9am-12:30pm

Objectives

The soaring number of index and exchange traded funds available provides investors with incredible choice and flexibility. But, with so many new options comes added complexity: how can an investor decide which funds are right for their portfolio? This workshop will explain the mechanics of index and exchange traded funds, their benefits and uses, and explore why investing with index and exchange traded funds is different from investing with actively managed funds.

Agenda

• Basics of indexes, index funds and ETFs: structure, benefits, and drawbacks
• Brief history and overview of the index fund and ETF marketplace
• Methods and resources for evaluating these funds
• Building portfolios with ETFs and index funds
• Challenges and opportunities for Financial Advisors

About your workshop leader:

Michael Krause, President, AltaVista Research, LLC, USA

Michael is president and founder of AltaVista Research. As the firm’s chief analyst, Michael is responsible for maintaining the firm’s ETF coverage as well as several model portfolios. He is also a frequent contributor to broadcast and print media.

Prior to founding AltaVista, Michael worked at UBS Investment Bank in New York. As part of a consistently II-ranked Investment Strategy team, he developed expertise in the fundamental analysis of indices, which he now applies to the analysis of ETFs. Before joining UBS, Michael was a Senior Equity Analyst at a Japanese buy-side firm in New York, where he specialized in disciplined valuation analysis at a time when it was almost a forgotten art (the late 1990s). Prior to that, he was an analyst and editor of research at Clarion Capital in Taiwan.

Having lived and worked in Asia for six years, he speaks Japanese and Chinese (Mandarin). Michael graduated from Georgetown University with a degree in Finance and has more than a decade of experience as an investment professional.

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1:30pm-5pm

This is a broad discussion on portfolio construction assuming that the advisor focuses equally on the roles of “portfolio management” as well as “risk management”.

With the increased breadth of the ETF universe one must ask why this evolution of the ETF industry is so significant towards the evolution of the role of the portfolio manager. The problems are clear: high correlations, low yields and limited opportunities when so many things have gone up so far at the same time. The focus on alternative investments has been one growing trend to help deal with the need for ever improving diversification. But can ETFs, the quick and easy diversification tool, be the answer for even alternatives … thus leading to potentially an all-ETF model. 

The workshop will consider the ever popular “Yale model” and will also discuss the pitfalls in the use of ETFs to give a better understanding on how the focus should be on risk, not returns … something not often considered even in the ETF space. This is not a workshop just on the benefits of ETF investing. It is meant to discuss ideas on how improvements can be made to an investment process both with and without the use of indexing/ETFs.

About your workshop leader:

Richard Kang, Independent Investment & Risk Consultant and Contributing Writer, TheBetaBrief.com

Richard has been active in both institutional and individual asset/risk management for over twelve years with extensive experience in multi asset class mandates as well as strategies applying the use of passive instruments. In 2002, Richard co-founded an investment firm managing long-only GAA mandates for private investors and short-only “beta filtering” overlays for multi-strategy hedge funds/FOFs. In addition to running his firm, Richard was retained by a FOFs for two years as its CIO. He currently writes a blog, The Beta Brief (www.thebetabrief.com) and consults to a small number of indexing/ETF providers and asset allocators.

Times and documentation:
Registration for both masterclasses opens at 8:30am. Delegates can also register for Masterclass B from 12:30pm. Participants will receive comprehensive course documentation, including presentation materials.

Please note: Lunch will be provided to delegates registered for both masterclasses only

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