to achieve truly satisfying results by combining...
QIS3: Meaningful progress towards the implementation of Solvency II but ground remains to be covered
2007
This document outlines our position on the third quantitative impact survey on the standard formula for the calculation of capital requirements for insurance companies under Solvency II. Before reviewing the principles that underlie the standard formula, we will give a brief introduction to Solvency II. In light of this introduction, we will then review the changes that QIS3 has brought about in the design of Solvency II; we will also point out major improvements as well as changes that are inconsistent with the very principles of this body of regulations.
Conditional Risk Premia and Correlations in Commodity Futures Markets
2007
In this paper, the authors study the conditional risk premia of commodity futures and the way their returns vary over time with those of traditional asset classes (S&P500 stocks and US T-bonds). They draw the following two conclusions. First, that historically investors earned significant risk premia on 19 of the 21 commodity futures markets studied. Second, that the conditional correlations between equity and commodity futures returns fell over time.
Hedge Fund Performance in 2006: A Vintage Year for Hedge Funds?
2007
In a report entitled “Hedge Fund Performance: A Vintage Year for Hedge Funds?”, Véronique Le Sourd, Senior Research Engineer with the EDHEC Risk and Asset Management Research Centre provides a comprehensive account of the performance of each hedge fund strategy included in the EDHEC Alternative Indexes. The author reveals that funds of hedge funds, which are often taken to give an aggregate view of the industry’s performance, yielded a solid return of 11.25% in 2006.
A Review of the U.S. Senate Report on the Amaranth Debacle
2007
This paper summarises what the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations' report on the Amaranth debacle covered, and briefly touches upon important areas that the report omitted.
State Dependence Can Explain the Risk Aversion Puzzle
2007
Risk aversion functions extracted from observed stock and option prices can be negative as shown by Aït-Sahalia and Lo (2000) and Jackwerth (2000). We rationalize this puzzle by a lack of conditioning on latent state variables. Once properly conditioned, risk aversion functions and pricing kernels are consistent with economic theory. A revisited version of this working paper was published in the April 2008 issue of the Review of Financial Studies.
Risk Management and Portfolio Construction in a Commodity Futures Programme
2007
This article focuses on risk management within the context of a total-return futures program centered on commodities. The following issues are addressed: the evaluation of normal versus eventful risk, the sizing of trades and strategy buckets, and the construction of a portfolio, which takes into consideration these risk and sizing metrics. The article provides examples from three historical portfolios in order to make this discussion concrete and practical.
Performance Measurement for Traditional Investment, Literature Survey
2007
This paper presents the state of the art of performance measurement in the area of traditional investment, from a simple evaluation of portfolio return to the more sophisticated techniques including risk in its various acceptations. It also describes models that take a step away from modern portfolio theory and allow a consideration of cases beyond mean-variance theory.
Asset-Liability Management Decisions In Private Banking
2007
Working from the observation that the contribution of asset-liability management techniques developed for institutional investors is not yet familiar within private banking, a new study from the EDHEC Risk and Asset Management Research Centre, entitled “Asset-Liability Management Decisions in Private Banking” shows the expected benefits of a transposition of that kind. According to the authors of the study, Noël Amenc, Lionel Martellini and Volker Ziemann, asset-liability management represents a genuine means of adding value to private banking that has not been sufficiently explored to date....
Response to CESR public consultation on Best Execution under MiFID - On the Importance of Transaction Cost Analysis
2007
Response to the CESR's public consultation on best execution under MiFID, EDHEC strongly defend the idea that the analysis of the total net proceeds of financial transactions represent the most important factor for assessing execution quality. But this analysis also represents the most significant conceptual and technical challenge the industry will face in order to consistently monitor execution quality, and therefore allow best execution to become a tangible and measurable objective for investment firms.
