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Diversification Myths: Why Are You Investing In Individual Stocks?

By Chris Gilbert The age old question of exactly how many stocks to hold is likely never going to be definitively answered. There are entire books, even courses, on the subject after all. Since portfolio construction is more of an art than a science, in this post I want to break down relevant studies, examine historical data, and analyze some of the best investors in an attempt to come up with the optimal strategy . As always, please share your comments and thoughts below! Talking Points Diversification by the numbers Myths of diversification Why are you investing in individual stocks? “Wide diversification is only required when investors do not understand what they are doing.” – Warren Buffett By The Numbers My investing strategy, which is definitely not perfect, consists of holding relatively few stocks (around 10 or so). This is because I want to invest in wonderful companies purchased at attractive prices. I have found that these opportunities, especially of late, don’t seem to come around all that frequently. This also makes me a big believer in holding a decent amount of cash in my portfolio as well. But why adopt this strategy? It’s simple logic, the more stocks you own, or the more diversified you are, the less likely you are to underperform the market. By this same logic, however, you’re also much less likely to outperform the market. Say you own 2 stocks and one doubles while the other stays flat. You still earn a 50% return. With 4 stocks and one doubling – a 25% return. What about more? Say you own 10 stocks and one doubles while the others go nowhere. You’d still earn 10%. 20 stocks… 5%. 100 stocks… 1%. While this may be an oversimplified example, you get the point. The more stocks you own the more your results trend toward average. But let’s look at some more numbers. In the book, Investment Analysis and Portfolio Management , Frank Reilly reviewed studies regarding randomly selected stocks and found that as little as 12 stocks could attain around 90% of the maximum benefits of diversification. He also goes on to note if the individual investor is properly diversified, 18 or more stocks = full diversification according to his research, then the investor will average market performance. According to Mr. Reilly the only way to beat the market is by being less than fully diversified. In his book, You Can be a Stock Market Genius , Joel Greenblatt came to a similar conclusion. Greenblatt found statistics that showed owning only 2 stocks could eliminate 46% of non-market risk. This number climbs to 72% with 4 stocks, 81% with 5 stocks, and 93% with a 16-stock portfolio. As you can see, the amount of non-market risk can be decreased with the more stocks you own. Which was already obvious. But let’s keep going. You would need to own 32 stocks to eliminate 96% of non-market risk and a whopping 500 stocks to almost eradicate it (99%). Greenblatt’s point is, there seems to be a pattern of diminishing returns after a certain number of stocks. Personally, I would argue maximum benefit is to be had between 8-16 stocks. Myths Of Diversification Myth #1 – You can diversify away risk One of the main reasons investors are afraid to concentrate their portfolio is the belief that it’s too risky. While it may be true to a point, can you ever totally remove risk? We’ve already seen you can partially remove non-market risk, also known as unsystematic risk, by holding more stocks. But systematic risk is a different animal. This type of risk cannot be diversified away. Consider all of the factors that affect the stock market such as macroeconomics, irrationality, or interest rates. You’ll never be able to remove these elements from the equation if you own 1,000 stocks. Think of systematic risk as the inherent risk of investing in stocks. Myth $2 – Overdiversification is safer So what, you say. It still seems safer to own 100 stocks compared to 10. But is it? While you may dilute your unsystematic risk, how much do you really know about your portfolio? Would you even know which stocks you own? Maybe you invest in index funds, which is totally fine for some by the way (more on that later), but if you’re an individual investor and you own 40+ stocks, there is now way to know the ins and outs of every one. We’ll call this practical risk. Practical risk means you may lose your main advantage in the stock market, competitive insight. When you overdiversify, you may miss out on a great opportunity and be saddled with a regrettable investment because your focus is stretched too thin. Myth #3 – Diversification can increase success I’ve already explained two reasons why this is a myth. The more stocks you hold, or the more diversified you are, the more your results trend toward average. This inherently decreases success, unless you want average. Secondly, when you own too many stocks, practical risk increases. Overdiversification makes it very difficult to invest in wide-moat, wonderful companies. There simply isn’t that many great opportunities available at any given time. This also decreases chances of success. Lastly, when you begin to invest in many different stocks just to increase diversification, you increase portfolio turnover. This inevitably leads to more fees and commissions, which also puts a damper on potential success. “We believe that almost all really good investment records will involve relatively little diversification. The basic idea that it was hard to find good investments and that you wanted to be in good investments, and therefore, you’d just find a few of them that you knew a lot about and concentrate on those seemed to me such an obviously good idea. And indeed, it’s proven to be an obviously good idea. Yet 98% of the investing world doesn’t follow it. That’s been good for us.” – Charlie Munger Why Are You Investing In Individual Stocks? So we’ve seen the more stocks you hold, the less chance you have of underperforming the market. This also means the less chance you have of outperforming the market as well. By this logic, the only way to increase our chances of success is to hold less stocks than a completely diversified portfolio. By doing this, we take on the inherent risk of owning stocks, so the real question to ask yourself is why are you investing in individual stocks? “If you want to have a better performance than the crowd, you must do things differently from the crowd.” – John Templeton If your answer is to invest your money in a proven vehicle that, historically speaking, beats all other investment options… and you don’t want to take the time and effort to perform proper fundamental analysis on each and everyone of your stocks, then I would recommend an index fund . I mean let’s face it, we’re not all Warren Buffett or Peter Lynch and we’re likely not going to be. But there is still no situation I would ever recommend going out and buying 50 some odd stocks just to say you’re diversified. As we just talked about, this can actually increase risk and reduce your chances of success in a variety of ways. Index funds, on the other hand, are a great way to expose yourself to the stock market and are likely to beat every fund manager over the long haul anyway. Now, if you’re answer is you think you can beat the market, then I recommend you keeping a fairly concentrated portfolio of 8-12 stocks. Why 8-12? Well, for one, you don’t want to be too diversified for all the reasons stated above. And secondly, we’ve seen you can only diversify so much before the benefits begin to severely drop off. Lastly, if you’re really practicing a true value investing strategy, it’s unlikely you’re going to find an abundance of opportunities out there. To mitigate risk, search out high-quality companies with a competitive advantage, and purchase when they’re selling at a discount to their intrinsic value. By concentrating your portfolio, you can obtain a thorough understanding of each company, and coupled with a value investing strategy, decrease risk while increasing returns. Summary Strictly reviewing the numbers, it makes little sense to overdiversify your portfolio. Overdiversifying will not eliminate all risk nor increase your chances of success. If you are willing to practice a value investing strategy and research each of your investments, then focus your portfolio to 8-12 stocks. If not, invest in an index fund. Disclosure: None

