A week screamed by and I did not get to post. If you were bothered by this…great! Also, I apologize. I have a young kid, a career, and a dog (two, actually) that is literally hitting my leg with his stuffed chicken toy, insisting that I play with him, as I type this. In between diapers and toy tosses, however, I was able to get through some pods.
This time, I am going to highlight a great new podcast from some intellectual heavyweights in the investing community: AQR has entered the pod-test.
Cliff Asness is the most prominent member of the firm in the media. He’s a great follow on twitter. While he will occasionally get worked up about some political issue, he’s brilliant and hilarious, so don’t block him on those rare occasions.
Asness the Managing Principal at AQR, studied under Professor Fama at the University of Chicago, and (I think) was the manager of quantitative strategies at Goldman Sachs Asset Management before launching AQR. He posts on a blog on the AQR site and it is great to check out for the research and masterful Seinfeld references and other humor. If you want more background check out The Quants (although I think he has taken some issue with his portrayal):
Anyhow, AQR is one of the best quantitative finance shops around (even Jack Bogle has said he hates their hedge funds less than most others…high praise). Their site is among the linked “investing resources” on the right margin of the page.
AQR’s new podcast is called The Curious Investor. The episodes can be found here.
Two episodes are live as of publication. As you would expect from a big, media savvy shop the production quality is high. The two hosts are smart AQR employees (one is a V.P. and the other is a Managing Director, both are CFA charter holders).
The second episode is sort of a good basic discussion about what factors are. If you are not familiar with the quantitative/academic research about factors, the episode will likely be very interesting to you. If you have any questions, you can find some answers via the resources linked on this site.
The main thrust of the episode (in addition to a general explanation) is that one should not place credence in purported factors that emerge based on data analysis without any supporting theory explaining the existence of the pattern in the data and why it is likely to continue in the future. The episode is called Face the Factors.
One thing that is pretty awesome about going to the AQR site for these pods is that they have a page set up for each one with some related blog posts and research for download. If you are so inclined, you can listen to the general overview and then go deeper down the rabbit hole. I am sure this will evolve nicely given their research and publication firepower.
The second episode is about behavioral economics and featured several heavy weight academics, including recent Nobel winner Richard Thaler. I have discussed Thaler and behavioral finance on this site several times before. He has written the following books, which you should consider checking out:
Thaler and co. have an entertaining and lively discussion about “the dumb things people do” with their investments. He always seems like a funny and down to earth guy. In sum, it is a great start for what is sure to be a worthy entrant in to the finance podcasting landscape. [Now if Research Affiliates can just start a blog so they can take shots at one another about Smart Beta versus Factor and timing (and whatever else), I for one will be a happy man.]
One final, interesting, note that ties in to stuff I am currently reviewing in relation to my portfolio: In the episode, Thaler makes a modest (not thirsty) mention of his asset management shop, Fuller & Thaler Asset Management, Inc.
I was looking at some REITs last week as potential destinations for my GPT proceeds. As you may recall, I noted that Fuller Thaler had a fairly large position in Brixmor Property Group (“BRX”) in a previous post about retail REITs. See Retail REITs: Apocalypse or Opportunity?
At the time I said:
BRX has shown up in the holdings of a mutual fund that behavioral economist Richard Thaler is associated with. The strategy of the relevant fund is based, partially, on statistically cheap stocks with insider buying and/or buybacks.
Last week, while updating my info on BRX I noticed (as of 06/30/18) Fuller Thaler added about 10% more to the BRX position. They were owners of about 3.6% of the outstanding units in BRX. I also noticed that Fuller Thaler has added Kite Realty (“KRG”), another of the retail REITs I have on my watchlist, to the portfolio over the last couple of quarters ( up to about 3% of the outstanding).
In my next post, I’m planning to take a look at these two REITs and a couple of other potential options for my GPT proceeds. I will also talk about a recent summary piece discussing research about historical REIT returns.
Thanks for reading!