Investing Research Articles

Financial media and expert commentators often cite the U.S. unemployment rate as an indicator of economic and stock market health, generally interpreting a jump (drop) in the unemployment rate as bad (good) for stocks. Conversely, investors may interpret a falling unemployment rate as a trigger for increases in the Federal Reserve target interest rate (and… Keep Reading

U.S. job gains or losses receive prominent coverage in the monthly financial news cycle, with media and expert commentators generally interpreting employment changes as an indicator of future economic and stock market health. One line of reasoning is that jobs generate personal income, which spurs personal consumption, which boosts corporate earnings and lifts the stock… Keep Reading

We have updated monthly allocations and performance data for the Simple Asset Class ETF Momentum Strategy (SACEMS) and the Simple Asset Class ETF Value Strategy (SACEVS). We have also updated performance data for the Combined Value-Momentum Strategy. We have updated the Trading Calendar to incorporate data for March 2020.

The home page, Simple Asset Class ETF Momentum Strategy (SACEMS) and Simple Asset Class ETF Value Strategy (SACEVS) now show preliminary positions for April 2020. SACEMS rankings are unlikely to change by the close. SACEVS allocations are currently sensitive to various yields and S&P 500 Index level, so they are likely to shift by the… Keep Reading

Economic data arrive too slowly to help investors navigate crises such as the coronavirus-19 outbreak. Are there data that support quick reactions? In their March 2020 paper entitled “Coronavirus: Impact on Stock Prices and Growth Expectations”, Niels Gormsen and Ralph Koijen employ equity index dividend futures by maturity to understand the evolution of investor reactions… Keep Reading

A subscriber requested evaluation of a streamlined version of the Simple Asset Class ETF Momentum Strategy (SACEMS) that considers only three exchange-traded funds (ETF): SPDR S&P 500 (SPY) iShares Barclays 20+ Year Treasury Bond (TLT) iShares iBoxx $ Investment Grade Corporate Bond (LQD) To evaluate, we test a strategy that each month picks the one… Keep Reading

Below is a weekly summary of our research findings for 3/23/20 through 3/27/20. These summaries give you a quick snapshot of our content the past week so that you can quickly decide what’s relevant to your investing needs. Subscribers: To receive these weekly digests via email, click here to sign up for our mailing list.

Are some calendar months more likely to exhibit stock market continuation or reversal than others, perhaps due to seasonal or fund reporting effects? In other words, is intrinsic (times series or absolute) momentum an artifact of some months or all months? To investigate, we relate U.S. stock index returns for each calendar month to those… Keep Reading

A subscriber asked whether applying a simple moving average (SMA) filter to “Simple Asset Class ETF Momentum Strategy” (SACEMS) winners improves strategy performance. SACEMS each months picks winners from among the a set of eight asset class exchange-traded fund (ETF) proxies plus cash based on past returns over a specified interval. Since many technical traders… Keep Reading

Which equity factor model is best among non-U.S. global stock markets? In other words, what market/accounting variables are most important to investors screening non-U.S. stocks? In his February 2020 paper entitled “A Comparison of Global Factor Models”, Matthias Hanauer compares eight widely used equity factor models on a common dataset spanning stocks from 47 non-U.S…. Keep Reading