Improved Portfolio Optimizer, and Initial Results

I've been working hard on making the tools better, in particular on the optimizer, to make sure it produces great results. Keep in mind that studies that use historical returns can only be relied on so much. And we should never be using historical…

Machine Learning In Investing

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Machine learning can be used in investing in a variety of ways. This article seeks to show a few of those and describe the basics. Hedge funds have tried for years to use machine learning (or AI) in their funds. Moving on to today, all quantitative…

Optimizing Some Popular Portfolios

In Forbes I found a post about some 'expert' model portfolios. I thought it would be interesting to try optimizing these portfolios using RIAengine smart portfolio optimizer, and seeing what backtests looked like. Here are the results. Buffet…

Investment Portfolio Risk, Reduce It Or Risk Losing Clients

Investment portfolio risk can be an uncomfortable topic. It’s easy to find articles all over the internet that encourage people to sit tight when things are dropping. Warren Buffet’s famous instructions regarding his wife’s trust are…

Limiting Drawdowns Rather Than Maximizing Returns

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Prominent asset manager Mary Meeker once said her primary goal is limiting drawdowns! While most portfolio construction is explicitly or implicitly focused on returns, she knew that minimizing events that can decimate the portfolio is more important…

Machine Learning in Finance and Investing

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The first time I heard the term ‘Artificial Intelligence’ was in the 1980s, when my dad worked for Digital Equipment Corporation, in the Silicon Valley of the East (Massachusetts). And yes they made computer chips from Silicon. In the 80’s…

How To Best Evaluate A Portfolio

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Recently I saw an article about Monte Carlo Analysis, which (as you know) is a way to evaluate a person’s ability to meet their future income needs. Using a portfolio of securities or asset allocations it runs through as many rolling periods…

A Better Portfolio Optimization Method

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You may have heard of Markowitz’s Critical Line Algorithm, or CLA. CLA was Markowitz’s attempt to solve the problem of portfolio optimization using quadratic math. For a couple reasons is was an ingenious invention. But it also has its…

For RIAs, it's very important to manage your data flow

I know, "data flow" sounds a little pretentious, and what the heck does it mean? The core of your business works between several key applications: a financial planning application, a portfolio management system, of course a CRM, and maybe…

Upgrading Postgres to the latest version on Centos 7 Server

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I recently upgraded postgres to the latest version and I think the steps can help someone else too. So here they are. This assumes Centos 7 server installed. First, take a backup of database First SSH into the server. Now connect to postgres: sudo…