emerging markets

April 2019: Is the Recession in Front or Behind Us?

Download PDF: March19_PC It is tempting to argue that we are currently experiencing the “manufacturing recession”, similar to the “commodity recession” we experienced back in 2011-2012 and 2014-2015. All the data is supporting the thesis that we did have a recession in 2018, albeit a mild one: 1) industrial production and manufacturing PMI weakens inContinueContinue reading “April 2019: Is the Recession in Front or Behind Us?”

Lessons from Past Emerging Markets Cycles: Part II (Bonds)

PDF: Lessons from Past Emerging Markets Cycles Part II -Bonds In the past five years, the size of Emerging Market corporate and sovereign bonds has increased by over 50%. This highlights the increasing need of investment for EM to continue growing. Although currently the size of EM bond market is pale compared to U.S. bondContinueContinue reading “Lessons from Past Emerging Markets Cycles: Part II (Bonds)”

Lessons from Past Emerging Markets Cycles: Equity

PDF: Emerging Markets Review A Review of Emerging Markets Equity Performance Emerging markets equity is an inherently volatile asset class, with annual volatility of 17.7% compared to 14.2% for its developed markets counterpart. Investors who were willing to endure the higher risk has been rewarded tremendously in the long run. Between 1988 and today (SeptContinueContinue reading “Lessons from Past Emerging Markets Cycles: Equity”

Putamen Capital: March 2019 Bird Eye View

Four months after Putamen Capital started trading, we continue to build and improve our database, model and quantitative trading strategy to guide our investment decision, with the goal of building an all-weather portfolio that outperform our benchmark (MSCI All Country World Index). This month we introduce an enhanced version of our tactical asset allocation andContinueContinue reading “Putamen Capital: March 2019 Bird Eye View”

Putamen Capital: January 2019 Update

Our strategy last quarter to allocate small portion for equity paid off handsomely. Since we first launched our asset allocation model in October 2018, our model portfolio returned by 1.8% while our benchmark, MSCI ACWI, lost 6.0%. This month, the model recommends increasing the defensiveness of the portfolio by allocating 100% to bonds, a safe-havenContinueContinue reading “Putamen Capital: January 2019 Update”

December 2018: Outlook, Update On Asset Allocation Model and Sector Valuation Overview

Thesis Review, US Treasury and Emerging Markets Prior to discussing our model update and 2019 sector outlook, we want to review our investment thesis from last month (Nov 24th), which has been panning out nicely. In the post we wrote: “In the anticipation of Fed backing-off from rising rates further in 2019, we do believeContinueContinue reading “December 2018: Outlook, Update On Asset Allocation Model and Sector Valuation Overview”

Assessment Of The Current Cycle: Asset Class Selection for Portfolio Construction

Figure 1. World Efficient Frontier (1988 – Nov 1988, except for few asset classes) A teacher of mine once said to me that in order to gain anything in life, investing included, we need to take risk. The amount of risk we are willing and able to face determines the expected gain or progress thatContinueContinue reading “Assessment Of The Current Cycle: Asset Class Selection for Portfolio Construction”