Risk Mitigating Strategies

March 2023

In this paper we use the name Risk Mitigating Strategies (RMS) to describe an investment framework that can be used to consider allocations to strategies that are expected to be diversifying and most notably complimentary to equity growth risk. An RMS allocation may seek to provide positive long-term returns while producing low to negative correlations to traditional sources of risk (interest rates, credit spreads, equities, etc.) on average. More specifically, an RMS allocation may seek to profit from turbulent markets or equity drawdowns by having low to negative conditional correlations to equities during these times.

A key tenant of any strategic allocation is the framework used to achieve investor objectives. For RMS it can be helpful to use a functional framework that includes three groups, first responders, second responders, and diversifiers. These groups can be seen as levers with which to customize an RMS framework to seek a specific outcome.  As markets and objectives change over time this may also afford investors additional flexibility to adapt as new tools or opportunities become available. We detail the components of the functional framework as well as the role RMS can play in the strategic asset allocation of an institutional investor throughout the following paper.