Services Tags: Asset Allocation

The State of Real Estate: Location, Location, Location…Where Are We?

October 2013 Investment Perspectives

Core real estate has been an attractive investment since the market’s recovery began in the first quarter of 2010. In this three-and-a-half-year period, the NCREIF Property Index (“NPI”) has returned a stunning 50.7%. Given this 13.1% three-year annualized return and unrelenting appreciation gains reported quarter after quarter, investors may wonder if they are too late to enter into private real estate or if their current investments are poised for a downturn. This newsletter will address these very issues by examining the health of the real estate market as suggested by the key indicators of performance, fund leverage and cash balances, transaction volume, asset values, income environment, and investor appetite.

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Navigating the Low Rate Environment for Healthcare Organizations

September 2013 Investment Perspectives

Despite the recent increase in long-term interest rates, the low rate environment is now more than four years old and continues to create challenges for investors. While interest rates are notoriously volatile the current low rate environment and negative real yields on risk free securities is unprecedented in its duration. Given the Federal Reserve’s clear indication that it will not raise interest rates until there is a substantial drop in unemployment or increase in inflation, it appears the current low rate environment is unlikely to change in the near future. While this creates challenges for all institutional investors, it creates a unique set of challenges for non-profit health care organizations (“HCOs”).

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Emerging Trends in Alternative Asset Classes

2013 Marquette Investment Symposium session

In this presentation from our 2013 Investment Symposium, we explore various emerging trends in the alternatives space, including low volatility equity, tail risk, managed futures, gold, MLPs, GTAA, risk parity, farmland, direct lending, and opportunistic credit.

Investment Symposium 2013
Recorded September 13, 2013

Please contact us for access to this video.

Stress Test and Spending Policies for Endowments & Foundations

2013 Marquette Investment Symposium session

In this presentation from our 2013 Investment Symposium, we analyze different spending policy options for non-profit institutions, examine the long- and short-term effects of various spending policy decisions, and explore how stress testing can aid in understanding the risks of different spending policies.

Investment Symposium 2013
September 13, 2013

Please contact us for access to this video.

Global Tactical Asset Allocation

July 2013 Investment Perspectives

At Marquette we work with clients to construct portfolios that minimize risk while generating desired rates of return commensurate with overall program goals. These allocations are strategic in nature and designed to generate acceptable rates of return over long periods of time by assembling a diversified set of asset classes. These allocation decisions are meant for long term performance and, as a result, tend to be fairly static. Allocations are rebalanced to maintain desired risk and return targets but are fairly steady regardless of market conditions.

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Investment Manager Search 2013: Fiduciary Duty Deep Dive

Live webinar on the investment manager search fiduciary duties of high alpha, high integrity and low fees. An update of our popular manager search webinar in 2011, we’ll dive even deeper into the details of a five-step best practice process with traditional and alternative manager case studies. 

Thorough manager due diligence and fee negotiation are critical to avoiding poor products and performance erosion.

Register now to join us for a live webinar on the investment manager search fiduciary duties of high alpha, high integrity and low fees. An update of our popular manager search webinar in 2011, we’ll dive even deeper into the details of a five-step best practice process with traditional and alternative manager case studies. Clear guidance for both clients and managers will also be covered, including “do’s and don’ts” for approaching our research process.

 

Live Webinar – Tuesday, June 18, 2013 – 1:00-1:45 PM CT

Please contact us for access to this video.

In Search of Opportunity for Active U.S. Equity Managers

This paper seeks to determine if there are areas of public equity markets that are “less efficient” and thus potentially conducive to active investing. Without taking a stance on the active versus passive debate, this paper asks, “if you plan to hire an active manager, what is the best place to start looking?”

As we highlighted in a recent newsletter (Passive Strategies Gaining in Popularity), institutional investors continue to shift their U.S. equity allocations away from actively managed strategies and into index funds. The support for this shift has been proven by academic research as well as recent investment experience. This paper does not question the validity of passive investing approaches. Accepting that it is difficult at best to beat a market that is relatively efficient, this paper nonetheless seeks to determine if there are areas of public equity markets that are “less efficient” and thus potentially conducive to active investing. Without taking a stance on the active versus passive debate, this paper asks, “if you plan to hire an active manager, what is the best place to start looking?” The following paper is broken up into multiple sections. First, the workhorse of active equity manager evaluation, Fama-French factor analysis, is introduced. Next, active managers with different size and style biases are examined to search for pockets of alpha. Finally, additional thoughts and conclusions are provided for investors.

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1Q 2013 Market Environment Briefing

A briefing on our 1Q 2013 Market Environment report, covering the overall U.S. economy, fixed income, U.S./non-U.S. equity, hedge funds, private equity, real estate and infrastructure.

Live Webinar – Tuesday, April 16, 2013 – 1:00-1:45 PM CT

Please join Marquette’s asset class analysts for a live webinar briefing on our 1Q 2013 Market Environment report. This webinar series is designed to brief clients on the market as soon as possible after quarterly market data becomes available.

The overall U.S. economy will be discussed, along with fixed income, U.S./non-U.S. equity, hedge funds, private equity, real estate and infrastructure.

Live webinar attendees will be able to submit questions to the presenters and vote in audience polls during the event. Questions will be answered as time allows during the Q&A session towards the end of the webinar.

If you are unable to attend the webinar live, you can also view it afterward on demand. Registrants will automatically receive a follow-up email shortly after the end of the webinar to notify them of webinar recording availability.

Please contact us for access to this video.

Is Risk Parity Right for Your Portfolio?

February 2013 Investment Perspectives

Driven by volatile equity markets, falling interest rates, and heightened aversion to portfolio losses, interest in risk parity has skyrocketed over the last three years. Unfortunately, the risk parity investment thesis is not always understood by investment committees and trustees, which can contribute to sub-optimal portfolio decisions. In the following newsletter, we address the salient points of risk parity to help educate investors so they can determine if it is an appropriate allocation for their portfolios.

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Global Equity Position Paper

The following paper examines global equity as an asset class, focusing on justifications and concerns for investing globally rather than via a traditional partitioned U.S. and non-U.S. approach. Furthermore, relative performance, risks, and meaningful outperformance from active management are also considered. Ultimately, this paper strives to investigate the theoretical reasons for global investing and whether these same arguments hold true in reality.

As economies and capital markets become increasingly more integrated, interest in global equity investing has soared over the past few years, making some U.S. institutional investors question the traditional partitioned approach of U.S. and non-U.S. equity allocations. Over the last ten years, allocations to global equity mandates (as a percentage of new commitments to global and international funds) have risen from 6% in 2000 to almost 40% by 2011.1 In essence, U.S. investors have increased global equity mandates as a percentage of their total equity allocations, meaning a shift from a partitioned U.S., non-U.S. approach to a global program.

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