The Investor's Guide to Active Asset Allocation offers you the background and analytical tools required to take full advantage of the opportunities found in asset allocation, sector rotation, ETFs, and the business cycle. Written by renowned technical analyst and best-selling author Martin Pring, the book presents Pring's unique Six Business Cycle Stages, explaining why certain asset categories perform better or worse during different phases of the business cycle, and demonstrating how to use intermarket tools and technical analysis to recognize what business cycle stage the market is in. Pring shows you how to apply active asset allocation, rotating among sectors and major markets (stocks, bonds, and futures) as the business cycle stage changes, to develop optimum allocation strategies. He focuses on exchange traded funds (ETFs) as the best vehicle for asset allocation rotation, since they are easily traded and have much more flexibility than mutual funds. He also offers specific guidelines for what sectors to be in, depending on the business cycle stage. The Investor's Guide to Active Asset Allocation provides you with proven investing expertise on: Basic Principles of Money Management How the Business Cycle Drives the Prices of Bonds, Stocks, and Commodities The Pring Six Business Cycle Stages Technical Tools that Help to Identify Trend Reversals Putting Things into a Long-Term Perspective Recognizing Stages Using Easy-to-Follow Indicators as well as Models How the Ten Market Sectors Fit into the Rotation Process How Individual Sectors and Groups Performed in Each of the Six Stages Asset Allocation for Specific Stages This dynamic investing resource also gives you access to downloadable content, which contains supplementary information that will help you execute the strategies described in the book. You'll find links to useful websites that contain a wide-ranging library of ETFs, database sources, historical data files in Excel format, and a collection of historical multi-colored PowerPoint charts. An essential tool for improving your analytical skills, The Investor's Guide to Active Asset Allocation shows you how to move from a passive to an active allocation model and explains the link between business cycle and stock market cycle for more effective - and profitable - trading and investing.

No issue is more critical to institutional investors than asset allocation. In today's volatile and increasingly global financial markets, asset mix and portfolio allocation are ever more important. However, the term asset allocation means different things to different people in different contexts. Whether policy asset allocation, tactical asset allocation or dynamic strategies for asset allocation, the policies and tactics are designed to reshape the return distribution. Because there are a number of decisions to make and issues to evaluate when reviewing asset allocation, this authoritative text assembles some of the best thinking in the investment world today on the subject of asset allocation. In Active Asset Allocation, pension sponsors, endowment and foundation managers and portfolio managers will find answers to many of the perplexing problems of assessing and managing the asset mix. Editors Robert D. Arnott and Frank J. Fabozzi, joined by a host of eminent practitioners and theoreticians, focus on the many dimensions of the asset allocation decision, tactical asset allocation and the risks associated with active asset allocation. Completely revised to reflect the latest thinking, Active Asset Allocation updates the ground-breaking material that made the first edition a critically acclaimed best-seller. Some of these current thoughts on asset allocation are communicated through a comprehensive series of chapters, including Managing the Asset Mix; Asset Performance and Surplus Control; Risk-Adjusted Surplus; Tax Consequences of Trading; A Disciplined Approach to Global Asset Allocation; Does Tactical Asset Allocation Work? and At Last, a Rational Case forLong-Horizon Risk Tolerance and for Asset Allocation Timing?

The active versus passive debate is a contentious issue. Filled with concrete evidence and comprehensive money management strategies, this chapter from The Only Guide You'll Ever Need for the Right Financial Plan delves into the case for passive investing over active investing. You can do so by investing in passively managed investment vehicles like index funds and passive asset class funds. You are virtually guaranteed to outperform the majority of both professionals and individual investors. Written for savvy investors and advisors, this chapter helps you: Integrate a passive investing strategy Maintain your portfolio's risk portfolio in a tax-efficient manner Determine the difference between the theories of efficient versus inefficient markets Make cost-effective investment decisions From Larry Swedroe, the author of the bestselling series of "The Only Guide" investment books, with Kevin Grogan and Tiya Lim, this chapter helps you integrate diversification, low turnover, and asset allocation into one plan that meets the needs of a unique situation.

