Risk Adjusted Rates of Return

Meyers, Glenn G. ( (no email) )
Thu, 23 Apr 1998 16:59:17 -0400

On page C1 of the March 20 Wall Street Journal, there is an article
about M-Squared - a risk adjusted rate of return. The M-Squared refers
to grandfather/granddaughter team with the names Monigliani. One member
of the team was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics, the other member
currently works for Morgan-Stanley.

What M-Squared does is it "allows investors to analyze a bunch of
disparate as if they had all shown the same volatility. It does that by
hypothetically blending shares of a volatile fund with cash" to match
the "S&P 500's volatility."

Now I have always been suspicious about many of the various methods of
finding risk-adjusted discount rates. I prefer observable rates. This
strikes me as being different in that the formula for determining this
seems explicit (I did not check any references, I just read the WSJ
article.), and the components are observable.

I would like to hear what others think of this approach. Would this
approach be superior to the various risk adjustments that we all know
and (perhaps) love?

Glenn Meyers
Insurance Services Office, Inc.
Internet: gmeyers@iso.com
Voice:(212) 898-5938
Fax: (212) 898-6060

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