Otto van Hemert, Director of Core Strategies at Man AHL, discusses trend strategies, inflation resilience, seasonality in markets, and combining trend and seasonality in portfolios. He shares insights on measuring seasonality, the emergence of seasonality in commodities and financial markets, and the impact of long-term trend signals capturing seasonality effects.
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Quick takeaways
Behavioral signals remain constant and reliable for systematic trading, unlike value models.
Commodities show resilience during inflation spikes, offering potential as a robust investment.
Deep dives
Inflation-Resilient Strategies and the 2008 Financial Crisis
Following the 2008 financial crisis, Otto von Heymert's experience shaped his view on quantitative value investing. He observed that value models didn't adjust well to the changing environment, leading to significant losses. This led him to focus on behavioral signals as they remain constant over time, making them more reliable for systematic trading.
Building a New Systematic Macro Fund
Venturing into a new role at IMC, Otto von Heymert asked himself what strategies he could excel at in a crowded market. Focusing on patterns that repeated over time, such as calendar-related behaviors by institutions, he aimed for strategies with stable patterns for systematic trading.
The Best Strategies for Inflationary Times
In his research on inflationary times, Otto found that long bonds and equities are negatively impacted during inflation spikes, contrary to popular belief about stocks. He highlighted the resilience of commodities during inflationary periods, indicating their potential as a robust investment.
Seasonality and Trend in Portfolio Design
Otto discussed how seasonality and trend signals can complement each other in a portfolio. While trend signals indicate crisis alpha characteristics, seasonality signals rely on historical patterns at specific frequencies like annual, monthly, or quarterly cycles. Combining both signals requires managing the risk of overlapping positions and understanding their distinct risk attributes.
In today’s episode I speak with Otto van Hemert, Director of Core Strategies at Man AHL.
After briefly touching upon Otto’s background, we dive into one of his most popular papers: The Best Strategies for Inflationary Times. Otto shares the inspiration for the research as well as some of what he feels were the less obvious results.
Trend strategies, which were a standout winner in the inflation resilience horse race, serve as the bridge to a discussion on seasonality. Interestingly, Otto’s research suggests that long-term trend signals are actually capturing seasonality effects!
Otto shares his thoughts on different approaches to measuring seasonality, why he believes seasonality emerges in both commodities and financial markets, and how to think about combining trend and seasonality in a single portfolio.
Please enjoy my conversation with Otto van Hemert.
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