ALTERNATIVE INVESTMENTS: CTAs, HEDGE FUNDS, AND FUNDS-OF-FUNDS

Bing Liang
Additional contact information
Bing Liang: Isenberg School of Management, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA 01003, USA

Chapter 5 in The World of Hedge Funds:Characteristics and Analysis, 2005, pp 109-127 from World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.

Abstract: AbstractIn this paper, we study alternative investment vehicles such as hedge funds, funds-of-funds, and commodity trading advisors (CTAs) by investigating their performance, risk, and fund characteristics. Considering them as three distinctive investment classes, we study them not only on a stand-alone basis but also on a portfolio basis. We find several interesting results. First, CTAs differ from hedge funds and funds-of-funds in terms of trading strategies, liquidity, and correlation structures. Second, during the period 1994–2001, hedge funds outperform funds-of-funds, which in turn outperform CTAs on a stand-alone basis. These results can be explained by the double fee structure but not survivorship bias. Third, correlation structures for alternative investment vehicles are different under different market conditions. Hedge funds are highly correlated to each other and are not well hedged in the down markets with liquidity squeeze. The negative correlations with other instruments make CTAs suitable hedging instruments for insuring downside risk. When adding CTAs to the hedge fund portfolio or the fund-of-fund portfolio, investors can benefit significantly from the risk-return trade-off.

Keywords: Hedge Funds; Investment Analysis; Quantitative Analysis; Risk Analysis; Portfolio Analysis; Portfolio Returns; Risk of Hedge Funds (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2005
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.worldscientific.com/doi/pdf/10.1142/9789812569448_0005 (application/pdf)
https://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/9789812569448_0005 (text/html)
Ebook Access is available upon purchase.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wsi:wschap:9789812569448_0005

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in World Scientific Book Chapters from World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Tai Tone Lim ().