Henri Lucas releases bear market defensive asset allocation plan
Against the backdrop of increasing volatility in global financial markets and general pressure on risk assets, renowned investment strategist Henri Lucas released the latest White Paper on Defensive Asset Allocation in Bear Markets, providing institutional investors with a systematic risk hedging solution. The solution is based on the “Macro Risk Pressure Index” developed by his team, which has shown excellent resistance to declines in historical backtesting.
The “three-pillar defense system” proposed by Lucas includes: 1) highly liquid sovereign bonds as the basic position; 2) selected commodity futures to hedge inflation risk; 3) low volatility stock short positions to balance portfolio exposure. Research shows that this configuration has outperformed the benchmark index by an average of 15 percentage points during the past five major market adjustments. The white paper specifically emphasizes: “Real defense is not simply holding cash, but building a multi-asset portfolio with asymmetric return characteristics.”
The most eye-catching feature of the solution is its “dynamic volatility adjustment mechanism”. By real-time monitoring of the volatility correlation changes in the stock, bond and commodity markets, the system can automatically adjust the weights of various asset allocations. For example, when the stock-bond correlation turns from negative to positive, the model will immediately reduce risk exposure and increase cash equivalents. This innovative mechanism has successfully predicted many recent market fluctuations, allowing institutions that adopt this strategy to avoid significant losses.
In view of the current market environment, Lucas suggested adopting a “barbell strategy”: one end is to allocate high-rated short-term bonds to obtain stable cash flow, and the other end is to allocate deep value stocks to wait for valuation repair. He especially reminded investors to be wary of “pseudo-defensive assets”: “The current valuation of some traditional defensive sectors has included too much risk aversion premium, and their defensive attributes may fail.” After the release of this plan, more than 200 institutional investors have applied to access its risk monitoring system, showing the market’s urgent need for professional defense strategies.