Portfolio construction should focus on three risk buckets – beta, smart beta, and alpha. If not, you run the risk of creating a poorly diversified (that is, over diversified) portfolio – and, worse, a portfolio that costs far more than it should.

Each of our Symposium 2015 DDF presenters gave a 2-minute overview of their high conviction portfolio construction strategy idea.

Rather than large, liquid companies with significant global revenue bases which dominate benchmark allocations, investors should seek exposure to India’s surging local demand…

When combining managers together to form a multi-manager global equity portfolio, investors should still aim to keep active share relatively high.

uilding NZ fixed interest portfolios is harder than it has ever been… Portfolios need to be constructed for the specific needs of clients, which will typically be a combination of liquidity, income, quality, and diversification

At the coal face, engagement between company boards and institutional shareholders can achieve meaningful improvements for all investors. Perseverance and commitment are essential.

The diverse range of quality small cap companies with recurring earnings and growing dividend yields offer investors essential risk diversification and should be incorporated into portfolios.

Investors will need to hunt out alternative sources of yield to meet their investment objectives. All is not lost. Yield can be preserved in a low yield world but investors need to be aware of the risks and trade-offs.

Each panelist outlined which high conviction markets idea from Symposium 2015 day one they agreed with most, and which one they agreed with least.

What return premia - if any - are attached to different types of investment risk? And just how reliable are those premia are in practice? Can the risks be diversified?

It’s possible, or more likely probable, that for future generations, our money will run out before our body does. This means that our historical models of accumulation and decumulation will not work for future generations.

As we all brace for lift-off in the key US Federal funds rate, a robust, top-down macro perspective will be even more critical to the success of portfolios than ever.

Our Symposium 2015 debated their high conviction ideas on the drivers of, and medium-term outlook for, the New Zealand economy.

Economic growth has had a lot of bad press recently. But on closer inspection, the objections typically leveled against growth do not stand up to empirical scrutiny.

NZ has plummeted down the global income per capita rankings from third in the 1950s to 23rd in 2015. Successive governments have done little to reverse the decline. Why have we failed to regain our position?

Our Symposium 2015 Faculty debated their high conviction ideas on the drivers of, and medium-term (two to three year) outlook for the markets.

Despite a genuine desire to invest in New Zealand on behalf of a substantial Australian superannuation fund, after several years of trying, no money has been invested.

For investors, one of the most important events of 2014 was the dramatic collapse in the oil price. The long-term equilibrium price is now likely to be lower. Overall, portfolios must be repositioned for increased volatility.

Returns in defensive equity yield and income sectors have been outsized as bond yields have fallen. Growth sectors have underperformed. But globally, technology shares are cheap on a relative basis.

High and rising house prices in Auckland hog the headlines. Increasingly unaffordable house and land prices result from the collision of two, no doubt individually well-intentioned, sets of policies.