FT

THE CONTRARIAN INVESTOR

My post-graduate economics supervisor suffered from one of the most debilitating and chronic diseases known to afflict academics.

I have a small, helpful suggestion for all of you who manage investment decisions for family offices, charities and rich individuals: the next time your highly paid, immaculately coiffured investment manager presents you with a sorry and lamentable series...

$123trn is a lot of money - it could almost repay most of the UK government's UK debt and my credit card bill combined.

Mark Lyttleton is probably the one name that comes to most people's lips when describing a successful, popular implementation of an explicitly absolute return strategy. His fund's record is of consistent positive net of fees returns through the market...

Tim Russell is one of the stars of Cazenove's hugely successful move into mainstream fund management - he manages a small stable of hedge funds and Ucits III absolute return mandates all focused on making money through the business cycle. Unlike his closest...

I have just come back from the US having visited Vanguard fund management's campus outside Philadelphia.

It is that time of year when the big investment banks try to justify the vast amounts of money lavished on their research departments by presenting their annual forecast for the year ahead.

Over the last few months I have been spending a fair bit of time talking absolute returns with some of the best fund managers in the business.

Over the past few months I have constantly banged the drum for a brave new world in which asset managers finally bite the bullet and launch cost effective multi-asset portfolios, comprised largely if not exclusively of ETFs.