When is alternative beta useful?

When is alternative beta useful?

Suhail Shaikh, chief investment officer at Fulcrum Asset Management, explains how portfolios can be improved by allocating more to alternative beta.

In recent years, a popular way to improve the performance of investor portfolios has been to access new sources of return, including allocating to alternative or ‘smart’ beta. But how can alternative beta complement more traditional investments and benefit portfolios? There is no single definition for the term alternative beta, with investors and investment providers using it to describe a broad spectrum of approaches. These can range from relatively simple investments in non-market-capitalisation indices (for example, equally-weighted indices), through to the capture of fundamental r...