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Kettera Strategies Heat Map - June 2021

June was a negative month for the longer-term systematic trend programs, where setbacks came primarily in fixed income and currency markets. In commodities, gains in energy markets, notably natural gas, were offset by losses in precious metals and grains markets. The overall reversal of the “reflation trade” interfered with several correlated trends and led to a general deleveraging of longer-term trend portfolios.

Industrial commodities – energy and metals specialists were positive in June, notably Nat Gas traders, as macro fundamentals pushed gas prices higher in Europe and North America. Crude strategies were also positive, riding prices to their highest levels since the pandemic began. Metals markets were more challenging, but most of the fundamental relative value and spread specialists we cover were positive, avoiding the sharp directional reversals in gold and copper.

Currency specialists were positive in June, with systematic strategies outperforming discretionary strategies. The shorter-term technically-driven programs in particular seemed to be outperformers. The hawkish U.S. Fed announcement mid-month led to robust price movements in the short and medium term, which benefited quickly adapting strategies that ignore market fundamentals. The more “discretionary macro” FX specialists appeared to struggle with the USD rally.

For many, if not most, of the discretionary global macro managers we follow, June was May turned upside-down. Last month this style category was the outperformer, but all the positions that had worked in May – long gold, short US dollar – completely reversed in June. On the other hand, those discretionary managers that were more focused on equities and fixed income markets fared better than their peers.

In quant macro, it's a rare month when there’s no identifiable common theme among these traders. The strategies with notably positive months tended to focus on, or include, relative value (RV) and spread models in the commodities markets. RV trades in the energy and metals sector helped boost several programs. Directional trades in commodities, on the other hand, tended to pose challenges to managers nearly across the board – largely, it seems, to entering the month with a long metals (long inflation) stance. The wild card was the FX sector, where some managers’ econometric models called the US dollar resurgence, while others’ saw the inflation picture as a negative for the greenback.

Kettera Strategies

PAST PERFORMANCE IS NOT NECESSARILY INDICATIVE OF FUTURE RESULTS.  See notes at end of this document for details on the construction of the Hydra "baskets" and the benchmark used for each style class.  Also note that some baskets may contain managers that have not yet reported by this date.  *=Less than 75% reported.

For the “style classes” and “baskets” presented in this letter: The “style baskets” referenced above were created by Kettera for research purposes to track the category and are classifications drawn by Kettera Strategies in their review of programs on and for the Hydra Platform. The arrows represent the style basket’s overall performance for the month (e.g. the sideways arrow indicates that the basket was largely flat overall, a solid red down arrow indicates the basket (on average) was largely negative compared to most months, etc.). The “style basket” for a class is created from monthly returns (net of fees) of programs that are either: programs currently or formerly on Hydra; or under review with an expectation of being added to Hydra. The weighting of a program in a basket depends upon into which of these three groups the program falls. Style baskets are not investible products or index products being offered to investors. They are meant purely for analysis and comparison purposes. These also were not created to stimulate interest in any underlying or associated program. Nonetheless, as these research tools may be regarded to be “hypothetical” combinations of managers, HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS HAVE MANY INHERENT LIMITATIONS, SOME OF WHICH ARE DESCRIBED BELOW. NO REPRESENTATION IS BEING MADE THAT ANY PRODUCT OR ACCOUNT WILL ACHIEVE PROFITS OR LOSSES SIMILAR TO THOSE SHOWN. IN FACT, THERE ARE FREQUENTLY SHARP DIFFERENCES BETWEEN HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS AND THE ACTUAL RESULTS SUBSEQUENTLY ACHIEVED BY ANY PARTICULAR TRADING PROGRAM. ONE OF THE LIMITATIONS OF HYPOTHETICAL RESULTS IS THAT THEY ARE GENERALLY PREPARED WITH THE BENEFIT OF HINDSIGHT. IN ADDITION, HYPOTHETICAL TRADING DOES NOT INVOLVE FINANCIAL RISK, AND NO HYPOTHETICAL TRADING RECORD CAN COMPLETELY ACCOUNT FOR THE IMPACT OF FINANCIAL RISK IN ACTUAL TRADING. THERE ARE NUMEROUS OTHER FACTORS RELATED TO THE MARKETS IN GENERAL OR TO THE IMPLEMENTATION OF ANY SPECIFIC TRADING PROGRAM WHICH CANNOT BE FULLY ACCOUNTED FOR IN THE PREPARATION OF HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS AND ALL OF WHICH CAN ADVERSELY AFFECT ACTUAL TRADING RESULTS.

Benchmark sources:

1-The IndexIQ Hedge Global Macro Beta Index can be found at:  https://www.newyorklifeinvestments.com/indices/iq-hedge-global-macro-beta-index-iqhggmb?ticker=IQHGGMB

2-The Societe Generale Trend Index and SG CTA Index can be found at: https://cib.societegenerale.com/en/prime-services-indices/

3-The Societe General Short-term Traders Index: (same link as above)

4-The EurekaHedge AI Hedge Fund Index https://www.eurekahedge.com/Indices/IndexView/Eurekahedge/683/Eurekahedge_AI_Hedge_fund_Index

5-The BarclayHedge Currency Traders Index and BTOP FX Traders Index can be found at: http://www.barclayhedge.com/

6- The BarclayHedge Discretionary Traders Index and Barclay Ag Traders Index can be found at http://www.barclayhedge.com/, and details on the NilssonHedge Commodities CTA Index can be found  at: https://nilssonhedge.com/index/cta-index/commodities-cta-index

7-The CBOE Eurekahedge Relative Value Volatility Hedge Fund Index can be found at: http://www.eurekahedge.com/Indices/IndexView/Eurekahedge/641/CBOE_Eurekahedge_Relative_Value_Volatility_Hedge_Fund_Index

8-The Eurekahedge-Mizuho Multi-Strategy Index: (See above)

9-The Eurekahedge Long Short Equities Hedge Fund Index: (See above)

10-Blend of BarclayHedge Equity Market Neutral Index: http://www.barclayhedge.com/ with EurekaHedge Equity Mkt Neutral Index (see link above)

11 – Barclay Crypto Traders Index.

INDICES AND OTHER FINANCIAL BENCHMARKS SHOWN ARE PROVIDED FOR ILLUSTRATIVE PURPOSES ONLY, ARE UNMANAGED, REFLECT REINVESTMENT OF INCOME AND DIVIDENDS AND DO NOT REFLECT THE IMPACT OF ADVISORY FEES. INDEX DATA IS REPORTED AS OF DATE OF PUBLICATION AND MAY BE A MONTH-TO-DATE ESTIMATE IF ALL UNDERLYING COMPONENTS HAVE NOT YET REPORTED. THE INDEX PROVIDERS MAY UPDATE THEIR REPORTED PERFORMANCE FROM TIME TO TIME. KETTERA DISCLAIMS ANY OBLIGATION TO VERIFY THESE NUMBERS OR TO UPDATE OR REVISE THE PERFORMANCE NUMBERS.

 

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