Find Businesses That Control Their Destinies

By Frank Caruso, James T. Tierney, Jr. In a volatile world, it often feels like companies are subject to forces beyond their control. Finding companies that can steer their own course is a good way to capture resilient growth through changing market conditions. Not all companies are equally vulnerable to unpredictable market forces. Some exercise a much greater degree of control over their fate by virtue of having fundamentally sounder businesses based on stronger people, better products, superior operating execution and more responsible financial behavior. Searching for companies that command their destinies is one of several ways that active investors can capture excess returns over long time horizons. Balance Sheets Matter Balance sheet health – and low earnings volatility – is a great indicator of resilience. Investors should always scrutinize a company’s balance sheet, but in times of stress, this is even more important. Companies with less debt to service will pay less of a penalty in their financing costs when interest rates rise. Low debt ratios also are good indicators of a company’s flexibility to execute its strategy without relying on banks or credit markets. And businesses that can generate the cash they need to fund and invest in their operations are less beholden to the demands of externally sourced capital, and less vulnerable to a potential tightening of credit markets. Solid balance sheets and sustainable sources of growth are a winning combination. Companies with both are much better equipped to reward shareholders by increasing their dividends or buying back shares – even in tough market conditions. Companies in the top quintile of share repurchases – especially those with attractive valuations – have outperformed the market historically ( Display ). Click to enlarge Focus on Pricing Power Pricing power is another indicator of a company’s ability to deliver sustainable growth. With China and emerging markets slowing down, and with anemic recoveries in countries from the US to Europe, it’s difficult to find sources of new demand. And with inflation stuck at very low levels, it’s not easy for companies to raise prices. So companies that demonstrate pricing power in their industries are better positioned to improve their earnings than are their competitors that lack it. We think there are three keys to pricing power: innovation, competition and cost and inflation dynamics. Innovative products and services are capable of commanding higher prices even in a tough economy and amid low inflation. For example, Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL ) commands premium prices for its smartphones because of its innovative features and an ecosystem that allows all the company’s devices to work together seamlessly. A highly competitive environment makes it much more difficult for companies to raise prices. And in a low-inflation world, cost dynamics are crucial. Given this reality, we believe that companies with strong market positions and relatively fixed cost businesses are better placed to increase revenues while leveraging costs. For example, Visa (NYSE: V ) and MasterCard (NYSE: MA ) are the two largest global card networks. As such, they have had the ability to modestly increase prices over time while competitors have seen price erosion. And the nature of their networks means that additional transactions or volumes are highly profitable from an incremental margin perspective. Understanding these dynamics can help underpin an investing plan for an unpredictable world. Investors in passive equity portfolios may be more exposed to capricious market forces because they will hold many benchmark stocks that are more vulnerable to instability. In contrast, in our view, active equity managers can target companies with clear advantages in confronting erratic headwinds – and controlling their destinies – which can lead to resilient long-term returns. The views expressed herein do not constitute research, investment advice or trade recommendations and do not necessarily represent the views of all AB portfolio-management teams. Frank Caruso, CFA, Chief Investment Officer – US Growth Equities James T. Tierney, Jr., Chief Investment Officer – Concentrated US Growth

