I argue that delegated portfolio management can cause the equilibrium relation between CAPM beta and expected stock returns to become flat, instead of linearly positive, and propose an alternative to the widely used Fama and French (1993) 3-factor asset pricing model which incorporates this...

The Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) predicts a positive relation between risk and return, but empirical studies find the actual relation to be flat, or even negative. This paper provides a broad overview of explanations for this ‘volatility effect' that have been proposed in different...

Some exchange-traded funds (ETFs) are specifically designed for harvesting factor premiums, such as the size, value, momentum and low-volatility effects. Other ETFs, however, may implicitly go against these factors. This paper analyzes the factor exposures of US equity ETFs and finds that,...

The added value of smart beta indices is known to be explained by exposures to established factor premiums, but does that make these indices suitable for implementing a factor investing strategy? This paper finds that the amount of factor exposure provided by popular smart beta strategies...

Some exchange-traded funds (ETFs) are specifically designed for harvesting factor premiums, such as the size, value, momentum, and low-volatility effects. Other ETFs, however, may implicitly go against these factors. This paper analyzes the factor exposures of U.S. equity ETFs and finds that,...

High-risk stocks do not have higher returns than low-risk stocks in all major stock markets. This paper provides a comprehensive overview of this low-risk effect, from the earliest asset pricing studies in the nineteen seventies to the most recent empirical findings and interpretations since....

This paper examines the exposures of low-volatility portfolios to various sources of systematic risk. Our analysis includes interest rate, implied volatility, liquidity, commodity, sentiment, macroeconomic, and climate risk factors. We find that low-volatility portfolios lower the exposure to...

Betas are used in many applications ranging from asset pricing tests, cost of capital estimation, investment management and risk management. Beta needs to be estimated, and to reduce estimation error, shrinkage to its cross-sectional average value of one is often applied. Since beta is the...

We explore the cross-section of factor returns using a sample of 150+ equity factors. Most factors exhibit a positive premium and a negative market beta in the long run. Factor themes with a clear positive beta, in particular low leverage and size, have no alpha after controlling for this beta...

Short-term alpha signals are generally dismissed in traditional asset pricing models, primarily due to market friction concerns. However, this paper demonstrates that investors can obtain a significant net alpha by combining signals applied on a liquid global universe with simple buy/sell...