Our primary goal is to foster client success. Whatever the mission – whether it’s securing the future of retirees and their families, providing the best healthcare that workers can afford, educating young talent, building communities through social development programs or sustaining charities – we stand with them as a partner they can depend on to help chart a road map to success.

Our fundamental investment principles are diversification, valuation, and a thorough understanding of risk. Surrounding these principles is humility. Our perspectives on risk and diversification help to defend portfolios against disruptive events, while our focus on valuation aids us in the pursuit of investment opportunities.

To these we add several functional investment principles relating to how we approach portfolios. Together they add up to a clear and consistent approach to investing, guidance and service: The Verus perspective.

• A client’s enterprise risk tolerance and objectives guide decision-making

  Every institution has a unique set of challenges and obligations that ultimately shapes its investment goals and modulates its propensity for risk-taking. The qualities that define an enterprise underpin our approach and inform every aspect of our advice, creating a unique investment solution for every client need.

• Asset allocation and risk exposures drive results

  Allocation of assets and risk exposures are far more important to achieving long-term enterprise objectives than manager selection or tactical trading. We focus our time and resources on these crucial decisions.

• Economic factors and valuation drive long-term asset class returns

  Understanding the sources and dynamics of global GDP growth, fiscal policy, monetary policy and inflation are essential to designing an effective strategic investment policy, because these factors create the environment for investing over a given period. The relative valuations of asset classes ebb and flow as the supply and demand of capital changes. Understanding valuations and the factors that influence them is crucial because the price an investor pays for an asset largely determines the result of the investment.

• Risk and diversification must be viewed through multiple lenses

  Most institutional portfolios are not as diversified as investors believe. Not only do asset classes share common risks but their correlation tends to rise in times of crisis, just when investors need diversification the most.
  
  At Verus, we measure and evaluate diversification by many different perspectives, including economic regime and critical risk factors, and complement classic mean-variance optimization models with proprietary scenario analysis, stress tests and measurements geared to each client’s specific objectives.

• Fees and expenses must be minimized and justified

  Investments need not be complex or expensive to be successful; low-cost beta allocations often drive most investment results. Yet institutions frequently pursue expensive alpha-based strategies to little advantage. At Verus, we believe that all investment management fees and trading costs should be justified and expertly managed.

The Verus perspective