Duration
30h Th
Number of credits
Lecturer
Language(s) of instruction
English language
Organisation and examination
Teaching in the second semester
Schedule
Units courses prerequisite and corequisite
Prerequisite or corequisite units are presented within each program
Learning unit contents
Course structure following "Analysis of Investments & Management of Portfolios" (10th ed), by Keith C. Brown & Frank K. Reilly (henceforth B&R)
Background (based on readings which should be prepared before the course starts)
1. General background:
B&R Part 1: The Investment Background: pre-reading
2. For equity markets:
Overview of equity securities by Ryan C. Fuhrmann, CFA and Asjeet S. Lamba, CFA:
- Types of equity securities and their characteristics
- Equity markets: characteristics, institutions, and benchmarks
(i) Fixed-income securities: defining elements by Moorad Choudhry, PhD, and Stephan E. Wicox, PhD, CFA
(ii) Fixed-income markets: Issuance, trading and funding by Moorad Choudhry, PhD, Steven V. Mann, PhD, and Lavone F. Whitmer, CFA
- Types of fixed income securities and their characteristics
- Fixed Income markets : characteristics, institutions and benchmarks
Detailed course plan:
A. Efficient capital markets
1. Efficient Market Hypotheses
2. Tests and Results of the Hypotheses
3. Behavioral Finance
4. Implications of Efficient Capital Markets
Reading: B&R Ch 6. Efficient Capital Markets.
B - On the way to the CAPM
1. Risk and return: assumptions
2. Markowitz Portfolio Theory
3. The Capital Market Line
4. The Security Market Line
5. CAPM: Theory vs. Practice
Readings:
B&R Ch 7. An Introduction to Portfolio Management.
B&R Ch 8. An Introduction to Asset Pricing Models.
C - Multifactor Models
1. Introduction to Multifactor Models
2. Arbitrage Pricing Theory
3. Empirical Multifactor Models
4. Style Analysis
Reading: B&R Ch 9. Multifactor Models of Risk and Return.
D - Passive and Active Strategies
1. Passive Strategies
2. Fundamental Active Strategies
3. Technical Active Strategies
4. Asset Allocation
Readings:
B&R Ch 15. Equity Portfolio Management Strategies.
B&R Ch 16. Technical Analysis.
E - Bond Portfolio Management
1. Bond Valuation and Yields
2. The Yield Curve
3. Duration and Convexity: an Introduction
4. Bond Investment Strategies
Readings:
B&R Ch 18. The Analysis and Valuation of Bonds.
B&R Ch 19. Bond Portfolio Management Strategies.
F - Alternative Investments
1. The Notion of Alternative Investments
2. Hedge Funds
3. Issues in Hedge Funds Investments
4. Other Alternative Instruments
5. Alternatives²
Reading: B&R Ch 24. Professional Money Management, Alternative Assets, and Industry Ethics.
+ extra material posted on the website.
G - Portfolio Performance
1. Traditional performance measures
2. Attribution analysis
Reading: B&R Ch 25. Evaluation of Portfolio Performance.
+ extra material posted on the website.
H - Special topics
based on guest lectures (specific material, attendance is compulsory)
Learning outcomes of the learning unit
At the end of this course students will be able to:
- Understand the overall investment process, including general asset allocation as well as specific investments in asset classes such as equities, bonds and alternative investments; understand the difference between active and passive approaches to portfolio management;
- Understand the concepts of risk and return in order to assess the attractiveness of investments applying factor models or various performance measures;
- Understand central capital market models such as the Capital Asset Pricing Model, the Arbitrage Pricing Theory and the Efficient Market Hypothesis and know techniques and approaches such as the Markowitz Portfolio Optimization in investment management, which have proven themselves in practical application;
- Be able to understand, analyze and solve real-life, unprecise situations where investment decisions have to be made, in light of limited market data;
- Be able to research and understand a scientific article related to investment management.
Specific skills and competences trained during this course.
