Portfolio Management: An Overview

describe the portfolio approach to investing;

describe types of investors and distinctive characteristics and needs of each;

describe defined contribution and defined benefit pension plans;

describe the steps in the portfolio management process;

describe mutual funds and compare them with other pooled investment products.

Portfolio Risk and Return: Part I

calculate and interpret major return measures and describe their appropriate uses;

describe characteristics of the major asset classes that investors consider in forming portfolios;

calculate and interpret the mean, variance, and covariance (or correlation) of asset returns based on historical data;

explain risk aversion and its implications for portfolio selection;

calculate and interpret portfolio standard deviation;

describe the effect on a portfolio’s risk of investing in assets that are less than perfectly correlated;

describe and interpret the minimum-variance and efficient frontiers of risky assets and the global minimum-variance portfolio;

discuss the selection of an optimal portfolio, given an investor’s utility (or risk aversion) and the capital allocation line.

Portfolio Risk and Return: Part II

Basics of Portfolio Planning and Construction