Investment objective & strategy
As of April 10, 2024 · prospectusObjective. The Wealthfront Risk Parity Fund (the Fund) seeks long-term total return, which consists of both capital appreciation and income.
Strategy. The Fund seeks to achieve its investment objective by allocating its assets among a broad range of asset classes (including but not limited to global developed and emerging market equities, global developed and emerging markets fixed income, real estate investment trusts (REITs), treasury inflation-protected securities, and commodities). The Fund will generally have some level of investment in most of these asset classes but there is no stated limit on the percentage of assets the Fund will allocate to a particular asset class. The Funds exposure to these asset classes will be achieved principally through investments in exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and in derivative instruments such as total return swaps, as discussed further below. Because the Fund will gain exposure to global … The Fund seeks to achieve its investment objective by allocating its assets among a broad range of asset classes (including but not limited to global developed and emerging market equities, global developed and emerging markets fixed income, real estate investment trusts (REITs), treasury inflation-protected securities, and commodities). The Fund will generally have some level of investment in most of these asset classes but there is no stated limit on the percentage of assets the Fund will allocate to a particular asset class. The Funds exposure to these asset classes will be achieved principally through investments in exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and in derivative instruments such as total return swaps, as discussed further below. Because the Fund will gain exposure to global developed and emerging markets fixed income asset classes either through ETFs or through total return swaps that reference relevant ETFs, the Funds investments in fixed income instruments may be of any duration, maturity and quality. The Adviser will use proprietary portfolio construction methodologies to assemble a diversified portfolio that targets an annualized volatility for the Fund of 12%, but the Funds actual volatility level for longer or shorter periods may be materially higher or lower than the target depending on market conditions. Volatility measures the range of returns of a security, fund or index, as indicated by the annualized standard deviation of its returns. Higher volatility generally indicates higher risk and is often reflected by frequent and sometimes significant movements up and down in value. A volatility target does not provide any assurance about the maximum loss for an investor in the Fund. In allocating assets among the different asset classes, the Adviser seeks to derive approximately equal risk exposures for the Fund from the underlying asset classes based on the Advisers assessment of the risk associated with each asset class. This means that lower risk asset classes (such as global fixed income) will generally have higher notional allocations than higher risk asset classes (such as global developed and emerging market equities). Based on the Advisers assessment of the Funds portfolio risk as well as the prevailing market conditions (such as market volatility), the Adviser will use leverage (through investments in derivative instruments such as total returns swaps) to adjust or to increase the Funds exposure to certain asset classes in order to seek higher returns than traditional portfolios at similar risk level, or lower risk at similar return levels. However, t here can be no assurance that employing such a strategy will achieve any particular level of return or will reduce volatility or potential loss for the Fund . The Adviser will periodically (at least monthly) reassess the risk of each asset class and their correlations and will rebalance the Funds existing asset allocations based on the Advisers assessment. The Advisers use of derivatives is expected to create aggregate exposure to investments for the Fund in excess of its net assets, thereby leveraging the Fund. It is expected that, on average, the Fund would have a net notional investment exposure of approximately 250% of the Funds net assets, although the amount of exposure may be significantly higher or lower at any given time. Through the use of derivatives that have the effect of leverage, the Fund will have the potential for greater gains, as well as the potential for greater losses, than if the Fund did not use derivatives or other instruments that have an economic leveraging effect. Economic leveraging tends to magnify, sometimes significantly depending on the amount of leverage used, the effect of any increase or decrease in the Funds exposure to an asset class and may cause the Funds net asset value to be more volatile than a fund that does not use leverage. For example, if the Fund gains exposure to a specific asset class through an instrument that provides leveraged exposure to that asset class, and the leveraged instrument increases in value, the gain to the Fund will be magnified; however, if the leveraged instrument decreases in value, the loss to the Fund will also be magnified. A total return swap is a contract in which a payer and receiver exchange the risks of an underlying asset for the payment of a fee. The payer owns the underlying asset, also called the reference asset, and agrees to pay the receiver the total return on the asset, including its market appreciation and coupons, while the receiver agrees to pay a set rate, which could be fixed or variable. If the reference asset depreciates, the receiver pays the depreciation to the payer because the payer has transferred default risk, credit deterioration risk, market risk, and other risks of the asset to the receiver. The Funds exposure to the different asset classes will be achieved principally through investments in either ETFs or in total return swaps, where the Fund will pay a counterparty a set fee in exchange for the total return of a reference asset, sector, industry or sub-industry, which will usually be ETFs that are determined by the Adviser to be representative of a specific asset class. To a lesser extent, the Fund may also invest in other derivative instruments such as forward and futures contracts to also gain exposure to the various asset classes and employ leverage. The Adviser may choose whether to invest in ETFs directly or derivatives of those ETFs based on various factors including the financing cost of a derivative contract, the size and anticipated liquidity of an ETF relative to the Funds potential investment, the deteriorating financial condition of a counterparty to a derivative contract, or the overall cost of an investment in derivatives in periods when leverage is not required to achieve the stated volatility target. The inability of the Fund to invest in derivative instruments may prevent it from achieving its investment objective(s). A significant portion of the assets of the Fund may be invested directly or indirectly in money market instruments, which may include, but are not limited to, short-term U.S. Government securities, U.S. Treasury securities, money market mutual fund shares, and cash and cash equivalents. These cash or cash equivalent holdings serve as margin or collateral for the derivative positions the Fund takes and also earn income for the Fund. The larger the value of the Funds derivative positions, the more the Fund will be required to maintain cash and cash equivalents as margin or collateral for such derivatives. The Fund may engage in active and frequent trading, which may result in frequent portfolio trading and high portfolio turnover.
Top holdings
As of Oct. 31, 2024 · N-PORT| Security | Ticker | Value | % of fund |
|---|---|---|---|
| U.S. Treasury Bills | 912797LY | $147.10M | 11.40% |
| U.S. Treasury Bills | — | $142.27M | 11.03% |
| UST BILLS 0% 11/07/2024 | B | $138.39M | 10.73% |
| UST BILLS 0% 11/14/2024 | B | $134.77M | 10.45% |
| U.S. Treasury Bills | B | $122.96M | 9.53% |
| U.S. Treasury Bills | B | $98.31M | 7.62% |
| U.S. Treasury Bills | B | $97.24M | 7.54% |
| FIRST AM-TR OB-X | TMPXX | $93.59M | 7.25% |
| U.S. Treasury Bills | — | $91.55M | 7.10% |
| TREASURY BILL 11/24 0.00000 | — | $89.18M | 6.91% |
Portfolio moves
Jul 31, 2024 → Oct 31, 2024How many positions this fund opened, exited, grew, trimmed, or left unchanged between its two most recent N-PORT snapshots — net changes between point-in-time reports, not a trade log.
Similar funds
Funds whose portfolios most overlap this one, by weight| Fund | Overlap | Net exp. |
|---|---|---|
| Credit Suisse Managed Futures Strategy Fund | 18% | 1.33% |
| Credit Suisse Multialternative Strategy Fund | 14% | 0.90% |
| Leuthold Grizzly Short Fund | 11% | — |
Advisers
| Firm | Role |
|---|---|
| Wealthfront Strategies, LLC | Adviser |
Footnotes
- Net assets and holdings count as of October 31, 2024, from the fund's N-PORT filing.
Machine-readable: JSON · Markdown. Programmatic access via the agent surface.