A Note on HYLD

HYLD, the advisorshares short term high yield ETF has taken a sharp price decline over the last few days. The ETF went ex dividend on September 24  with a $.32 dividend. Morningstar's analysis puts the 30 day SEC yield at 10.92%.

Since the duration is 2.8 years  the ETF should be less exposed to changes in the overall level of interest rates than longer duration bonds  such as  those in the high yield bond index ETF JNK which has a 4.2 year duration, And its yield is  close to 4% higher than the JNK

Last year HYLD eliminated stocks from its portfolio and significantly reduced its exposure to the energy sector. Its assets under management have declined sharply and are now under $300 million.      This means the instrument can be extremely volatile and thus are definitely not for short term investors/traders. And poor execution in trades in HYLD can be particularly costly.

As yields have moved up/prices declined funds have flowed out of high yield ETFs. JNK  the largest high yield ETF lost just under $600 million in assets in the week from September 22 -28 second only to XLV the healthcare SPDR ETF (more performance chasing). But because the fund is liquid the price of the ETF has remained close to intrinsic value, In fact according to Morningstar it traded at a slight premium on September 29.This is despite the fact that the trading volume was 11.8 million shares vs an average of 8 million

HYLD however suffered from a lack of liquidity. When there is a spike in volume it can move to a large discount to intrinsic value as traders react to price regardless of value. Therefore as of market close on September 29 it is trading at a discount of 3.26% to intrinsic value. This is compared to an average discount of .21%. In other words $1 worth of the bonds in HYLD was selling at $.9674 


While there is no guarantee the discount will close in the near term long term investors would certainly be advised not to sell with the ETF trading at such a large discount. It is not surprising that the large price decline occurred on a day of high volume on September 28 . On that day HYLD fell from 37.05 to 35.90  a decline of  2,8% pushing it to a large  discount vs intrinsic value You can see below the volume compared to previous days. listed are high, low close and volume.

Sep 29, 2015	35.62	36.63	35.62	35.88	52,600	35.88
Sep 28, 2015	37.05	37.05	35.80	35.90	170,600	35.90
Sep 25, 2015	36.92	37.24	36.88	37.10	21,400	37.10
Sep 24, 2015	37.17	37.49	36.92	36.94	47,300	36.94
Sep 24, 2015	0.322 Dividend
Sep 23, 2015	37.69	37.75	37.50	37.51	77,100	37.19
Sep 22, 2015	37.72	37.80	37.52	37.61	51,600	37.29
Sep 21, 2015	37.82	38.04	37.72	37.95	45,100	37.62
Sep 18, 2015	37.96	38.05	37.78	37.90	70,600	37.57
Sep 17, 2015	37.80	38.19	37.78	38.08	74,300	37.75
Sep 16, 2015	38.08	38.18	37.52	37.88	72,700	37.55
Sep 15, 2015	38.32	38.32	37.92	37.93	82,300	37.60
Sep 14, 2015	38.33	38.33	38.23	38.24	9,100	37.91

What could have happened to cause this move ? it seems the best explanation is poor execution by a seller/sellers of HYLD. I have written before about the importance of trade execution. In this case it seems pretty clear that whoever was selling HYLD on September 28 wasn't practicing good trade execution,. HYLD fell 2.4% in the first two hours of trading with a large spike in volume during that period. On this 2 day chart below you can see the price decline on the spike in volume (bottom scale). It is also clear something very strange went on during the open on Tuesday the 29th..another example of the rule of avoiding trading during the opening hour of trading.

What conclusions can be drawn from this:

• HYLD is definitely not a short term trading instrument, in order to benefit from its high yield it needs to be held longer term to capture the dividend flow and not to be overly concerned with short term movements such as those that push the ETF to large discounts vs intrinsic value. In order to benefit from the high yield one must have the fortitude to hold through the price fluctuations

• Trade execution is crucial particularly in relatively low liquidity instruments like HYLD,

• Sales at the current discount of 3% are certainly does not look to be a good point to sell, those looking for an entry point might find the price reflecting the heavy discount an attractive one,

On the WIsdom of Those Forecasts By Wall Street "Experts"

WSJ

Strategists had barely changed their views through the middle of the year. It wasn’t until the S&P 500 sharply dove more than 10% in the middle of August that Wall Street started becoming less optimistic on the path for equities in 2015.

Since it is always hard to find a Wall Street Expert working at a brokerage firm who isnt optimitic, there isnt a single analyst surveyed in the article that doesnt see the market ending the year higher than current levels with the average of those surveyed with a year end targe of 2177 for the S+P 500 which is around 15% higher than the current 1884.

