Enterprising Investor

In episode #369, recorded at the 72nd CFA Institute Annual Conference in London, Connson Locke, senior lecturer in practice in the department of management at the London School of Economics, talks about the what the underlying question in the leadership research has been: Are leaders born or made? Moreover, what makes a great leader? What are some tips for developing presence and influence as a leader?

In Episode #368, we highlight some of the key attributes and tricks of the trade required to ensure you sell your self effectively in business meetings. We all know the importance of first impressions but what does LWAR stand for and what are the 3Cs and how do they lead to communication excellence. In this interview all is explained.

In Episode #367, Psychologist and behavioral finance expert Dr. Daniel Crosby helps unlock investor behavior by explaining the four primary psychological tendencies that affect investment decision making and discussing how advisers can build rules-based behavioral portfolios for their clients.

In Episode #366, Brian Portnoy, CFA, explains wealth is "funded contentment." It is the ability to underwrite a meaningful life however one chooses to define that. Being rich is having "more." In this episode, Dr. Portnoy discusses his latest book, The Geometry of Wealth, explains what drives a more meaningful life, and shares how financial advisers should be coaches who can help their clients underwrite a life of meaning.

In Episode #366, Professor Mihir Desai talks about his book "The Wisdom of Finance - discovering humanity in a world of risk and return."

In Episode #365, we take a brief look at the US-China trade wars, to elections in India, and the ongoing Brexit debate. Never has there been a time when markets seem so closely connected with so many large-impact events unwinding.

In Episode #364, we walk about the difference between risk and uncertainty, and what implication does this difference have for decision making? This distinction is important in finance where pricing and investment decisions often use complex models that use assumed distribution to encapsulate risk. In reality, however, it can be argued that the future is inherently one of uncertainty and cannot be captured via a probability distribution and that a heuristic approach to decision making might be optimal. This leads to the proposition that less is more and that a heuristic approach, using less information, can produce better outcomes than a complex model dependent on numerous assumptions.

In Episode #363, Mithu Storoni, an eye surgeon who holds a PhD in Neuro-ophthalmology and author of the book "Stress-Proof," explains that chronic stress is changing the structure of the brain, thinning the part that carries the seat of sophisticated decision making and this is a problem for investors today because we have to compete with artificial intelligence (AI).

In Episode #362, Marko Papic, chief political strategist and senior vice president at BCA Research, discusses a variety of geopolitical risks, including the rise and implications of populism, the biggest threat to the single market in Europe, what's happening in China, and whether US President Donald Trump will be re-elected in 2020. He also provides investors an update on geopolitical risks to watch in 2019.

In Episode #361, we talk with Ken Sena and Bryan Healey, co-founders of Aiera, an adaptive, deep-learning platform designed to enhance active fundamental investment strategies. Aiera is also short for "artificially intelligent equity research analyst."

In Episode #359, Caitlin Long, a Wall Street veteran who has been a blockchain evangelist since 2014 and bitcoin since 2012, discusses bitcoin, blockchain myths versus reality, cryptocurrencies, why the world needs more systemic thinkers, how Satoshi Nakamoto solved the "Byzantine Generals Problem", and more.

In Episode #358, BlackRock's chief equity strategist, Kate Moore, tells viewers what she is counseling clients, offers advice on building a portfolio that is adequately defensive, and shares her outlook on China, among other things. She also discusses traits that make for the best investors and "the number one thing" that has contributed to her career success.

In Episode #357, Shamaila Khan, director, emerging market debt at AllianceBernstein, discusses a number of issues related to this market, including concerns about broader contagion, which countries look most fragile, bright spots, global macro trends, and active versus passive investing.

In Episode #356, Priscilla Hancock, a managing director, senior fixed-income specialist, and head of the fixed-income insights team at J.P. Morgan Asset Management, explains why investors should stay in fixed income, what attributes fixed-income portfolios should have to be well positioned for the future, and where there are risks and opportunities in the municipal bond markets.

In Episode #355, Philippe Desfosses, CIO of ERAFP, France's public service pension scheme, discusses the unique situation ERAFP is in-including regular inflows and a funding ratio of 105%--and the resulting challenges they face in applying the traditional framework. To further complicated things, some sovereign bonds have been producing negative returns. He suggests a number of changes that need to be made by the industry so pension fund managers can properly deal with the challenges presented by these unique situations.

In Episode #354, Shazia Syed, chief executive and chairperson of Unilever Pakistan Limited, describes her journey from management trainee to CEO, including the skills she needed to cultivate and lessons learned along the way. As an active advocate for greater gender diversity, Syed also discusses the importance of mentors in building one's career.

In Episode #353, Professor Raphael Douady and Ron Rimkus, CFA, discuss the evolution of risk management practices and where we are today. Douady believes even with the "quantitative-ization" of risk management and increased sophistication in data analysis, investors need to strive to uncover the invisible or hidden risks of their investment portfolios. Risk management strategies that only focus on the visible risks could exacerbate the invisible risks inadvertently. Douady also explains that the evaluation of risk is not just about fat tails, it is also about where the risks are coming from. Douady's "Dominant Factor Analysis" is one method that helps investors determine dominant factors and the possible sources of risks in the portfolio as a window to portfolio sensitivities under different market conditions. Finally, Douady warns that investors cannot seriously avoid economic cycles and notes it is better for investors to be prepared for a "Minsky Moment" rather than trying to predict it.

In Episode #352, Sonny Kalsi discusses his outlook, including the megatrends affecting real estate investment opportunities today. Kalsi examines the effects of disrupters—from the growth of online retail to the sharing economy and changing generational preferences. Kalsi explores single-family and multi-family housing in the United States 10 years after the Great Recession and changes he expects going forward during a rising interest rate environment. He shares his mistakes and lessons learned in his nearly 30 years as a real estate investor and discusses how his philosophy, process, and people have adapted to better position his firm for the future.

In Episode #351, Professor Luigi Zingales discusses Capitalism and the economic system—what works, what doesn't work, and what can be done to fix the parts that are broken. Zingales focuses on the problems with capitalism, such as the concentration of market power and where distortions occur that benefit the few—not the many. In addition, Zingales proposes a unique alternative to the public company model of maximizing shareholder wealth and recommends companies instead "maximize shareholder welfare" to focus on what investors care about—not just profits and market value—but also the environment, governance, and society.

In Episode #350, we continue our talk on with the Pension Fund Association of Japan, which manages over US$ 110 billion in assets for pension clients.

In Episode #349, Martin S. Fridson, CFA, chief investment officer at Lehmann Livian Fridson Advisors LLC, is regarded as one of Wall Street's most thoughtful and perceptive analysts and has been dubbed "the dean of the high yield bond market". In a wide-ranging interview, he discusses a number of issues, including the investment grade and the high yield credit markets, how to correctly forecast the default rate, and how the leveraged buyout market has evolved since the 1980s.

In Episode #348, we talk pension funds and how they tend to have regular outflows and are often underfunded, as a result the tools the industry has developed tend to be based on these assumptions.

In Episode #347, Richard Howitt, CEO of the International Integrated Reporting Council, discusses the power of Integrated Reports for investors. For example, their additional detail on multiple sources of capital and return; their prospective, not retroactive nature; and their insistence on executive management narrative to help make sense of data.

In Episode #346, Roger Urwin, lead author of the CFA Institute report Investment Firm of the Future, and Willis Towers Watson's global head of content, along with Richard Howitt, CEO of the International Integrated Reporting Council, discuss the report, as well as pertinent details with which all investment pros should familiarize themselves.

In Episode #345, Matt Gertken, geopolitical strategist at BCA Research, shares his thoughts on some of the current largest geopolitical topics that we should all be thinking about. From China to Russia, via the United States, there is a lot to consider in terms of the big picture. Mr. Gertken talks about the likely shift in power from west to east—both politically (global influence) and economically (trade wars). With China facing domestic demands as well as global ones, the topic of the country's growth outlook makes for fascinating listening.

