IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/quaeco/v85y2022icp342-354.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

On the benefits of active stock selection strategies for diversified investors

Author

Listed:
  • Stadtmüller, Immo
  • Auer, Benjamin R.
  • Schuhmacher, Frank

Abstract

Motivated by the deteriorating standalone performance of popular active stock selection strategies, we investigate how they behave in a portfolio context. We show that investors holding portfolios diversified within and across asset classes via passive investment products cannot benefit from the addition of active products based on, for example, value, profitability and momentum effects. More specifically, the latter do not significantly improve out-of-sample Sharpe ratios. This result holds for both optimized portfolio weighting schemes (recently tilted towards bond markets) and heuristic fixed-weight approaches (with pronounced equity focus). It is also robust to a variety of modifications in our general research setup.

Suggested Citation

  • Stadtmüller, Immo & Auer, Benjamin R. & Schuhmacher, Frank, 2022. "On the benefits of active stock selection strategies for diversified investors," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 342-354.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:quaeco:v:85:y:2022:i:c:p:342-354
    DOI: 10.1016/j.qref.2022.04.006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1062976922000485
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.qref.2022.04.006?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jacobs, Heiko & Müller, Sebastian & Weber, Martin, 2014. "How should individual investors diversify? An empirical evaluation of alternative asset allocation policies," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 19(C), pages 62-85.
    2. Qingfu Liu & Yiuman Tse & Linlin Zhang, 2018. "Including commodity futures in asset allocation in China," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(9), pages 1487-1499, September.
    3. Jacobs, Heiko, 2015. "What explains the dynamics of 100 anomalies?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 65-85.
    4. Victor DeMiguel & Lorenzo Garlappi & Raman Uppal, 2009. "Optimal Versus Naive Diversification: How Inefficient is the 1-N Portfolio Strategy?," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(5), pages 1915-1953, May.
    5. Andrew J. Patton, 2009. "Are "Market Neutral" Hedge Funds Really Market Neutral?," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(7), pages 2295-2330, July.
    6. Chordia, Tarun & Roll, Richard & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 2011. "Recent trends in trading activity and market quality," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(2), pages 243-263, August.
    7. Hwang, Inchang & Xu, Simon & In, Francis, 2018. "Naive versus optimal diversification: Tail risk and performance," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 265(1), pages 372-388.
    8. Louis K.C. Chan & Jason Karceski & Josef Lakonishok, 1999. "On Portfolio Optimization: Forecasting Covariances and Choosing the Risk Model," NBER Working Papers 7039, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Adams, Zeno & Füss, Roland & Glück, Thorsten, 2017. "Are correlations constant? Empirical and theoretical results on popular correlation models in finance," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 9-24.
    10. Rad, Hossein & Low, Rand Kwong Yew & Miffre, Joëlle & Faff, Robert, 2020. "Does sophistication of the weighting scheme enhance the performance of long-short commodity portfolios?," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 164-180.
    11. Ravi Jagannathan & Tongshu Ma, 2003. "Risk Reduction in Large Portfolios: Why Imposing the Wrong Constraints Helps," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(4), pages 1651-1683, August.
    12. Joachim Freyberger & Andreas Neuhierl & Michael Weber & Andrew KarolyiEditor, 2020. "Dissecting Characteristics Nonparametrically," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 33(5), pages 2326-2377.
    13. Dirk G. Baur & Brian M. Lucey, 2010. "Is Gold a Hedge or a Safe Haven? An Analysis of Stocks, Bonds and Gold," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 45(2), pages 217-229, May.
    14. Frazzini, Andrea & Pedersen, Lasse Heje, 2014. "Betting against beta," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(1), pages 1-25.
    15. Zakamulin, Valeriy, 2017. "Superiority of optimized portfolios to naive diversification: Fact or fiction?," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 22(C), pages 122-128.
    16. Bessler, Wolfgang & Wolff, Dominik, 2015. "Do commodities add value in multi-asset portfolios? An out-of-sample analysis for different investment strategies," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 1-20.