Quantification of Hedge Fund Default Risk
2007
In a working paper entitled ‘Quantification of Hedge Fund Default Risk’, which led to the publication of a full article in the Fall issue of the Journal of Alternative Investments, Jean-René Giraud and Stéphane Daul of the EDHEC Risk and Asset Management Research Centre, together with co-author Corentin Christory, examined numerous cases of hedge fund default in order to find the common factors behind fund failures. The objective of the paper was to provide an initial framework for quantifying the non-financial extreme risk of hedge funds with the aim of factoring it into the portfolio...
CP20: Significant improvements in the Solvency II framework but grave incoherencies remain - EDHEC response to Consultation Paper n° 20
2007
EDHEC position paper entitled "CP20: Significant improvements in the Solvency II framework but grave incoherencies remain", by Philippe Foulquier, Director of the EDHEC Financial Analysis and Accounting Research Centre, and Samuel Sender, Research Associate with the EDHEC Risk and Asset Management Research Centre, contains EDHEC's answer to CP20, a consultation process initiated by CEIOPS (Committee of European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Supervisors) on the "Advice to the European Commission in the Framework of the Solvency II Project on Pillar I Issues".
Transaction Cost Analysis in Europe: Current and Best Practices - European Survey
2007
A new report from EDHEC Risk Advisory, Transaction Cost Analysis in Europe: Current and Best Practices, which was commissioned by HSBC Investment Bank, reviews the conditions in which buy-side firms (traditional and alternative) are currently monitoring transaction costs and investigates the various issues related to transaction cost analysis in the context of the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive due to be enforced in November 2007. This directive contains an important provision related to Best Execution.
Extending Black-Litterman Analysis Beyond the Mean-Variance Framework
2007
This paper introduces a suitable extension of the Black-Litterman Bayesian approach to portfolio construction in the presence of non-trivial preferences about higher moments of asset return distributions. It also presents an application to active style allocation decisions in the hedge fund universe. Overall the results suggest that significant value can be added in a hedge fund portfolio through the systematic implementation of active style allocation decisions provided that a sound investment process is implemented that accounts for both non-normality and parameter uncertainty in hedge fund...
A Copula Approach to Value-at-Risk Estimation for Fixed-Income Portfolios
2007
This paper introduces a multivariate copula approach to Value-at-Risk estimation for fixed income portfolios. Using a parsimonious model to extract time-varying parameters used as proxies for factors affecting the shape of the yield curve, and a Student copula to model the dependence structure of these factors, we are able to generate VaR estimates that strongly dominate standard VaR estimates in formal out-of-sample tests. A revisited version of this paper was published in the Summer 2007 issue of the Journal of Fixed Income.
The Challenge of Hedge Fund Measurement: a Toolbox Rather Than a Pandora's Box
2006
This paper, which is being written to provide an overview of the multitude of publications we have seen on hedge fund performance, is the result of a reading and analysis of about 200 studies on this subject. The issue of performance measurement in the hedge fund industry has led to literature that is both abundant and controversial. The explanation of this complexity lies in the particular features of alternative funds.
QIS 2: Modelling that is at odds with the prudential objectives of Solvency II
2006
In a new position paper by Philippe Foulquier, director of the EDHEC Financial Analysis and Accounting Research Centre, and Samuel Sender, research associate with the EDHEC Risk and Asset Management Research Centre, entitled ‘QIS 2: Modelling that is at odds with the prudential objectives of Solvency II’, EDHEC regrets the approach chosen by the CEIOPS (Committee of European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Supervisors) for the European Commission as proposed in the QIS 2 (Quantitative Impact Study 2), which does not favour optimal management of the risks of European insurance companies....
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Operating from campuses in Lille, Nice, Paris, London and Singapore, EDHEC is one of the world’s top 15 business schools. Fully international and directly connected to the business world, EDHEC commands a strong reputation for research excellence and the ability to train entrepreneurs and managers capable of breaking new ground. EDHEC functions as a genuine laboratory of ideas and produces innovative solutions valued by businesses. The School’s teaching is inspired by its research work and a focus on “learning by doing”, all with the aim of equipping people with the skills to succeed in business.
