The Need to Boost Research Productivity Time and Cost-Efficiently
Threat for Active Investment Managers
Race to the bottom
- Grow in size to reduce cost per $bn assets managed (M&A)
- Stretch research staff to offset inflation of mid-back office costs
- Cut risk budgets to keep close to the benchmark each quarter
Opportunity for Active Investment Managers
Race to the top
- Grow # of quality of investment decisions per number of staff.
- Use data science to encode sound investment knowledge NOW
- Leverage new technologies to compound knowledge COST EFFICIENTLY
Faster, Better Way To Do Data-Heavy, Complex Groundwork Research
Butterwire is calibrated to support a long-term, low turnover, fundamental approach to active investing. It aims to increase the chances that some portfolio positions will outperform significantly at a 12-month horizon, while reducing the number and impact of the poorest performers.
1
Find and Triage "Interesting" Stocks
Look for stocks that have relatively attractive fundamentals and are controversial and are consistent with your style and mandate.
Zero in on the 15% of your entire investable universe that is "interesting", not on a broker's subset where 85% is rated as "buy"
2
Maximise Portfolio Exposure to "Idiosyncratic" Risk
Ensure your risk budget is spread across a number of largely unrelated, stock-specific exposures, simulate ways to increase expected active return / active risk ratio.
Transparently assess your portfolio's past performance and future performance prospects
3
Respond to "top-down" macro signals and smart portfolio alerts
Get a real time read of prevailing macro expectations to inform tactical allocation decisions and get alerted whenever an array of signals calls for your attention on a specific holding or portfolio characteristic.