Mutual Fund Alpha Charts

Charting Alpha

Most mutual fund investors chase recent performance. However, experience shows that alpha, or out-performance, is rarely sustained in the fund universe. To visualize how alpha fluctuates across different time-periods, we extended the relative strength spread notion of stocks to mutual funds. By normalizing performance across multiple funds vs. a single benchmark, the CNX 500 index, we can get a sense for how stable the alpha is.

Exhibits

Have a look at the RS-Spread chart of the HDFC Growth Fund:
hdfc.growth.mf.relstrength

Notice how 1-year alpha was below zero between Oct’2012 and May’2014 and is now back below zero again. This should indicate that whatever strategy the fund is employing is not that great in generating sustainable alpha. Now compare that to the Birla Sun Life Frontline Equity Fund:
birla.frontline.mf.relstrength

Notice how the fund has managed to outperform over the last 5-years. Here’s the MNC fund’s RS-Spread chart:

Birla.MNC.mf.relstrength

The FundCompare Tool

We update these charts daily for more than 100 funds. You can access them through our FundCompare tool. If you have any questions, give us a call or Whatsapp us!

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Index Update 17.10.2015

MOMENTUM

We run our proprietary momentum scoring algorithm on indices just like we do on stocks. You can use the momentum scores of sub-indices to get a sense for which sectors have the wind on their backs and those that are facing headwinds.

Traders can pick their longs in sectors with high short-term momentum and their shorts in sectors with low momentum. Investors can use the longer lookback scores to position themselves using our re-factored index Themes.

You can see how the momentum algorithm has performed on individual stocks here.

Here are the best and the worst sub-indices:

index momentum best 365 2015-10-16 png

index momentum best 50 2015-10-16 png

index momentum worst 365 2015-10-16 png

index momentum worst 50 2015-10-16 png

Relative Strength Spread

CNX_500 relative-spread-index 50 2015-10-16 png

Refactored Index Performance

50-day performance, from August 05, 2015 through October 16, 2015:

Equally Weighted Market Cap. Weighted
CNX PHARMA (EQUAL) +2.75% CNX PHARMA (CAP) +5.01%
CNX REALTY (EQUAL) +1.57% CNX REALTY (CAP) +0.57%
CNX IT (EQUAL) -2.27% NI15 (CAP) -0.58%
CNX ENERGY (EQUAL) -2.77% CNX MEDIA (CAP) -0.81%
NI15 (EQUAL) -2.84% NSE QUALITY 30 (CAP) -1.25%
NSE QUALITY 30 (EQUAL) -3.24% CNX IT (CAP) -1.61%
CNX MEDIA (EQUAL) -3.27% CNX FMCG (CAP) -3.15%
CNX INFRA (EQUAL) -3.74% CNX CONSUMPTION (CAP) -3.58%
CNX SERVICE (EQUAL) -4.38% CNX SERVICE (CAP) -3.76%
CNX FINANCE (EQUAL) -4.92% CNX FINANCE (CAP) -4.16%
LIX15 Midcap (EQUAL) -5.00% LIX15 Midcap (CAP) -5.06%
CNX CONSUMPTION (EQUAL) -5.13% CNX ENERGY (CAP) -5.38%
CNX COMMODITIES (EQUAL) -5.94% CNX BANK (CAP) -5.47%
LIX 15 (EQUAL) -6.50% CNX AUTO (CAP) -5.94%
NV20 (EQUAL) -6.72% NV20 (CAP) -6.15%
CNX BANK (EQUAL) -6.74% CNX COMMODITIES (CAP) -7.72%
CNX PSE (EQUAL) -7.40% LIX 15 (CAP) -7.98%
CNX AUTO (EQUAL) -7.49% CNX MNC (CAP) -8.60%
CPSE INDEX (EQUAL) -8.32% CNX INFRA (CAP) -9.06%
CNX PSU BANK (EQUAL) -8.45% CNX PSE (CAP) -9.41%
CNX MNC (EQUAL) -8.57% CNX PSU BANK (CAP) -9.89%
CNX FMCG (EQUAL) -8.98% CPSE INDEX (CAP) -10.29%
CNX METAL (EQUAL) -10.22% CNX METAL (CAP) -13.97%