In Episode #344, recorded at the 71st CFA Institute Annual Conference in Hong Kong, Mary C. Gentile, creator and director of Giving Voice to Values (GVV) at the University of Virginia Darden School of Business, explains the values-driven leadership that is at the center of GVV, an innovative approach to values-driven leadership development in business education and the workplace.

In Episode #343, Jane Hyun, founder and president of Hyun & Associates and former recruiting executive at multiple investment banks, discusses the nuances and importance of understanding cross culturalism for advancing your career.

In Episode #342, Anil Gaba, professor of decision sciences and the Orpar Chaired Professor of Risk Management at INSEAD, explains how risk and uncertainty are not the same and how control can be gained by paradoxically giving up control. Professor Gaba offers a fascinating insight into luck, chance, control, the illusion of control, and decision making. For example, behaviorally we have cognitive biases—such as overconfidence—and emotional biases, which make it hard to learn from experience. This gives an illusion of control that, if we could learn to overcome, could lead to better investment decisions. Can we make our own luck, or do we just have to deal with the cruel vicissitudes of life? At the end of the day, Professor Gaba says that we have to make the best decisions that we can in the moment but that we are all exposed to the uncertainty of life.

In Episode #341, Bruce Tomlinson, CFA, draws upon his extensive experience as an alternative assets manager to provide an overview of qualitative and quantitative techniques asset owners can use to screen for superior performance.

In Episode #340, investment strategist Joachim Klement, CFA, explains how seasoned investors might better capitalize on their experience, shares his views on a range of behavioral biases that affect the decision-making of both asset managers and asset owners, and weighs in on the efficacy of certain valuation conventions and market anomalies.

In Episode #339, Chris Ailman provides his insights as a CIO on dealing with governance issues in the marketplace. The interview provides a comprehensive overview of a range of topics from governance issues and the mistakes companies make to the latest trends in the ESG world.

In Episode #338, David Pope, CFA, of S&P Global Market Intelligence, explains both the general development and specific projects they have conducted to explore developing tools for investment professionals. These tools leverage some of the most recent developments in NLP technology that are used to perform investment analysis.

In Episode #337, New York Times bestselling author and Ted Talk regular, Pico Iyer, discusses the importance of silence for all of us in the modern world.

In Episode #336, recorded live at the 71st CFA Institute Annual Conference in Hong Kong, Oscar N. Onyema, chief executive officer of the Nigerian Stock Exchange and member of the National Council, makes the case for why now is an opportune time to invest in Nigeria, despite ongoing challenges.

In Episode #335, Kate Darling asks the question, "Do robots have rights?" How should we approach this topic from a regulatory perspective? Who are we really protecting when we discuss appropriate human behavior toward robots? Robot ethics is an "emerging" topic—so much so that there is no standard definition as to what it entails.

In Episode #334, Nobel Laureate Daniel Kahneman's talks with us about his simple yet powerful principles on intelligent thinking—such as the System 1 and System 2 thinking processes—provide a practical framework for understanding the mental structures that drive our choices. Investment professionals are constantly required to make decisions in the face of uncertainty. Kahneman's contributions are of special significance to the financial marketplace. In this interview, Kahneman reviews his work and also provides insights on ways behavioral thinking could evolve.

In Episode #333, Steven Eisman, managing director at Neuberger Berman and portfolio manager for the Eisman Group, is known for predicting the global financial crash of 2008 and for being portrayed in the book and the film, The Big Short. In this interview, he addresses several questions, including: Are markets more ethical today than they were in the past? Are there systemic risks in today's market that could see a repeat of 2008? Have regulators done a good job? And the burning question that everyone seems to want the answer to: Does Steve believe there is another "big short" opportunity approaching? Tune in for the answers to these questions and more.

In Episode #332, Alex Murguia, co-founder of inStream and managing principal of McLean Asset Management, discusses the impact of technology on financial planning and wealth management. Financial planning remains a key component of many wealth management offerings and can be a point of differentiation for advisers in otherwise crowded markets. In recent years, increasingly agile technology has transformed financial plans from the multi-paged volumes that tended to gather dust to more cost effective, dynamic, real-time roadmaps and guides for clients' financial lives.

