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Optimal Dynamic Strategies on Gaussian Returns

2019/05/31 by Nick Firoozye, Adriano Koshiyama, Firoozye, Nick +1
Decision Sciences · Economics, Econometrics and Finance · #60G10 #62E15 #62F99 #62P05 #91G70 #91G80 #Complex Systems and Time Series Analysis #FOS: Economics and business #Forecasting Techniques and Applications #Portfolio Management (q-fin.PM) #Risk Management (q-fin.RM) #Statistical Finance (q-fin.ST) #Stock Market Forecasting Methods #Trading and Market Microstructure (q-fin.TR)

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1906.01427

openalex publication_date 2019/05/31 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

Dynamic trading strategies, in the spirit of trend-following or mean-reversion, represent an only partly understood but lucrative and pervasive area of modern finance. Assuming Gaussian returns and Gaussian dynamic weights or signals, (e.g., linear filters of past returns, such as simple moving averages, exponential weighted moving averages, forecasts from ARIMA models), we are able to derive closed-form expressions for the first four moments of the strategy's returns, in terms of correlations between the random signals and unknown future returns. By allowing for randomness in the asset-allocation and modelling the interaction of strategy weights with returns, we demonstrate that positive skewness and excess kurtosis are essential components of all positive Sharpe dynamic strategies, which is generally observed empirically; demonstrate that total least squares (TLS) or orthogonal least squares is more appropriate than OLS for maximizing the Sharpe ratio, while canonical correlation analysis (CCA) is similarly appropriate for the multi-asset case; derive standard errors on Sharpe ratios which are tighter than the commonly used standard errors from Lo; and derive standard errors on the skewness and kurtosis of strategies, apparently new results. We demonstrate these results are applicable asymptotically for a wide range of stationary time-series.

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