More on Trade Execution

In an earlier post I reviewed best practices related to trade execution that a good advisor would avoid and that robo advisors, human advisors, and individual investors may miss. The drag on performance may be well in excess of anything you might pay to a "more expensive" advisor that is more sophisticated in his trade execution.

The WSJ reviews another "bad practice" in trade execution: trading on the market open especially on a Monday morning.

Rising stock-market volatility is proving especially costly for retail investors who typically buy and sell stocks soon after the market opens—often the most perilous time of the trading day.

Buying and selling by individual investors is especially heavy in the minutes immediately after the market opens in the U.S. at 9:30 a.m. Eastern time, when the chances of getting the best price for a stock are lower and swings tend to be bigger, traders and other market observers said.

But within minutes, the gap between the price sellers want for a stock, known as the “ask” price, and what buyers are offering, the “bid,” shrinks sharply and continues to narrow up until the end of the trading session. This quirk in the market has been amplified in recent weeks amid the big market swings.

The smaller gap, or spread, is better for investors because they are less likely to overpay for a stock or sell below the prevailing price in the market. The wider the spread, the more exposed investors are to high costs, which can erode returns at a time when major stock indexes are down for the year.

Of course it doesnt matter whether the market is up or down for the year, these costs reduce the return on the portfolio.

Trades for individual investors tend to be executed in the morning, because they put in orders the previous evening through their online brokerage accounts or their financial advisers, often after they have been able to catch up on the news after work. About 15% of average daily trading volume is driven by individual investors, according to TABB Group, a research and consulting firm focused on financial markets....

And Mondays are even worse:

“Mondays are generally going to be some of your busiest market opens as well because you’re queuing up orders over the weekend,” said Gregg Murphy, senior vice president of retail brokerage at Fidelity. “A large percentage of trade activity takes place in the first 30 minutes of market open.”

Goldman Sachs Forecasts $20 Oil..You Be the Judge of How Reliable that forecast is

Goldman trims 2016 West Texas price forecast to $45 a barrel

• September 11, 2015
• Surplus seen persisting into next year 
• Goldman Sachs Group Inc. cut its oil price forecasts as it sees a global glut persisting into 2016 on further OPEC production growth that may force prices to drop as low as $20 a barrel.

  The bank trimmed its 2016 estimate for West Texas Intermediate to $45 a barrel, from a May
•  projection of $57, according to an e-mailed research note Friday. 
• Goldman also reduced its 2016 Brent crude prediction to $49.50 a barrel, from $62
• It wasnt hard to find this January 15, 2014

Over the last several weeks, crude has been whipsawed by conflicting expectations out of the Middle East: Iran is seen as potentially increasing exports as it reaches a deal that curbs its nuclear ambitions, but at the same time, instability in Iraq and Libya have knocked more than 1 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil offline.

Where to next? Forecasts for crude, gas, and natgas: Goldman

	3m	6m	12m
WTI Crude Oil	$99	$96	$90
Brent Crude Oil	$108	$105	$100
RBOB Gasoline	$3	$3	$2
NYMEX Heating	$3	$3	$3
NYMEX Nat. Gas	$4	$4	$4
UK NBP Nat. Gas	$71	$72	$78

Source: Goldman Sachs Global Investment Research

• Brent crude ended 2014 at a bit under $60

Does that Higher Advisor Fee from the Human Always Mean Worse Returns than The Super Low Fee "Robot"....Do More Advisor Assets Management Cause Lower Potential Returns ?

I am a big believer that investors should keep a sharp eye out for the costs related to their investments. That is the reason I recommend portfolios composed of low cost ETFs.

But a closer look shows that this claims by robo advisors about the improved investment results because of their low fees may not actually be accurate upon closer inspection. Here is how Wealthfront presents its comparison to an advisor charging 1%

They estimate that a wealthfront advisor would benefit from the full impact of the difference between and advisors 1% fee and their fee of .25% every year over the life of the clients account.

 Betterment makes a similar claim calculating an investors savings of  over $55,000 on a $100,000 initial investment over 20 years.

Those claims are extremely simplistic and the market activity of the last few weeks is a case study in why.

Execution matters

The always insightful Jason Zweig of the WSJ  Presented some basic rules for readjusting portfolios and trading. These are particularly important in the volatile markets we are seeing as of late:

 trade seldom — but, when you do, trade smart. Check in advance to see how late in the day you can buy a mutual fund and still get that day’s price. Avoid buying individual stocks or exchange-traded funds during the first hour (9:30 to 10:30 a.m. Eastern time) or last half hour (3:30 to 4 p.m.) of trading, when prices can be especially prone to big swings.

And always use “limit orders” stipulating the highest price at which you will buy (or the lowest at which you would sell

If you have an advisor ask about his trade execution.

Unfortunately simply using an advisor doesn’t guarantee proper execution as the article notes:

On Aug. 24, the day the Dow dropped 1,000 points, it materialized that some financial advisers don’t use limit orders when trading ETFs. “There are still a lot of advisers who built their practice on mutual funds and have never really been through the wringer on trading ETFs,” says Dave Nadig, director of exchange-traded funds at FactSet. “This volatile market is unforgiving for people who don’t know what they’re doing” — and their clients.

 Those who ran into trouble would be those who had orders in place to sell an ETF that fell by a certain percentage. Such orders may have been executed at a price much lower than even where the order kicked in as shares fell quickly, he says.

TDAmeritrade Institutional, TDAmeritrade Inc.’s unit supporting independent registered investment advisers, said it has heard from some advisers who had ETF stop orders execute at the market open Monday. Advisers were not asking for the firm to reverse trades and the firm has no plans to do so at this time, a spokeswoman said in an email.

“Advisors we’re hearing from understand our responsibility is to make sure the mechanics of the stop-loss orders work as they are designed, which they did,” she said in the email. “Once a stop order is triggered, the order is turned into a market order to trade at the next available price. Extraordinary market volatility at the open played a huge part in pricing swings of some ETFS.”

Not surprisingly Zweig advises

So, if you use an adviser, make sure he always uses limit orders when trading ETFs. He can’t bottom-fish for you if he doesn’t know how to use the equipment.

In fact in many cases you don’t even have to ask your advisor. Many advisor managed accounts are separately managed for each account and you should be able to see the details of your trade executions in the information your broker provides

About Execution by Those Robo Advisors

The trade execution at a robo advisor is not at all transparent. It is impossible to know what time of day the trades are executed and how they are entered are they market orders or limit orders. How often does the account trade. We already know that Betterment proudly declares that it trades on a daily basis for “optimal tax management”. But does all that tax management trading actually increase the performance of the portfolio pre and after tax ?

If Jason Zweig recommends trading seldom what happens to a wealthfront portfolio when as they themselves state part of their strategy is to trade as frequently as daily or even several times a day.

Critics of actively traded mutual funds have pointed out the potential costs of market impact the slippage between the market price when a mutual fund begins to execute a trade and the final price of its transaction. A large trade “moves the market against the trader” as the price moves up as the large investor executes its buys (or the opposite for sells)

Most robo advisors trade ETFs but Wealthfront with its strategy executes trades in hundreds if not thousands of individual stocks increases the potential for market impact. John Bogle the pioneer of index funds estimates the cost of market impact at .50% 

With robo advisors growing rapidly in assets –Wealthfront is already over $2 billion the potential costs due to market impact is extremely high…and remember Wealthfront is trading stocks not ETFs.

The more assets in the investment advisory firm the more likely for unseen costs because of execution. Investment firms are required to enter trades as block orders” all accounts buying or selling a security must have their trades aggregated in an order. The larger the assets the greater the potential for market impact or for the trades executed in a mechanical manner.all trades entered at a particular time of day regardless of market conditions for example.

A smaller more sophisticated advisor might be able to “fine tune” the execution to take account of trading and market conditions.

The real question to ask about the “cost” of those higher fees or perhaps more accurately in the case of robo advisors the cost of those lower fees and automated activity.

All of the calculations and assumptions and marketing material related to robo (and probably many other advisors) are based on the portfolios performing exactly as the underlying indices and ETFs performed…based on closing prices.

But in reality there is absolutely no guarantee of that …and probably no way to even check .certainly not with a robo advisor and with extreme difficulty if at all with other investment advisors.

The hidden costs of execution particularly when comparing a large robo advisor executing trades in the $100s of millions compared to an advisor that executes taking into account trading technigwues an advisor that in Zweig’s terminology “knows how to use the equipment”.

What if you do it yourself ?

Many individuals choose to manage their portfolios on their own often persuaded by the argument that if an advisor “just manages a stable allocation of ETFs” the fee is a needless cost.