Trend Model Summary

Index Signal % From Peak Day of Peak
CNX AUTO LONG
9.15
2015-Jan-27
CNX BANK SHORT
12.86
2015-Jan-27
CNX COMMODITIES LONG
34.08
2008-Jan-04
CNX CONSUMPTION SHORT
5.14
2015-Aug-05
CNX ENERGY LONG
32.46
2008-Jan-14
CNX FMCG SHORT
8.34
2015-Feb-25
CNX INFRA LONG
51.93
2008-Jan-09
CNX IT LONG
88.13
2000-Feb-21
CNX MEDIA LONG
15.16
2008-Jan-04
CNX METAL LONG
65.79
2008-Jan-04
CNX MNC SHORT
9.23
2015-Aug-10
CNX NIFTY SHORT
8.43
2015-Mar-03
CNX PHARMA SHORT
4.54
2015-Apr-08
CNX PSE LONG
32.11
2008-Jan-04
CNX PSU BANK SHORT
39.36
2010-Nov-05
CNX REALTY SHORT
90.28
2008-Jan-14
CNX SERVICE SHORT
9.35
2015-Mar-03
A retracement is underway for most indices. CNX 100 broke about its 50-day SMA, activating the Tactical CNX 100 Theme. With most companies yet to announce their results, curb your enthusiasm.
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Correlation Update 17.10.2015

Nifty one year daily return correlations

Nifty one year daily return correlations

Nifty one month daily return correlations

Nifty one month daily return correlations

Bank Nifty one year daily return correlations

Bank Nifty one year daily return correlations

Bank Nifty one month daily return correlations

Bank Nifty one month daily return correlations

Midcap one year daily return correlations

Midcap one year daily return correlations

Midcap one month daily return correlations

Midcap one month daily return correlations

A lot of thick blue squares mean that positive correlations are high. Red squares mean negative correlations are high. Whites are the doldrums.

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Relative Strength Spread Charts

What is Relative Strength Spread?

Relative Strength Spread of a stock is the relative cumulative performance of the stock vs. the CNX 500 index over the same period.

We had discussed how the Relative Strength Spread Index is a coincident indicator of momentum earlier. With a new update, we are publishing charts of relative strengths of individual stocks over multiple lookback periods. This can be found under the ‘Quant’ tab of the equity pages.

How to interpret Relative Strength Spread?

Relative Strength Spread is a measure of historical out-performance. By observing the RS-Spread over different lookback periods, investors can get a sense of future direction of momentum. For example, if you look at the RS-Spread of TATAMOTORS, you can observe how the stock lagged the broad market for the better part of the year before suddenly turning around in the last few days.

TATAMOTORS.relstrength

Now contrast that to BHARATFORG:

BHARATFORG.relstrength

Unlike a price or return chart that looks at an individual stock, the RS-Spread chart incorporates information from a broad set of stocks and compares it to the market average. It has more information content than the ‘Relative Momentum’ chart as well.

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A quick note on bonds

We compared the total returns from the short-end of the curve to Nifty. Here’s what we found:

  1. IRR over the last 10 years for bonds was 6.53%.
  2. Biggest drawdown was -5.04%.
  3. Only two years of negative correlation with NIFTY.

Annual returns:
nifty.vs.0-5.bonds

Equity curve:
0-5's vs. NIFTY returns

Drawdowns:
0-5s.NIFTY.drawdowns

The right place for bonds in a portfolio is for regular income. From a returns perspective, you are better off investing in equities. Bonds are no less volatile when compared to the returns they give, and are mostly correlated with equity volatility.

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