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Time to increase allocation into emerging market equities
ETF Securities Asset Allocation Research – Time to increase allocation into emerging market equities
Summary
• Until recently developed market (DM) equities have been favoured over emerging market (EM) equities due to concerns over the slowdown of the Chinese economy.
• However, EM economies are recovering, investment flows are returning to emerging countries and EM equities are currently very cheap on absolute and relative values.
• Using the US dollar as a trading signal is a simple way to allocate between DM and EM equities and enhances the portfolio risk/return profile by increasing return.
Emerging market economy to rebound
The slowdown in EM equities has been driven by a combination of factors including the economic slowdown of its main constituent China, as the country is making its transition from an industry-driven economy into a service-driven economy and the slump in oil prices which affected many emerging countries such as Saudi Arabia.
Manufacturing PMIs for both DM and EM countries have been declining since early 2014. While DM PMIs remained above the 50 mark, EM PMIs fell below the 50 mark in August 2015 according to our calculations, before recovering last month.
(click to enlarge) Source: ETF Securities, Bloomberg
According to the Institute of International Finance (IIF), the year-over-year growth in foreign investment inflows into emerging countries has also been declining since May 2013 to become outflows in January and February 2016. According to market participants, EM companies have been through a period of deleveraging, repaying their foreign debt and refinancing them into local currencies. If this is the case, EM companies are getting healthier, setting the base for a potentially strong recovery. Total investment flows recovered for the first time last month, up US$3.4bn year-over-year, after 13 months of continuous decline.
(click to enlarge) Source: Institute of International Finance, ETF Securities, Bloomberg
Emerging market equities at a bargain
Our valuation analysis of DM and EM equities shows that EM equities are currently very cheap compared to DM equities as the relative, cyclically adjusted price to earnings (CAPE) currently stands at 35% below its 11 years median of 0.72.
(click to enlarge) *MSCI World index as proxy for DM equities and MSCI EM index as proxy for EM equities. Source: ETF Securities, Bloomberg
EM/DM relative CAPE has been declining since mid-2013 as EM CAPE has been falling 33% while DM CAPE has been quite flat over the same period. EM CAPE is 44% below its 11 years median, indicating that EM equities are also cheap in absolute value.
We use the MSCI world index as a proxy for DM equities and the MSCI EM index as a proxy for EM equities. While EM equities are more volatile than DM equities, EM equities have outperformed DM equities by an annualised 53% since 1988. The largest component for the EM index is China and the largest component for the DM index is the US, both accounting for 39% of their respective index.
Using USD to increase equity returns
As the benchmark currency for international trades, the US dollar (USD) is one of the key drivers of equity performance. Following the financial crisis, very accommodative monetary policy from the Fed weighed on the USD until the second half of 2014. Between the summer 2014 and the end of 2015, the USD surged 25% as the Fed reduced quantitative easing. EM equities, on the other hand, fell 23% over the same period.
In 2015, strong signs of US economic recovery led the Fed to initiate a rate tightening cycle, with the first rate hike in December last year. After a pause in the tightening cycle, we believe that the USD will appreciate as markets anticipate forthcoming rate increases but then it will depreciate again as rate hikes materialise. EM equities tend to perform well during periods of weak USD and vice-versa.
One simple and rational way to implement a relative trade strategy between EM and DM equities is to use the USD as a trading signal. In our strategy, we are using the dollar basket index (DXY) as a proxy for the USD. It measures the value of the USD against a basket of DM currencies. While the Fed’s trade-weighted USD index benchmarks the USD against a broader basket of currencies including EM currencies, we decided to use the DXY because of its stronger correlation with DM/EM relative performance.
(click to enlarge) *DXY Index as a proxy for the US dollar. Source: ETF Securities, Bloomberg
Our strategy is a momentum strategy which consists of buying DM equities when the USD has strengthened by more than 1.5% over the past 6 months and then shifting to EM equities when the USD has weakened by more than -1.5% over the past 6 months. As a result, the investment decision is not dependent on forecast data but only based on actual USD or DXY index historical returns over the past 6 months.