    17. Ludovic Phalippou & Oliver Gottschalg, 2009. "The Performance of Private Equity Funds," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(4), pages 1747-1776, April.
    18. Bolong Cao & Shamila Jayasuriya & William Shambora, 2010. "Holding a commodity futures index fund in a globally diversified portfolio: A placebo effect?," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 30(3), pages 1842-1851.
    19. Adams, Zeno & Glück, Thorsten, 2015. "Financialization in commodity markets: A passing trend or the new normal?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 93-111.
    20. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 2012. "Size, value, and momentum in international stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(3), pages 457-472.
    21. Fernandez-Perez, Adrian & Fuertes, Ana-Maria & Miffre, Joëlle, 2019. "A comprehensive appraisal of style-integration methods," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 134-150.
    22. Harry Markowitz, 1952. "Portfolio Selection," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 7(1), pages 77-91, March.
    23. R. David Mclean & Jeffrey Pontiff, 2016. "Does Academic Research Destroy Stock Return Predictability?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 71(1), pages 5-32, February.
    24. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 2015. "A five-factor asset pricing model," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(1), pages 1-22.
    25. Avanidhar Subrahmanyam, 2010. "The Cross†Section of Expected Stock Returns: What Have We Learnt from the Past Twenty†Five Years of Research?," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 16(1), pages 27-42, January.
    26. van Dijk, Mathijs A., 2011. "Is size dead? A review of the size effect in equity returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 35(12), pages 3263-3274.
    27. Ledoit, Oliver & Wolf, Michael, 2008. "Robust performance hypothesis testing with the Sharpe ratio," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 15(5), pages 850-859, December.
    28. Clifford S. Asness & Tobias J. Moskowitz & Lasse Heje Pedersen, 2013. "Value and Momentum Everywhere," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 68(3), pages 929-985, June.
    29. Dominik Wolff & Ulrich Neugebauer, 2019. "Tree-based machine learning approaches for equity market predictions," Journal of Asset Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 20(4), pages 273-288, July.
    30. Mark Britten‐Jones, 1999. "The Sampling Error in Estimates of Mean‐Variance Efficient Portfolio Weights," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 54(2), pages 655-671, April.
    31. Wolfgang Bessler & Heiko Opfer & Dominik Wolff, 2017. "Multi-asset portfolio optimization and out-of-sample performance: an evaluation of Black–Litterman, mean-variance, and naïve diversification approaches," The European Journal of Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(1), pages 1-30, January.
    32. Robert F. Engle & Olivier Ledoit & Michael Wolf, 2019. "Large Dynamic Covariance Matrices," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(2), pages 363-375, April.
    33. Ang, Andrew, 2014. "Asset Management: A Systematic Approach to Factor Investing," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199959327, Decembrie.
    34. Ravi Jagannathan & Tongshu Ma, 2003. "Risk Reduction in Large Portfolios: Why Imposing the Wrong Constraints Helps," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(4), pages 1651-1684, August.
    35. Jobson, J D & Korkie, Bob M, 1981. "Performance Hypothesis Testing with the Sharpe and Treynor Measures," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 36(4), pages 889-908, September.
    36. Damianov, Damian S. & Elsayed, Ahmed H., 2020. "Does Bitcoin add value to global industry portfolios?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    37. Eling, Martin & Schuhmacher, Frank, 2007. "Does the choice of performance measure influence the evaluation of hedge funds?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 31(9), pages 2632-2647, September.
    38. John Douglas (J.D.) Opdyke, 2007. "Comparing Sharpe ratios: So where are the p-values?," Journal of Asset Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 8(5), pages 308-336, December.
    39. Belousova, Julia & Dorfleitner, Gregor, 2012. "On the diversification benefits of commodities from the perspective of euro investors," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(9), pages 2455-2472.
    40. Kirby, Chris & Ostdiek, Barbara, 2012. "It’s All in the Timing: Simple Active Portfolio Strategies that Outperform Naïve Diversification," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 47(2), pages 437-467, April.
