Investors bet on emerging market alpha

With spreads on EM sovereign debt at historically tight levels, investors are looking elsewhere to generate alpha. One cutting-edge strategy is to invest in illiquid securities. Hedge funds, in particular, are turning increasingly to these esoteric assets. But the approach is not for the faint-hearted. Sudip Roy reports.

Local-currency opportunities

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As usual Walter Molano’s Latin American Advisor research note of September 6 was entertaining and thought-provoking. The topic was alpha, the risk-adjusted measure of excess return on an investment. The veteran analyst, who is head of research at sell-side firm BCP Securities in Greenwich, Connecticut, got quickly to the point: fund managers in emerging markets can no longer rely on performance through the pursuit of beta – the correlation of a particular asset or portfolio to the market as a whole.

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