According to the International Monetary Fund, emerging markets now represent more than a third of global GDP — and are expected to grow at a faster rate than advanced economies. With such explosive growth, investors often assume that an investment strategy focused on growth would yield better...

In this paper we review changes in the insurance industry due to new risk-based regulations such as Solvency 2 and SST. The move from corporate management based on cash-flow to risk-based management is described and discussed through its consequences on capital management, economic valuation and...

“In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” — Benjamin FranklinThe Brandes Institute has added a third inevitability to Ben Franklin's famous quip about life's certainties: short-term underperformance among active managers. Over the years, Institute research...

Global micro-cap stocks have provided greater diversification benefits and a more robust long-term value premium than small- and mid- to large-cap stocks. Among the features contributing to these benefits for micro caps worldwide:• a large, diverse universe with little sell-side research...

Rating standards affect risk-taking behavior of firms. We present a model that explains firms' selection of target ratings and their best response to a rating standard change, which prompts some firms to increase the risk. We then test the main predictions of the model using a natural experiment...

The Financial Crisis of 2008/2009 increased plan sponsors' desire to control risk — and we are still seeing the unfortunate effects. Many approaches adopted to control risk are illusions of risk control. Of particular concern is how sponsors are misapplying tools designed to monitor...

The possibility to minimize volatility of the systematic risk while maximizing returns, is the use of an optimized buy long/sell short strategy that takes into account, that the market model is kinky. The equation of the market model – including a beta plus for increasing markets and a beta...

We examine whether fair value (FV) input levels and estimation sources are related to FV inflation, the difference between an insurer's FV estimate and the consensus FV estimate across the security's holders. FV inflation is higher and self-estimation more likely, when insurers report using...

This paper reviews the recent literature on CAPM and APT, and reaches a surprising conclusion. While APT died a silent death, CAPM's progeny is alive and well! We provide a short review of the recent literature on the conditional CAPMs, intertemporal CAPMs, and higher-order Co-Moments-based...