Equities

European Equities: Time to Focus on the Micro

European Equities: Time to Focus on the Micro European equities trade near a record historical discount to U.S. equities; potential for a turnaround in earnings and improving macro conditions further bolster the case for an overweight position. Europe has faded from the headlines in 2013 as Federal Reserve tapering, Abenomics in Japan, and a slowdown…

Master Limited Partnerships

This report provides an in-depth overview of energy master limited partnerships. This evolving asset class has a number of unique features, including market niche and favorable tax treatment for taxable investors. We review the development of the asset class, investment characteristics from the perspective of both taxable and nonprofit investors, current valuations, and industry growth.

Global Equity Investing

In a broad and integrated global equity market, realization of portfolio goals increasingly requires investors to adopt both an appropriate global equity investment strategy and a well-thought-out implementation plan that includes decisions regarding portfolio structure. This structure should enable investors to easily dial exposure up or down among sectors, regions, styles, and capitalization sizes. “Global…

U.S. Small Cap Investing – Issues and Expectations

Is conventional wisdom correct in assuming that the small-cap sector of the U.S. equity market is less efficient than the large-cap sector? And what, exactly, defines the small-cap sector? This report seeks to answer those questions and others by sorting through the relevant small-cap indices and the biases of manager databases. It also outlines the…

Active or Passive Management – It’s Not That Simple

A detailed discussion of the conditions necessary for investors to consider active management, and the requirements for the majority of managers to outperform the market. For six equity assets classes, we discuss the manager database, popular benchmarks, general bets embedded in active management, and indexing options to develop a framework for evaluating the expected performance…

Fundamental Indexing

An examination of the rules-based quantitative strategy of weighting portfolios by fundamentals rather than by market capitalization. The report discusses the major players of fundamental indexing; differences between fundamental- and cap-weighted indices; the debate over whether fundamental indices should be considered true indices; and fees associated with fundamental index exposure.