    41. Michael Graham & Jarno Kiviaho & Jussi Nikkinen, 2013. "Short-term and long-term dependencies of the S&P 500 index and commodity prices," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(4), pages 583-592, March.
    42. Tu, Jun & Zhou, Guofu, 2011. "Markowitz meets Talmud: A combination of sophisticated and naive diversification strategies," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(1), pages 204-215, January.
    43. Bianchi, Robert J. & Drew, Michael E. & Fan, John Hua, 2015. "Combining momentum with reversal in commodity futures," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 423-444.
    44. Carmine De Franco, 2021. "Stock picking in the US market and the effect of passive investments," Journal of Asset Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 22(1), pages 1-10, February.
    45. Robert W. Faff, 2003. "Creating Fama and French Factors with Style," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 38(2), pages 311-322, May.
    46. Jacobs, Heiko & Müller, Sebastian, 2020. "Anomalies across the globe: Once public, no longer existent?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(1), pages 213-230.
    47. Carhart, Mark M, 1997. "On Persistence in Mutual Fund Performance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 57-82, March.
    48. Behr, Patrick & Guettler, Andre & Miebs, Felix, 2013. "On portfolio optimization: Imposing the right constraints," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 1232-1242.
    49. Daskalaki, Charoula & Skiadopoulos, George, 2011. "Should investors include commodities in their portfolios after all? New evidence," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 35(10), pages 2606-2626, October.
    50. Jeremiah Green & John R. M. Hand & X. Frank Zhang, 2017. "The Characteristics that Provide Independent Information about Average U.S. Monthly Stock Returns," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 30(12), pages 4389-4436.
    51. Anderson, Robert M. & Bianchi, Stephen W. & Goldberg, Lisa R., 2012. "Will My Risk Parity Strategy Outperform?," Department of Economics, Working Paper Series qt23t2s950, Department of Economics, Institute for Business and Economic Research, UC Berkeley.
    52. Jaewon Choi & Mathias Kronlund, 2018. "Reaching for Yield in Corporate Bond Mutual Funds," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 31(5), pages 1930-1965.
    53. Gao, Xin & Nardari, Federico, 2018. "Do Commodities Add Economic Value in Asset Allocation? New Evidence from Time-Varying Moments," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 53(1), pages 365-393, February.
    54. Best, Michael J & Grauer, Robert R, 1991. "On the Sensitivity of Mean-Variance-Efficient Portfolios to Changes in Asset Means: Some Analytical and Computational Results," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 4(2), pages 315-342.
    55. Chordia, Tarun & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar & Tong, Qing, 2014. "Have capital market anomalies attenuated in the recent era of high liquidity and trading activity?," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(1), pages 41-58.
    56. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1993. "Common risk factors in the returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 3-56, February.
    57. Soosung Hwang & Alexandre Rubesam, 2015. "The disappearance of momentum," The European Journal of Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(7), pages 584-607, May.
    58. Treynor, Jack L & Black, Fischer, 1973. "How to Use Security Analysis to Improve Portfolio Selection," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 46(1), pages 66-86, January.
    59. Hui Zou & Trevor Hastie, 2005. "Addendum: Regularization and variable selection via the elastic net," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series B, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 67(5), pages 768-768, November.
    60. Adams, Zeno & Glueck, Thorsten, 2014. "Financialization in Commodity Markets: A Passing Trend or the New Normal?," Working Papers on Finance 1413, University of St. Gallen, School of Finance, revised Aug 2015.
    61. Chan, Louis K C & Karceski, Jason & Lakonishok, Josef, 1999. "On Portfolio Optimization: Forecasting Covariances and Choosing the Risk Model," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 12(5), pages 937-974.
    62. Hui Zou & Trevor Hastie, 2005. "Regularization and variable selection via the elastic net," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series B, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 67(2), pages 301-320, April.
    63. Bessembinder, Hendrik, 2018. "Do stocks outperform Treasury bills?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 129(3), pages 440-457.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Anja Vinzelberg & Benjamin R. Auer, 2022. "Unprofitability of food market investments," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(7), pages 2887-2910, October.