(click to enlarge) Source: ETF Securities, Bloomberg
Exposed to equity only, our portfolio does very little to reduce volatility, at 16.6% compared to 14.7% for the MSCI AC World, our benchmark. However, the strategy still enhances the portfolio Sharpe ratio to 0.40 from 0.08 by increasing returns by 122% compared to the MSCI AC World index.
The portfolio also outperformed both DM and EM equities on an annual basis over the same period by 119% and 43% respectively while being less volatile than EM equities. In addition, the transaction cost is expected to be very low as the number of transactions in the simulated portfolio stands at around two transactions per year on average.
(click to enlarge) *Based on daily data in USD from December 30, 1988 to March 31, 2016. Volatility and returns are annualised. Max drawdown defines as the maximum loss from a peak to a trough based on a portfolio past performance. Max recovery is the length of time in number of years to recover from the trough to previous peak. Risk free rate equals to 3.2% (Cash – a simulated combination of the IMF UK Deposit Rate and the Libor 1Yr cash yield). Source: ETF Securities, Bloomberg
After three years of negative performance, emerging markets are starting 2016 on a positive note, posting a solid 5.4% return during the first quarter of 2016 while DM equities were down – 1%. EM manufacturing PMIs for March have returned above the 50 mark indicating that emerging economies are recovering. Capital flows into EM are increasing again and our valuation analysis shows that EM equities are currently at a bargain, indicating that it is an opportune time to gain exposure or increase exposure to EM equities. With EM growth highly correlated to the USD, using the currency as a trading signal enables investors to increase their portfolio return and improve its Sharpe ratio by shifting exposure between DM and EM equities at a low implementation cost.
Important Information
General
This communication has been issued and approved for the purpose of section 21 of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 by ETF Securities (UK) Limited (“ETFS UK”) which is authorised and regulated by the United Kingdom Financial Conduct Authority (the “FCA”).
• Growing Mainstream Adoption of Digital Assets: Institutional investors and major asset managers are increasingly incorporating digital assets like Bitcoin into their portfolios, as evidenced by recent filings and the launch of Bitcoin ETFs in the U.S. Despite their current small market share, these investments reflect a broader trend towards mainstream acceptance
• Impact on Portfolio Performance: The inclusion of Bitcoin in portfolio optimizations, using strategies such as Maximum Sharpe Ratio and Risk Parity, has shown to improve the risk-adjusted returns compared to traditional portfolios. Portfolios optimized with Bitcoin not only offer higher returns for the additional risk taken but also present a wider range of efficient risk-return combinations
• Optimal Allocation Recommendations: Empirical studies suggest that even a small allocation to digital assets, specifically between 2% to 3% in broader asset mixes and up to 4% to 6% in more focused digital asset portfolios, significantly enhances portfolio performance without adversely impacting overall risk profiles
Gradually, then suddenly, as they say, digital assets are becoming mainstream.
The biggest asset managers in the world have launched spot Bitcoin ETFs in the US this year and adoption among institutional investors is rising rapidly.
Major financial institutions like Franklin Templeton themselves have just recently disclosed significant investments into Bitcoin ETFs via their latest 13F filings.
Institutional hedge funds that manage money for Ivy League university endowments have disclosed multi-million Dollar holdings. Stanford university’s Blyth Fund has recently disclosed that they hold around 7% allocation in Bitcoin ETFs.
Nonetheless, at the time of writing, US Bitcoin ETFs only account for approximately 0.6% of the overall size of the US ETF market based on data provided by ICI.
In Europe, Bitcoin ETPs also only comprise a tiny fraction of the 11 trn EUR UCITS market of only 0.05%, according to our calculations based on Bloomberg data.
In general, we expect the relative size of digital assets to increase further as even small allocations to digital assets are bound to increase portfolio risk-adjusted returns significantly as demonstrated in our latest deep dive on Bitcoin.
But what is the optimal allocation to Bitcoin and digital assets in general?
What is the optimal allocation to digital assets?
Most empirical portfolio studies usually look at how a classical 60/40 portfolio comprising of 60% allocation in stocks and 40% allocation in bonds responds to a gradual increase in digital asset allocation.
In our previous digital asset study, we did a similar exercise by investigating the effect of increases in digital asset allocation on overall portfolio risk and return metrics.
