Voice of experience
Pictet Asset Management was one of the pioneers of the multi-strategy approach in Europe, launching our Alphanatics strategy back in 2004.
Our goal at the time was to develop a strategy that minimised market risk and maximised active risk. That meant being ready to give up some risk premia (by limiting beta and interest rate duration, for instance) in exchange for a greater chance of stable returns.
We also wanted to harness the most attractive qualities of of hedge funds or funds of hedge funds - exposure to a broad, investable universe, unconstrained long and short investing, the ability to leverage - but none of their shortcomings, such as excessive reliance on carry and style biases, uncontrolled and excessive leverage, liquidity mismatch. This philosophy is as relevant today as it was when we devised it..
During the past 18 years, we have fine-tuned our approach, establishing a track record of delivering stable, alpha-driven returns to investors and growing the strategy to EUR4.7 billion. Today, our allocation spans market neutral and event driven equity strategies on a global, regional or sector basis, as well as fixed income relative value and special situations strategies, including sovereign debt (DM and EM), credit (investment grade, high yield and distressed), and foreign exchange (see Fig. 2).
