41 Portfolio Risk and Return: Part I

major return measures

holding period return (HPR)

average returns

arithmetic mean return

geometric mean return

money-weighted rate of return (IRR)

other return measures

gross return

pretax nominal return

after-tax nominal return

real return

leverage return

net return

mean, variance, and covariance (or correlation) of asset returns

Individual Security

Variance (Standard Deviation) of Returns

Covariance and Correlation of Returns for Two Securities

Population variance

Sample variance

Portfolio

Variance of returns

The risk of a portfolio of a risky assets depends on the asset weights and the standard deviations of the assets returns, and crucially on the correlation (covairance) of the assets returns.

minimum-variance and efficient frontiers of risky assets and global minimum-variance portfolio

Minimum variance frontier

Minimum-variance portfolio

Minimum-variance frontier

lowest standard deviation with a given expected return

the entire collection of minnimum-variance portfolios

Global minimum-variance portfolio

the left-most point on the minimum-variance frontier

Efficient frontier

Markowitz efficient frontier

Efficient portfolio

well-diversified or fully-diversified

portfolios have the greatest expected return with a given level or risk

risk aversion and its implications for portfolio selection

Risk seeking

Risk neutral

Risk averse

Utility Theory

Assumption

Utility function

degree of risk aversion

Indifference curve

a more risk-averse investor will have steeper indifference curves, reflecting a higher risk aversion coefficient

The optimal portfolio

Capital allocation line

Indifference curves

Markowitz efficient frontier