Since digital assets generally exhibit a higher risk-adjusted return (“Sharpe Ratio”) than other traditional asset classes, a marginal increase in allocation usually leads to an increase in overall portfolio risk-adjusted returns.
However, most institutional asset managers don’t employ a 60/40 portfolio in the first place because of high portfolio volatility and the dominance of the equity allocation for the whole portfolio’s risk-return profile.
In fact, most institutional asset managers in practice allocate based on optimized risk metrics such as portfolio Sharpe Ratio or portfolio volatility which is why we perform a similar exercise here.
In a first step, we looked at optimized multiasset portfolios comprising of global stocks (MSCI World AC), global bonds (Bloomberg Global Aggregate USD-hedged), and commodities (Bloomberg Commodity Index).
More specifically, we optimized these portfolios based on the following approaches:
• Minimum Variance/Volatility
• Maximum Sharpe Ratio
• Equal risk contribution (Risk parity)
The Minimum Variance approach tries to minimize the average portfolio volatility.
The Maximum Sharpe Ratio approach tries to maximize the ratio between average portfolio return (minus a risk-free return) and the corresponding average volatility. The Equal risk contribution or Risk Parity approach varies the respective portfolio weights until every asset has an identical relative contribution to the overall portfolio volatility.
In a second step, we added Bitcoin to the set of potential assets into the optimization. Our period of investigation (July 2010 – May 2024) was constrained by the fact that reliable market prices for Bitcoin only exist since 2010 as it is still a relatively young asset.
Here are the results for the different optimizations. The upper panel excludes Bitcoin while the lower panel includes Bitcoin in the optimization:
Several observations are in order:
Firstly, the minimum variance approach excludes Bitcoin completely since Bitcoin generally exhibits a higher level of volatility than the other assets.
Secondly, the maximum Sharpe Ratio approach excludes commodities in the traditional portfolio but includes Bitcoin in the new portfolio. The Bitcoin allocation is made largely at the expense of the stock allocation.
Lastly, the risk parity approach also includes Bitcoin at the expense of all other asset classes.
Furthermore, a comparison between the historical performances of the traditional portfolios that exclude Bitcoin and those that include Bitcoin reveals that the max Sharpe Ratio and the Risk Parity (ERC) portfolio were able to significantly outperform the Minimum Variance portfolio which didn’t allocate to Bitcoin at all.
It is also important to highlight that the Risk Parity portfolio with Bitcoin even exhibited a smaller maximum drawdown than the Minimum Variance portfolio without Bitcoin. In other words, the increase in portfolio volatility was largely due to an increase in positive upside volatility.
Moreover, investors are over-proportionately rewarded with higher returns for unit of additional risk as the risk-adjusted returns (“Sharpe Ratio”) increase significantly by adding Bitcoin.
The Sharpe Ratios for optimized portfolios with Bitcoin are even significantly higher than for optimized portfolios without Bitcoin.
In fact, by including Bitcoin and digital assets into their portfolio optimization, the universe of potential multiasset portfolios increases vastly.
Asset managers are not only enabled to provide investors with more efficient portfolios, i.e. higher risk-adjusted returns, but also provide investors with a much larger set of risk-return combinations compared to traditional portfolios that only include stocks, bonds, and commodities.
So far so good. What about other digital assets?
We also applied the same portfolio optimization approaches to a basket of the top 20 digital assets based on the MSCI Global Digital Assets Select 20 Capped Index.
–> The optimal % allocation is even higher in case of the Maximum Sharpe Ratio and Risk Parity portfolio optimization.
It is important to note that the period of investigation (November 2019 – May 2024) is much smaller due to the fact that younger digital assets within the top 20 digital assets like Solana or Ethereum have a smaller track record than Bitcoin.
All in all, the abovementioned results imply that even a small allocation to digital assets can have very positive effects on risk-adjusted returns without compromising the risk characteristics of the portfolios.
While highly risk-averse investors should probably avoid digital assets, the optimal allocation based on the Max Sharpe Ratio and Risk Parity approach appears to be between 2% and 3% for the full sample with bitcoin and between 4% and 6% for the smaller sample with a basket of the top 20 digital assets.