At the end of this course students will have:
- Gained knowledge and understanding of financial techniques and basis statistics tools to be able to use them in order to solve real-life financial management problems or cases;
- Improved their abstract reasoning related to advanced financial concepts such as equity and bond pricing or risk-adjusted performance measurement;
- Strengthened their capacity to research autonomously and methodically the information needed to solve a complex, transversal real-life investment problem, to perform a rigorous analysis of the problem at hand and to design economically sound solutions;
- Developed their ability to speak English;
- Developed team work abilities;
- Strengthened their capacity for creative conception of solutions;
- Strengthened their professional capacity for oral communication;
- Strengthened their professional capacity for written communication.
Prerequisite knowledge and skills
Prerequistes are:
- Some acquaintance with financial markets and instruments (see prereadings);
- Familiarity with cash flow discounting;
- Basic statistical techniques (descriptive statistics, hypothesis testing and linear regression).
A good level of English is also required.
Planned learning activities and teaching methods
The main course consists of a set of lectures (7 to 8 sessions of 3 hours). The lecture is a mix of theoretical concepts, illustrative examples, exercises and open discussions on the various concepts thaught. It is complemented with exercise sessions (2 sessions of 3 hours) that will illustrate more deeply real-life applications of portfolio management. Students are expected to prepare lecture and tutorial meetings to have an active participation in class.
Finally, the students will have to solve, per group, 1 assignment (1 month processing time). The assignment involves empirically evaluating the performance of a trading strategy, an equity or bond market fund using real-life market data.
Mode of delivery (face to face, distance learning, hybrid learning)
Face-to-face course
Further information:
see above
Course materials and recommended or required readings
Platform(s) used for course materials:
- LOL@
- Microsoft Teams
Further information:
The required textbook that will be used throughout the course is:
- Brown, Reilly, 2012. Analysis of Investments and Management of Portfolios. 10th ed. International Student Edition. Thomson One, Business School Edition.
Recommended books are:
- Bodie, Kane, Marcus, 2024. Investments. 13th ed. McGrawHill.
- Bodie, Kane, Marcus, 2021. Essentials of Investments. 12th ed. McGrawHill.
- Elton, Gruber, Brown, Goetzmann, 2013. Modern Portfolio Theory and Investment Analysis. 9th ed. Wiley.
The books will be complemented by a set of scientific articles and slides.
Exam(s) in session
Any session
- In-person
written exam ( multiple-choice questionnaire, open-ended questions )
Written work / report
Further information:
The final grade is a combination of the grades of a written exam and a group assignment. Notice, though, that the grade of the assignment is only accounted for in the calculation if:
- the student obtains a passing grade in the written exam
The relative weights between the different parts is typically 80% for the written exam, and 20% for the assignment. If the assignment cannot be taken into account, then the written exam counts for 100% of the final grade.
It will be ask, for the assignment, to describe the contributions of the various team members. A studet not actively participating to the group work, will automaticaly receive a failing grade for the corresponding assignment. Assignment points cannot be transferred from one academic year to the next.
Written exam
- Ability to explain the intuition behind the various theoretical concepts studied such as portfolio optimization, Capital Asset Pricing Model, pricing of equities and bonds, performance measurement of various assets, etc.;
- Ability to compute returns, optimal portfolio-weights, Sharpe Ratios and other various measures of risk and return, equity and bonds prices, etc.;
- Write straight-to-the-point answers.
Assignment
- Ability to compute price estimates using the pricing methods studied in class;
- Ability to conduct empirical analysis on a given data set, i.e., calculate risk-adjusted returns and various performance measures (risk and return);
- Ability to write a clean, organized and comprehensive report, to work in groups.
Work placement(s)
none
Organisational remarks and main changes to the course
Finance is definitively an analytic field. As a consequence, this course will require students to understand models, do calculations and numerical analysis. Problem sets are to be handed in at the time and date as announced in class. The purpose of problem-based assignments is to understand issues, not to replicate answers. There are no "right answers" to the cases, only good arguments and weak arguments.
Students are expected to do their own work (or work within their group). At no time is it tolerated to use materials from former academic years or other sources. No plagiarism of any kind will be tolerated.
Attendance to the lectures and tutorials is not required, however, it is strongly recommended. Part of the exam questions may be specifically based on the oral communication/presentation of the lectures or the tutorials. Attendance to the invited guest lectures is compulsory.
Contacts
Prof. Dr. Patrick Schwarz
email : patrick.schwarz[at]uliege.be
Teaching assistant: TBA
Association of one or more MOOCs
There is no MOOC associated with this course.