The Dangers Of Triple Levered ETFs

In a previous article , we explained why “buying oil” using ETFs comes with an overlooked set of complications. Well, things get even more messy if you want to amplify returns using leveraged ETFs. Investors should completely avoid trading any type of ETF, levered or unlevered, unless they understand exactly what’s going on under the hood. And that means actually taking the time to read the mammoth prospectus of the product in question. We know most amateur traders never bother to look at a 190-page prospectus. And so, with the recent popularity of oil gambling , we thought it prudent to dissect the triple-levered oil ETN – the VelocityShares 3x Long Crude Oil ETN (NYSEARCA: UWTI ). We can only hope that a few of you will listen to our warning and not burn through your precious account balance in the levered oil casino. To be clear, ETNs like UWTI are technically not ETFs. ETNs are “exchange traded notes.” An exchange traded note is a senior, unsecured debt security that a bank issues. Here’s a quick review of what these debt terms mean: These notes are tied to a benchmark. The bank promises to pay the investor the performance of the benchmark minus fees. UWTI is the Credit Suisse backed, 3x levered-long crude oil ETN. It tracks the daily movements of the S&P GSCI® Crude Oil Index while offering three times the index’s daily gain or loss. This means that if the oil index rallies 1%, UWTI should rally about 3%. And if the oil index falls 1%, then UWTI should fall about 3%. Keep in mind that the oil index itself does not track the spot price of oil perfectly. It suffers from the same problems we outlined here due to the “roll effect” in the futures market. You can see below that the index never really recovered from the 2008 fall. Click to enlarge Oil’s price fluctuations are volatile as it is. But if you throw 3x-leverage on top of them, you’ll get returns more unpredictable than next week’s lotto numbers. That’s what you’re facing when trading something like UWTI. This unpredictability is due to something called volatility drag. Vol drag is a well-known concept in professional quant land. It occurs in all price series due to negative compounding, but its effect is exacerbated and easier to see in a levered ETN like UWTI. Vol drag is not as complex as quants make it out to be. To understand vol drag, all you need to know is that a loss hurts more than a comparative gain. Imagine your account earns 10% one week and loses 10% the next. If you started with $100, your account would go up to $110, and then down to $99. The result would be a net-loss. You do not end up break-even and back at $100 as many would believe. Negative compounding prevents that from happening. The reality of negative compounding is what creates vol drag. The more price fluctuates up and down, the more you lose out. And if you take this same situation and apply 3x the leverage to it, the downside becomes even worse. Using the 3x-levered UWTI as an example, let’s say the oil index started at $100, gained 10% one day and then lost 9% the next. This would translate into UWTI gaining 30% on day 1 and falling by 27% the next. For simplicity reasons, let’s say that UWTI is also priced at $100 a share. The chart below shows the final values of the oil index and the leveraged ETF. The index ends up right around where it started. But UWTI falls lower than the index and actually finds itself underwater! The leverage embedded in UWTI causes this underperformance, which then compounds over time and has a large negative effect on total returns. Many investors fail to realize that placing a long oil bet in UWTI is far more complex than guessing if the price of oil will be $20 higher or lower next year. These gamblers that are long UWTI are also making a realized volatility bet. Realized volatility is a quant measure for how much price oscillates up and down. If price oscillates wildly, realized vol will be high. If price moves smoothly in a slow “drip drip” fashion, then realized vol will be low. The higher realized volatility you have, the more vol drag you get. And as we saw above, vol drag is not good for returns. Going back to our oil example, if oil rises and the path is smooth, then the uninformed gamblers can thank lady luck. UWTI will greatly outperform by avoiding vol drag. But if the path higher is noisy with wild oscillations, UWTI will track prices horribly and suffer in performance from major vol drag. The graphs below illustrate this effect: Click to enlarge In both these examples, the oil index goes from 100 to about 131. But they take very different paths to get there. In the example on the left, the index finishes at 131 in a smooth “drip drip” fashion. UWTI finishes around 171. The gambler outperformed. Index 31% gain. Gambler 71% gain. Fire up the jets to Cancun baby! On the right, the index finishes at 131 as well, but the path looks more like a hi-speed roller coaster ride. In contrast to the smooth scenario, UWTI finishes right around 100. Uh oh. Index 31% gain. Gambler 0%. No vacation this year. So even though the oil index finished higher, UWTI made NO money at all. Zip. Nada. Zilch. And here lies the plight of gambling with levered ETFs. If the price path is noisy and jagged, you end up with poor results, even if you were ultimately right on the direction of the index! If you’re wrong, and the oil index finishes lower, forget about it. Your account is taking heavy damage and your spouse is about ready with the divorce papers. The administrators of the UWTI ETN actually talk about this in the prospectus, but of course, no one reads it. “Daily rebalancing will impair the performance of the ETNs if the applicable Index experiences volatility from day to day and such performance will be dependent on the path of daily returns during the holder’s holding period. At higher ranges of volatility, there is a significant chance of a complete loss of the value of the ETNs even if the performance of the applicable Index is flat.” If you want to compete in this game over the long run, then stick with trading outright oil futures rather than UWTI, the VelocityShares 3x Inverse Crude Oil ETN (NYSEARCA: DWTI ), or even The United States Oil ETF, LP (NYSEARCA: USO ). Don’t gamble. If you’re unfamiliar with futures and how they work, we wrote a special report on them specifically for beginners. Good luck out there. Disclosure: I/we have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it. I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.