The results generally support our previous findings that we presented here.
Most portfolio optimization approaches also include digital assets within the optimal portfolio allocation which demonstrates that any modern portfolio approach that doesn’t include digital assets like Bitcoin is probably sub-optimal.
We recommend that agile asset managers familiarise themselves with this emerging asset class for the benefit of their clients and to remain competitive.
Bottom Line
• Growing Mainstream Adoption of Digital Assets: Institutional investors and major asset managers are increasingly incorporating digital assets like Bitcoin into their portfolios, as evidenced by recent filings and the launch of Bitcoin ETFs in the U.S. Despite their current small market share, these investments reflect a broader trend towards mainstream acceptance
• Impact on Portfolio Performance: The inclusion of Bitcoin in portfolio optimizations, using strategies such as Maximum Sharpe Ratio and Risk Parity, has shown to improve the risk-adjusted returns compared to traditional portfolios. Portfolios optimized with Bitcoin not only offer higher returns for the additional risk taken but also present a wider range of efficient risk-return combinations
• Optimal Allocation Recommendations: Empirical studies suggest that even a small allocation to digital assets, specifically between 2% to 3% in broader asset mixes and up to 4% to 6% in more focused digital asset portfolios, significantly enhances portfolio performance without adversely impacting overall risk profiles
To read our Crypto Market Compass in full, please click the button below:
I samarbete med Core Foundation lanserar Valour Inc världens första avkastningsbärande Bitcoin (BTC) ETP, Valour Bitcoin Staking (BTC) SEK ETP, och erbjuder investerare exponering för Bitcoin med en avkastning på 5,65 %
Lansering av världens första avkastningsbärande Bitcoin (BTC) ETP: Valour Inc. och Core Foundation samarbetar för att introducera världens första avkastningsbärande Bitcoin (BTC) ETP på Nordic Growth Market (NGM) börsen med en förvaltningsavgift på 1,9 %, erbjuder investerare exponering mot Bitcoin med en avkastning på 5,65 %.
Powering Valour Bitcoin Staking (BTC) SEK ETP med Core Blockchain: Core blockchain-nätverket, som drivs av Bitcoin, utgör grunden för Valour Bitcoin Staking (BTC) SEK ETP (ISIN: CH1213604536), vilket ger Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) kompatibilitet och den innovativa Satoshi Plus konsensusmekanismen för att förbättra säkerheten och skalbarheten.
Förenklad investering med Valour Bitcoin Staking (BTC) SEK ETP: Valour Bitcoin Staking (BTC) SEK ETP effektiviserar Bitcoin-investeringar genom att delegera Bitcoins till Core-validerare, avkastningen tillskrivs nettotillgångsvärdet (NAV) på daglig basis. Denna innovativa produkt säkerställer förvaringskontroll och säkerhet samtidigt som den erbjuder investerare betydande avkastning utan att de behöver sälja eller handla med sina Bitcoin-innehav.
Valour, en ledande emittent av börshandlade produkter (”ETPs”) som ger förenklad tillgång till digitala tillgångar, har lanserat världens första avkastningsbärande Bitcoin (BTC) ETP i samarbete med Core Foundation, en organisation dedikerad till utvecklingen av Core blockchain-nätverk (”Core Chain”). Detta erbjudande ger investerare exponering för Bitcoin med en avkastning på 5,65 % på Nordic Growth Market (NGM)-börsen.
Core blockchain-nätverket är en Bitcoin-driven lager-ett blockkedja för EVM-kompatibla smarta kontrakt. Med 50 % av Bitcoin-mining-hashkraften som bidrar till Cores säkerhet i utbyte mot att låsa upp Bitcoin-verktyg och belöningar, är Core Chain den mest Bitcoin-anpassade EVM-blockkedjan (BTCfi, Bitcoin staking och mer).
Handeln med Valour Bitcoin Staking (BTC) SEK ETP (ISIN: CH1213604536) började den 10 maj 2024 med en förvaltningsavgift på 1,9 %, vilket markerar ett historiskt ögonblick som världens första i sitt slag avkastningsbärande Bitcoin ETP. Detta innovativa erbjudande tillåter investerare att få exponering mot Bitcoin samtidigt som de får en anmärkningsvärd avkastning på 5,65 %, allt utan att behöva sälja eller handla Bitcoin direkt.