Since the formalization of asset allocation in 1952 with the publication of Portfolio Selection by Harry Markowitz, there have been great strides made to enhance the application of this groundbreaking theory. However, progress has been uneven. It has been punctuated with instances of misleading research, which has contributed to the stubborn persistence of certain fallacies about asset allocation. A Practitioner's Guide to Asset Allocation fills a void in the literature by offering a hands-on resource that describes the many important innovations that address key challenges to asset allocation and dispels common fallacies about asset allocation. The authors cover the fundamentals of asset allocation, including a discussion of the attributes that qualify a group of securities as an asset class and a detailed description of the conventional application of mean-variance analysis to asset allocation.. The authors review a number of common fallacies about asset allocation and dispel these misconceptions with logic or hard evidence. The fallacies debunked include such notions as: asset allocation determines more than 90% of investment performance; time diversifies risk; optimization is hypersensitive to estimation error; factors provide greater diversification than assets and are more effective at reducing noise; and that equally weighted portfolios perform more reliably out of sample than optimized portfolios. A Practitioner's Guide to Asset Allocation also explores the innovations that address key challenges to asset allocation and presents an alternative optimization procedure to address the idea that some investors have complex preferences and returns may not be elliptically distributed. Among the challenges highlighted, the authors explain how to overcome inefficiencies that result from constraints by expanding the optimization objective function to incorporate absolute and relative goals simultaneously. The text also explores the challenge of currency risk, describes how to use shadow assets and liabilities to unify liquidity with expected return and risk, and shows how to evaluate alternative asset mixes by assessing exposure to loss throughout the investment horizon based on regime-dependent risk. This practical text contains an illustrative example of asset allocation which is used to demonstrate the impact of the innovations described throughout the book. In addition, the book includes supplemental material that summarizes the key takeaways and includes information on relevant statistical and theoretical concepts, as well as a comprehensive glossary of terms.

The comprehensive guide to private market asset allocation Asset Allocation and Private Markets provides institutional investors, such as pension funds, insurance groups and family offices, with a single-volume authoritative resource on including private markets in strategic asset allocation. Written by four academic and practitioner specialists, this book provides the background knowledge investors need, coupled with practical advice from experts in the field. The discussion focuses on private equity, private debt and private real assets, and their correlation with other asset classes to establish optimized investment portfolios. Armed with the grounded and critical perspectives provided in this book, investors can tailor their portfolio and effectively allocate assets to traditional and private markets in their best interest. In-depth discussion of return, risks, liquidity and other factors of asset allocation takes a more practical turn with guidance on allocation construction and capital deployment, the “endowment model,” and hedging — or lack thereof. Unique in the depth and breadth of information on this increasingly attractive asset class, this book is an invaluable resource for investors seeking new strategies. Discover alternative solutions to traditional asset allocation strategies Consider attractive returns of private markets Delve into private equity, private debt and private real assets Gain expert perspectives on correlation, risk, liquidity, and portfolio construction Private markets represent a substantial proportion of global wealth. Amidst disappointing returns from stocks and bonds, investors are increasingly looking to revitalise traditional asset allocation strategies by weighting private market structures more heavily in their portfolios. Pension fund and other long-term asset managers need deeper information than is typically provided in tangential reference in broader asset allocation literature; Asset Allocation and Private Markets fills the gap, with comprehensive information and practical guidance.

Build an agile, responsive portfolio with a new approach to global asset allocation Adaptive Asset Allocation is a no-nonsense how-to guide for dynamic portfolio management. Written by the team behind Gestaltu.com, this book walks you through a uniquely objective and unbiased investment philosophy and provides clear guidelines for execution. From foundational concepts and timing to forecasting and portfolio optimization, this book shares insightful perspective on portfolio adaptation that can improve any investment strategy. Accessible explanations of both classical and contemporary research support the methodologies presented, bolstered by the authors' own capstone case study showing the direct impact of this approach on the individual investor. Financial advisors are competing in an increasingly commoditized environment, with the added burden of two substantial bear markets in the last 15 years. This book presents a framework that addresses the major challenges both advisors and investors face, emphasizing the importance of an agile, globally-diversified portfolio. Drill down to the most important concepts in wealth management Optimize portfolio performance with careful timing of savings and withdrawals Forecast returns 80% more accurately than assuming long-term averages Adopt an investment framework for stability, growth, and maximum income An optimized portfolio must be structured in a way that allows quick response to changes in asset class risks and relationships, and the flexibility to continually adapt to market changes. To execute such an ambitious strategy, it is essential to have a strong grasp of foundational wealth management concepts, a reliable system of forecasting, and a clear understanding of the merits of individual investment methods. Adaptive Asset Allocation provides critical background information alongside a streamlined framework for improving portfolio performance.

For over three decades, indexing has become increasingly accepted by both institutional and individual investors. Index benchmarks and investment products that track them have been a driving force in the transformation of investment strategy from art to science. Yet investors’ understanding of the sophistication of this burgeoning field has lagged the growing use of index products. Active Index Investing is the definitive guide to how indexes are constructed, how index-based portfolios are managed, and how the world’s most sophisticated investors use index-based strategies to enhance performance, reduce costs and minimize the risks of investing. Active Index Investing provides a comprehensive overview of (1) the investment theories that are the foundation of index based investing, (2) best practices in benchmark construction, (3) the growing world of index-based investment vehicles, (4) cutting-edge index portfolio management techniq ues and (5) the myriad ways investors can and do capture the benefits of indexing. Active Index Investing has a unique format that captures the views and perspectives of over 40 of the investment industry’s leading experts and practitioners, while maintaining a holistic view of this complex subject matter. In addition to the Appendix and Glossary within the book, it features an E-ppendix, available at www.IndexUniverse.com