Alternative Investments

Further asset classes and associated products: venture capital and private equity, hedge funds, commodities, real estate, etc.; benchmarks and indices for these asset classes; return time series and maybe estimation of the long-term average returns and volatilities of these asset classes; derivatives for these asset classes and controlling portfolios using these derivatives; trading strategies for these asset classes; selection and optimisation for these asset classes; performance and attribution analysis for these asset classes

Mode of delivery

face to face

Type

compulsory

Recommended or required reading and other learning resources/tools

Maginn, J. (ed.), Tuttle, D. (ed.), McLeavey, D. (ed.), Pinto, J. (ed.), 2007, Managing investment portfolios: a dynamic process, 3rd ed., Wiley, CFA Institute Investment Series, Chapters 8.1-8.2; 8.4-8.6; Baum, A., 2015, Real estate investment: a strategic approach, 3rd ed., Routledge

Planned learning activities and teaching methods

Interactive teaching (lecture and discussion), examples during the lectures, self-checking exercises, a project and four case studies

Assessment methods and criteria

Student evaluation relies on the quality of their assignments, their presentations and their participation (30 points), and the results of the final written exam (70 points). The final exam consists of two parts; questions for up to 15 points focus on real estate while up to 55 points can be received based on questions on other products within the asset class alternative investments.

Prerequisites and co-requisites

Courses of the 1st semester

Infos

Degree programme

Quantitative Asset and Risk Management (Master)

Cycle

Master

ECTS Credits

2.00

Language of instruction

English

Curriculum

Part-Time

Academic year

2024

Semester

2 SS

Incoming

Yes

Learning outcome

After the successful completion of the course, students are able to systemize the wide range of products in the asset class alternative investments. They can elaborate on different products of the asset class such as real estate and hedge funds alongside their risk profile and discuss different investment approaches. Furthermore, they can describe the characteristics of real estate markets, distinguish between different investment approaches (style and vehicle), reflect on the risks of these investments and perform real estate valuation based on various models. Additionally, they have the ability to conduct performance and attribution analyses for this asset class and are able to use alternative investment products in a portfolio management process to optimize portfolio selection.

Course code

0613-09-01-BB-EN-18