Part I. Please research and answer at least 5 of the following questions in preparation for the portfolio simulation (there are no right or wrong answers and your work will be judged on whether your answer is well reasoned or not):
- Given where we are in the business cycle, would you be under or overweight bonds? What will be your allocation to domestic equity, domestic small cap equities, and international developed and emerging markets equities?
- Will emerging markets stocks exhibit more correlation with the developed markets this year?
- What projections do you have for the world economy? Will the current commodity cycle continue?
- What is your view on the dollar? What factors could see a long position begin to rally relative to other currencies?
- Do you have an overall investment theme?
- What impact will expected interest rate increases have on the economy, and the broader markets?
- What sectors would benefit from lower interest rates? Which would suffer from higher interest rates?
- How will you identify undervalued stocks? What financial ratios will you use to screen stocks? Are you looking for growth oriented companies with superior earnings growth?
- What is your best estimate on the future course of interest rate spreads-widening or narrowing? Would you be favouring long duration or short duration bonds right now? Do you forecast higher default rates by corporate issuers?
- What is your sell discipline?
Part II.
A. Unfortunately CFA Institute has taken out the course on preparing Investment Policy Statements from their website, so I had to find an alternative course offered by Open University. Please use the following link to open and take the course:
It’s free, but you need to register to gain access to the course.
This course looks at how to take investor objectives and constraints and turn them into a portfolio which aims at achieving an expected return and level of risk appropriate for the investor. In this free course, Asset allocation in investment, portfolio optimisation techniques such as portfolio theory can be used to determine how much of an investor’s portfolio to put in each asset class. Portfolio theory can also be used to determine so-called model portfolios which offer optimised benchmarks for investors with the same objectives and constraints.
After completing the course please download statement of participation on completion and submit it as an evidence of completing the course.
B. Create an Investment Policy Statement which adheres to specific person’s situational profile, investor personality, and risk-return objectives. You can create an IPS for yourself or your friend/relative, but need to clearly explain the background information for this person.