Valour Bitcoin Staking (BTC) SEK ETP förenklar investeringar i världens mest kända digitala tillgång, vilket gör det enklare och säkrare för investerare att ta del av Bitcoins potentiella uppsida. Avkastningen tillskrivs nettotillgångsvärdet (NAV) på daglig basis, vilket ger investerare avkastning utan att behöva sälja eller handla med sina Bitcoin-innehav.
Valour Bitcoin Staking (BTC) SEK ETP genererar avkastning genom att delegera Bitcoins till en validator på Core Chain genom icke-depåbelagd, infödd Bitcoin-insats. Insatta Bitcoins får insatsbelöningar i form av CORE-tokens, som sedan återinvesteras i produkten.
Core Chain, den underliggande blockkedjan, är en Bitcoin-driven, decentraliserad, säker och skalbar lager 1-blockkedja som är kompatibel med Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM). Det stöds av Bitcoins Proof of Work (PoW) genom en unik konsensusmekanism känd som ”Satoshi Plus”. Denna mekanism gör det möjligt för Bitcoin-gruvarbetare att delegera sina PoW (DPoW) till Core-validerare utan att påverka deras framtida Bitcoin-belöningar, och därigenom låsa upp potentialen för Bitcoin-säkrade decentraliserade applikationer.
Trots att man engagerar sig i Bitcoin-insats, förblir säkerheten kompromisslös. Förvarskontroll upprätthålls medan avkastning genereras. Bitcoins satsas genom en specifik typ av inbyggd Bitcoin-transaktion som kallas en ”insatstransaktion”, som inkluderar en låsningsperiod och Core Chain-insatsdetaljer som Core Validator och Core-belöningsadressen. Under låsningsperioden kan Bitcoins inte överföras eller skäras ned. Endast ägaren kan överföra Bitcoins när låsningsperioden löper ut.
”Vi är glada över att introducera världens första avkastningsbärande Bitcoin ETP, som erbjuder investerare en oöverträffad möjlighet att få exponering mot Bitcoin samtidigt som de tjänar en betydande avkastning”, säger Olivier Roussy Newton, VD för DeFi Technologies. ”Valour Bitcoin Staking (BTC) ETP förkroppsligar vårt engagemang för innovation i det digitala tillgångsutrymmet, vilket ger investerare ett sömlöst och säkert sätt att delta i Bitcoins tillväxtpotential samtidigt som det erbjuder en ny investeringsväg för att engagera sig med världens främsta kryptovaluta.”
”Core Foundation är glada över att samarbeta med Valor Inc. för att lansera världens första avkastningsbärande Bitcoin ETP. Denna banbrytande produkt ger BTCfi till en bredare publik och hållbar avkastning till Bitcoin-innehavare. Investerare kan nu tjäna avkastning samtidigt som de behåller exponeringen mot Bitcoin. Detta möjliggörs av icke-depåbelagd Bitcoin-insats som hjälper till att säkra Core-blockkedjan. Core Foundation är stolta över att vara det första och mest pålitliga ekosystemet som driver dessa nya erbjudanden, vilket understryker Core Chains position som den mest Bitcoin-justerade blockkedjan, säger Core-bidragsgivaren Brendon Sedo.
Om Core Chain
Core blockchain-nätverket är en Bitcoin-driven lager-ett blockkedja för EVM-kompatibla smarta kontrakt. Med 50 % av Bitcoin-mining-hashkraften som bidrar till Cores säkerhet i utbyte mot att låsa upp Bitcoin-verktyg och belöningar, är Core den mest Bitcoin-justerade EVM-blockkedjan (BTCfi, Bitcoin staking och mer). Detta genombrott har samlat en massiv community av 2,2 miljoner Twitter-anhängare och 250 000 Discord-medlemmar, vilket har översatts till miljontals Core-användare, över 15 miljoner unika adresser och 230 miljoner transaktioner sedan huvudnätets lansering i januari 2023.
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Valour Inc. lanserar världens första avkastningsbärande Bitcoin (BTC) ETP
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