    2. Adam Zaremba & Jacob Koby Shemer, 2018. "Price-Based Investment Strategies," Springer Books, Springer, number 978-3-319-91530-2, November.
    3. Rad, Hossein & Low, Rand Kwong Yew & Miffre, Joëlle & Faff, Robert, 2022. "The strategic allocation to style-integrated portfolios of commodity futures," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 28(C).
    4. Thomas Conlon & John Cotter & Iason Kynigakis, 2021. "Machine Learning and Factor-Based Portfolio Optimization," Papers 2107.13866, arXiv.org.
    5. Cederburg, Scott & O’Doherty, Michael S. & Wang, Feifei & Yan, Xuemin (Sterling), 2020. "On the performance of volatility-managed portfolios," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 138(1), pages 95-117.
    6. Erindi Allaj, 2020. "The Black–Litterman model and views from a reverse optimization procedure: an out-of-sample performance evaluation," Computational Management Science, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 465-492, October.
    7. Bessler, Wolfgang & Wolff, Dominik, 2015. "Do commodities add value in multi-asset portfolios? An out-of-sample analysis for different investment strategies," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 1-20.
    8. Massimo Guidolin & Erwin Hansen & Martín Lozano-Banda, 2018. "Portfolio performance of linear SDF models: an out-of-sample assessment," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(8), pages 1425-1436, August.
    9. Ni, Xuanming & Zheng, Tiantian & Zhao, Huimin & Zhu, Shushang, 2023. "High-dimensional portfolio optimization based on tree-structured factor model," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    10. Yan, Cheng & Zhang, Huazhu, 2017. "Mean-variance versus naïve diversification: The role of mispricing," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 61-81.
    11. Hsu, Po-Hsuan & Han, Qiheng & Wu, Wensheng & Cao, Zhiguang, 2018. "Asset allocation strategies, data snooping, and the 1 / N rule," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 257-269.
    12. Ahmed, Shamim & Bu, Ziwen & Symeonidis, Lazaros & Tsvetanov, Daniel, 2023. "Which factor model? A systematic return covariation perspective," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    13. Behr, Patrick & Guettler, Andre & Truebenbach, Fabian, 2012. "Using industry momentum to improve portfolio performance," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(5), pages 1414-1423.
    14. Oikonomou, Ioannis & Platanakis, Emmanouil & Sutcliffe, Charles, 2018. "Socially responsible investment portfolios: Does the optimization process matter?," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 50(4), pages 379-401.
    15. Cakici, Nusret & Zaremba, Adam, 2022. "Salience theory and the cross-section of stock returns: International and further evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 146(2), pages 689-725.
    16. Jacobs, Heiko & Müller, Sebastian & Weber, Martin, 2014. "How should individual investors diversify? An empirical evaluation of alternative asset allocation policies," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 19(C), pages 62-85.
    17. Maillet, Bertrand & Tokpavi, Sessi & Vaucher, Benoit, 2015. "Global minimum variance portfolio optimisation under some model risk: A robust regression-based approach," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 244(1), pages 289-299.
    18. Marie Brière & Ariane Szafarz, 2021. "When it rains, it pours: Multifactor asset management in good and bad times," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 44(3), pages 641-669, September.
    19. Wolff, Dominik & Bessler, Wolfgang & Opfer, Heiko, 2012. "Multi-Asset Portfolio Optimization and Out-of-Sample Performance: An Evaluation of Black-Litterman, Mean Variance and Naïve Diversification Approaches," VfS Annual Conference 2012 (Goettingen): New Approaches and Challenges for the Labor Market of the 21st Century 62020, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    20. Jiang, Chonghui & Du, Jiangze & An, Yunbi & Zhang, Jinqing, 2021. "Factor tracking: A new smart beta strategy that outperforms naïve diversification," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 396-408.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Active portfolio management; Passive investment; Mean-variance analysis; Covariance shrinkage; Volatility timing; Naive diversification;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • C61 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Mathematical Methods; Programming Models; Mathematical and Simulation Modeling - - - Optimization Techniques; Programming Models; Dynamic Analysis

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:quaeco:v:85:y:2022:i:c:p:342-354. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/620167 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.