Asset Allocation

Once we have established a risk profile we will recommend an investment portfolio with a percentage allocation to be made into each of the asset categories below.  

• UK Equities (core)
  
• UK Equities (small/value)
  
• International Equities (core)
  
• International Equities (small/value)
• Emerging Markets (core)
• Emerging Markets (small/value)
  
• Fixed Interest & Cash
  
• Property

In the categories above,

• 'core' - are funds that invest across the total market and larger companies will form the majority of their holdings.
• 'small' - are funds that target smaller companies.
• 'value' - are funds that target companies that have a higher book value compared to their market value. 

Once the asset allocation has been established with an agreed percentage being invested in each asset class we then choose underlying funds to capture returns in each of the asset classes.

Our philosophy is based on research by Eugene Fama and Kenneth French in the early 1990s found that most of the variation in returns among equity portfolios can be explained by the portfolios’ relative exposure to three compensated risk factors:

• Market factor - Stocks have higher expected returns than fixed income securities.
• Size factor - Small cap stocks have higher expected returns than large cap stocks.
• Book-to-Market (BtM) factor - Lower-priced “value” (high BtM) stocks have higher expected returns than higher-priced “growth” stocks (low BtM)