Zweig notes some important guidelines for executing transactions such as not trading in the first or last hour of trading and using limit orders. There are many other techniques involved in improving execution. Do many investors have the time and skill to execute their transactions in the optimal manner ?

The difference in performance because of execution can easily exceed advisor fees, not to mention added value through rebalancing and tax management. While there is no reason not to expect a full range of services from your investment advisor..proper execution alone is an important factor.

How are Those Alternative Asset Classes Working Out

So called "alternative asset classes" have gained increasing popularity over the last few years. In fact they are in included in the portfolios of "robo advisors" aimed at inexperienced small investors.

These instruments are touted as providing returns uncorrelated wit standard asset classes thus giving additional diversification. Another benefit that is marketed is as an income producer in an environment of low interest rates.

I think it was Warren Buffett who stated that when the tide goes out we can see who is naked. A review of some of the major "alternative asset classes' shows that in many cases they simply added risk often unanticipated to portfolios.

First off here are the major asset classes for comparison

ACWI total world equity  -4.9% ytd       -8% one month

VTI total US equities  -3.8% ytd            -6.8% one month

AGG total US bonds +.4% ytd                -.3% one month

Master Limited Partnerships
These have been seen as attractive due to their relatively high yield. But they also are concentrated in the energy sector. The price of oil has declined causing the same for the MLPs. Additionally as is the case in many of these assets they are all interest rate sensitive ad prospects of lower rates hurts their performance.

AMLP  -13.4% ytd  -3.2% one month

REITs  This is again seen as a good source of income stream and a diversifier to stocks. As s the case of  MLPs they are also highly interest rate sensitive

VNQ   -8% ytd  -7.7% one month

Commodities: This too has been touted as a diversfier away from stocks, It has generally been touted as an inflation hedge although the data on that is far from conclusive. A far better inflation hedge is inflation protected bonds. The increased exposure to commodities has not diversified portfolios from the recent market decline it has exacerbated it. The stock market selloff around the world began with China and the slower economic growth in China has driven commodity prices lower well before the stock selloff.In fact commodities have fallen so much earlier in the year that they actually have declined less than the world stock markets in the pas month.

DBC

-17.1% ytd -2.1% one month

Emerging market bonds: This has been a major target fro investment by those seeking higher yields than those available in US $ bonds. I have written numerous times that the modest pickup in yield is outweighed by the additional currency and other risks. The currency movements in emerging markets has hit this asset class hard.

EBND
-12.4% ytd  One month -4.6%

"Smart Beta"

"Smart Beta" has been a buzzword in investment industry over the last few years. Most of these are variants of value investing and these types of passive funds and etfs have existed for a long time.

Value strategies have suffered during the market rally which has been driven by momentum/growth stocks and have actually fallen more than the overall market last month. But these results should not be surprising value strategies are for patient investors and gain their long term performance during recoveries from market selloffs

VTV Large Value -6.9% one month  -6.4%

VBR Small Value  -5.9% one month      -5.4%


Dividend and Dividend Growth strategies: These have gained a tremendous following. Apparently there is a large group of investor either through mutual funds, stock picking or ETFs that have flocked to higher dividend stocks and those with a record or rising dividends. Many of these investors argue that as long as the portfolio throws off attractive dividends, the price fluctuations don't matter.I find this argument illogical but it is not the place to "debate" that here.

Such portfolios tend to be highly correlated with interest rate moves higher rates drives down prices. Also the great interest in these stocks has led to high valuations with sectors like utilities often reaching above market average p/es.

SDY dividend champions
-6.9% ytd   -6.4% one month


Momentum and Minimum Value

Two "smart beta" strategies that are relatively new to the ETF marketplace do offer something different and are based on some rigorous academic research. While there is never any guaranteed that what has worked in past markets will work in the future the results have been interesting.

These two seem to have in fact given exposure to factors different than"value" or "growth"

Momentum strategies have performed as advertised: stronger than market performance in strong up markets and potentially worse markets during selloffs and higher than market volatility. There is considerable overlap between momentum and "growth stocks" but there performances have differed.

MTUM  +2.5% ytd  -6.4% one month

Minimum Variance strategies are designed to be less volatile than the overall markets thus outperforming in down markets and underperforming in strong up markets and net providing better risk adjusted returns than the market. Although there is overlap with value indices they are distinctive enought to produce different returns

USMV     -1.1 ytd                -5.6% one month


Many researchers have argue that combing momentum and minimum volatility indices in a portfolio offers potential for better risk adjusted returns than the overall market. Time will tell the "live" data set when these instruments have traded is too short.