In Episode #331, Amy Florian, CEO of Corgenius, a consulting firm that teaches financial services professionals how to support clients in times of grief, loss, and transition, explains that grief is triggered when there is a break in an attachment. And while we tend to think of this break as the loss of a loved one, positive transitions—such as retirement—can also trigger grief. Florian discusses why it's important for financial advisers to communicate with clients when they are grieving and experiencing difficult times and offers practical tips for compassionate conversations.

In Episode #330, Michael J. Mauboussin, author of The Success Equation, considers the continuum between luck and skill as it pertains to investing. He also shares his thoughts on the price/earnings multiple as a valuation tool, the hallmarks of an effective investment process, and how professional investors might mitigate some of the most common behavioral biases.

In Episode #329, Elizabeth M. Lilly, CFA, founder of a long-only investment firm focused on small-cap and micro-cap equities, explains how her investing style was shaped, in part, by Warren Buffett. She also discusses how she finds investment opportunities, the importance of a strong governance structure in firms, and how she avoids value traps and other pitfalls facing small cap value-oriented fund managers.

In Episode #328, we visit with Dr. Notebaert,founder and CEO of One Step Ahead—Notebaert Consulting, which specializes in helping companies and people put neuroscience into practice.

In Episode #327, Omar Selim, founder and CEO of Arabesque, an ESG quant asset management firm, sits at the nexus of ESG, machine learning, and big data. In this interview, Selim tells viewers why he believes Arabesque is "the Tesla of finance," what he thinks finance will look like in the next decade, and what it means to build a values-based asset management firm.

In Episode #326, Roberto Rigobon describes the Billion Prices Project, an alternative measure of inflation he developed with a colleague at MIT. He discusses the inspiration behind the Billion Prices Index, its composition and correlation to the US Consumer Price Index (CPI), and the practical implications of this work for policymakers and asset managers.

In Episode #325, John Wilson explains how to integrate key tenets of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing into the equity research process. He also offers insights into the outlook for ESG investing, including the opportunities and challenges it offers, as well as the prospects for improved ESG-related disclosure by firms.

In Episode #324, Christine L. Todd, CFA, shares her outlook for infrastructure spending in the United States and explains both the benefits and risks associated with investing in infrastructure through US municipal bonds.

In Episode #323, Heather Brilliant, CFA, Managing Director, Americas, at First State Investments, explains what it will take to make that shift and what needs to change for the industry to routinely act in the best interests of the client. She also discusses why we need to rebuild trust in the industry and the importance of assembling diverse investment and leadership teams.

In Episode #322, Elizabeth Corley, non-executive vice chair of Allianz Global Investors, a global asset manager owned by Allianz, has worked in the financial industry for 40 years and helped steer her company through the global financial crisis. In this interview, she discusses why it's critical that investment firms create a culture of accountability and inclusivity. She also explains why it's imperative that leaders help employees and clients focus their outlooks on the longer term and discusses the need for more diverse investment and leadership teams. Corley also offers her answers to the questions of what major trends investment firms must adapt to in order to be successful, trends that are most worrisome, and what will be the biggest change to the profession in the next decade.

In Episode #321, Dr. George Friedman, founder and chairman of Geopolitical Futures, a firm that specializes in geopolitical forecasting. Dr. Friedman also discusses immigration in Europe, the ramifications of secession movements, and much more, including his view of China five years down the road and why he draws inspiration from Hegel, the German philosopher.

In Episode #320, Andrea Turner Moffitt, a co-founder of Plum Alley Investments, a private investment platform that supports promising women entrepreneurs and gender-diverse teams, provides an overview of early-stage investing — how much was invested in 2016, what is getting funded, and who is making the decisions — and discusses why certain ideas and founders stand out, some of the challenges of being an early stage investor, and why women entrepreneurs need funding. She also shares with viewers the three key takeaways of her book, Harness the Power of Purse: Winning Women Investor, and explains why it is crucial that financial advisers today be "gender smart."