Identifying the Characteristics of Banks Proprietary Trading Style
33 Pages Posted: 19 Jul 2011
Date Written: July 12, 2011
Abstract
Bank’s proprietary desks and hedge funds have similar investment styles, goals and dynamics. We apply bank related factors, trend following strategies, and active managers benchmarks in order to understand the style and especially the dynamics of banks proprietary trading desks decisions. We find that bank traders are not trend followers, but are positively correlated to macro hedge funds and above all are short volatility strategies, meaning selling options (calls and puts) with bonds as the major underlying. We conclude that Asset Based Style (ABS) factors are an alternative approach for regulators and other market participants to understand banks proprietary market exposure.
Keywords: Banks Proprietary Trading, Hedge Fund Strategies
JEL Classification: G23
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation