Spring 2017

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Arnav Sheth, Saint Mary's College of California: Leveraging Herd Behavior in Foreign Exchange Markets

Tuesday, January 31st @ 11:00-12:30 PM (639 Evans Hall)

We examine the relationship between equity and foreign exchange markets at, and around, the WM/Reuters benchmark exchange rate known as the the `Fix'. Execution at the Fix is a service offered by brokers (normally banks) provided they obtain the trade order until a certain time prior to 4pm GMT (11 am Eastern Time). 

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Kellie Ottoboni, UC Berkeley: "Simple Random Sampling: Not So Simple"

Tuesday, February 7th @ 11:00-12:30 PM (639 Evans Hall)

The theory of inference from simple random samples (SRSs) is fundamental in statistics; many statistical techniques and formulae assume that the data are an SRS. True random samples are rare; in practice, people tend to draw samples by using pseudo-random number generators (PRNGs) and algorithms that map a set of pseudo-random numbers into a subset of the population. 

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Markus Pelger, Stanford University: Estimating Latent Asset-Pricing Factors

Tuesday, January 24th @ 11:00-12:30 PM (639 Evans Hall)

We develop an estimator for latent factors in a large-dimensional panel of financial data that can explain expected excess returns. Statistical factor analysis based on Principal Component Analysis (PCA) has problems identifying factors with a small variance that are important for asset pricing. 

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Adair Morse, Haas School of Business: A Popularity Asset Pricing Model

Tuesday, February 14th @ 11:00-12:30 PM (639 Evans Hall)

We study investments in impact funds, defined as venture capital or growth equity funds with dual objectives of generating financial returns and positive externalities. Being an impact fund elevates a fund’s marginal investment rate by 14.1% relative to a traditional VC fund, even more for funds focused on environmental, poverty, and minority/women issues. 

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Paul Kaplan, Morningstar: A Popularity Asset Pricing Model

Tuesday, February 21st @ 11:00-12:30 PM (639 Evans Hall)

This paper presents a formal model for theory of popularity as laid out informally by Idzorek and Ibbotson in their seminal paper, “Dimensions of Popularity (Journal of Portfolio Management, 2014). The paper does this by extending the capital asset pricing model (CAPM) to include security characteristics that different investors regard differently. 

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Terrence Hendershott, Haas School of Business: Relationship Trading in OTC Markets

Tuesday, February 28th @ 11:00-1:00 PM (639 Evans Hall)

We examine the network of bilateral trading relations between insurers and dealers in the over-the-counter corporate bond market. Using comprehensive regulatory data we find that many insurers use only one dealer while the largest insurers have a network of up to eighty dealers.

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Peter Shepard, MSCI: Second Order Risk

Tuesday, March 7th @ 11:00-12:30 PM (639 Evans Hall)

Managing a portfolio to a risk model can tilt the portfolio toward weaknesses of the model. As a result, the optimized portfolio acquires downside exposure to uncertainty in the model itself, what we call “second order risk.” 

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Carl-Fredrik Arndt, Two Sigma: Dynamics for the Top Eigenvalue and Eigenvector of Empirical Correlation Matrices of Financial Data

Tuesday, March 14th @ 11:00-12:30 PM (639 Evans Hall)

In this talk we will discuss how the top eigenvalue/eigenvector pair evolves through time for estimators of covariance and correlation matrices of equity return type data. By this we mean that the matrices have a top eigenvalue which is well separated from the others.

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Alex Papanicolaou, UC Berkeley: Minimum Conditional Expected Drawdown Portfolios

Tuesday, April 11th @ 11:00-1:00 PM (639 Evans Hall)

Drawdown, and in particular maximum drawdown, is a widely used indicator of risk in the fund management industry. It is a vital metric for a levered investor who can get caught in a liquidity trap and forced to sell valuable positions if unable to secure funding after an abrupt market decline. 

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Farzad Pourbabaee, UC Berkeley: Large Deviations of Factor Models with Regularly-Varying Tails: Asymptotics and Efficient Estimation

Tuesday, April 4th @ 11:00-12:30 PM (639 Evans Hall)

Abstract: I analyze the large deviation probability of factor models generated from components with regularly-varying tails, a large subclass of heavy tailed distributions. An efficient sampling method for tail probability estimation of this class is introduced and shown to exponentially outperform the classical Monte-Carlo estimator, in terms of the coverage probability and/or the confidence interval’s length. 

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: James Lewis, State Street Global Advisors: Systematic Long/Short Factor Portfolios

Tuesday, April 18th @ 11:00-12:30 PM (639 Evans Hall)

We consider a panel of 88 "systematic factors": simple, quantitative procedures that assign scores to a universe of assets using publicly available data. For each factor, we construct idealized daily factor portfolios (long/short, market-neutral) and daily return series for the 16-year period between January 2001 and December 2016. 

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Lisa Goldberg, Pete Hand and Alan Cummings, UC Berkeley & Aperio Group: The Tax-Loss Harvesting Life Cycle

Tuesday, January 17th @ 11:00-1:00 PM (639 Evans Hall)

The Tax-Loss Harvesting Life Cycle A 43-Year Retrospective of Equity Indexing Strategies for Taxable Investors Tax-loss harvesting aims to realize losses on individual stocks in conjunction with an investment objective such as index tracking.

Risk Seminar Spring 2017 pic

SEM217: Lionel Martellini (EDHEC-Risk Institute), Mass Customisation versus Mass Production in Retirement Investment Management: Addressing a “Tough Engineering Problem”

Tuesday, July 25th @ 11:00-12:30 PM (1011 Evans Hall)

Abstract: Triggered by the introduction of ever stricter accounting and prudential pension fund regulations, a massive shift from defined-benefit to defined-contribution pension schemes is taking place across the world. As a result of this massive shift of retirement risks on individuals, the investment management industry is facing an increasing responsibility in terms of the need to provide households with suitable retirement solutions.