How Momentum Investing Stacks Up?

Since we started to feature Tactical Asset Allocation(TAA) and its related momentum investing methodology almost 10 years ago, this method has been widely recognized as one of viable investment strategies. At individual stock level, momentum is recognized as one of the four key factors (market, size, value, momentum) that drive a stock fund’s returns. Many momentum factor based ETFs and mutual funds have come to market. These include AQR’s US large stock momentum fund AMOMX and iShares S&P 500 Momentum ETF (MTUM), among many others. 

We have discussed this topic from various angles. We encourage readers who want to read more in this subject to look at those in our newsletter collection. In this newsletter, we will look at how viable a momentum based portfolio is for a long term investor. 

The meaning of long term

At MyPlanIQ, we’ve strived to have a better understanding of the meaning of ‘long term’ in several previous newsletters. In general, we believe this depends on the types of investments (stocks, bonds) and the strategies employed (buy and hold (strategic) or tactical). For an all stock or risk asset portfolio, we generally give the following guideline: