Description

The Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy takes advantage of the historically negative correlation between gold and the U.S. dollar. It switches between the two assets based on their recent risk adjusted performance enabling the strategy to provide protection against severe gold corrections due to dollar strength. It is an excellent addition to existing equity or bond portfolios as it holds very little correlation to either.

This version of the strategy uses inverse leveraged ETFs to generate higher returns, but some retirement accounts are restricted from trading these ETFs. GLD-UUP provides an alternate form of the strategy without leveraged ETFs which also lowers the overall return and volatility.

Statistics (YTD)

What do these metrics mean? [Read More] [Hide]

TotalReturn:

'Total return, when measuring performance, is the actual rate of return of an investment or a pool of investments over a given evaluation period. Total return includes interest, capital gains, dividends and distributions realized over a given period of time. Total return accounts for two categories of return: income including interest paid by fixed-income investments, distributions or dividends and capital appreciation, representing the change in the market price of an asset.'

Applying this definition to our asset in some examples:
  • The total return over 5 years of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy is 85.8%, which is smaller, thus worse compared to the benchmark GLD (103.6%) in the same period.
  • Compared with GLD (56.8%) in the period of the last 3 years, the total return, or increase in value of 53.3% is lower, thus worse.

CAGR:

'Compound annual growth rate (CAGR) is a business and investing specific term for the geometric progression ratio that provides a constant rate of return over the time period. CAGR is not an accounting term, but it is often used to describe some element of the business, for example revenue, units delivered, registered users, etc. CAGR dampens the effect of volatility of periodic returns that can render arithmetic means irrelevant. It is particularly useful to compare growth rates from various data sets of common domain such as revenue growth of companies in the same industry.'

Which means for our asset as example:
  • Compared with the benchmark GLD (15.3%) in the period of the last 5 years, the compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 13.2% of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy is smaller, thus worse.
  • Compared with GLD (16.3%) in the period of the last 3 years, the annual performance (CAGR) of 15.4% is lower, thus worse.

Volatility:

'Volatility is a statistical measure of the dispersion of returns for a given security or market index. Volatility can either be measured by using the standard deviation or variance between returns from that same security or market index. Commonly, the higher the volatility, the riskier the security. In the securities markets, volatility is often associated with big swings in either direction. For example, when the stock market rises and falls more than one percent over a sustained period of time, it is called a 'volatile' market.'

Using this definition on our asset we see for example:
  • The volatility over 5 years of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy is 10.9%, which is lower, thus better compared to the benchmark GLD (15.2%) in the same period.
  • Looking at 30 days standard deviation in of 11.2% in the period of the last 3 years, we see it is relatively lower, thus better in comparison to GLD (14.3%).

DownVol:

'Downside risk is the financial risk associated with losses. That is, it is the risk of the actual return being below the expected return, or the uncertainty about the magnitude of that difference. Risk measures typically quantify the downside risk, whereas the standard deviation (an example of a deviation risk measure) measures both the upside and downside risk. Specifically, downside risk in our definition is the semi-deviation, that is the standard deviation of all negative returns.'

Using this definition on our asset we see for example:
  • The downside volatility over 5 years of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy is 7.7%, which is smaller, thus better compared to the benchmark GLD (10.5%) in the same period.
  • Compared with GLD (9.6%) in the period of the last 3 years, the downside deviation of 7.7% is smaller, thus better.

Sharpe:

'The Sharpe ratio was developed by Nobel laureate William F. Sharpe, and is used to help investors understand the return of an investment compared to its risk. The ratio is the average return earned in excess of the risk-free rate per unit of volatility or total risk. Subtracting the risk-free rate from the mean return allows an investor to better isolate the profits associated with risk-taking activities. One intuition of this calculation is that a portfolio engaging in 'zero risk' investments, such as the purchase of U.S. Treasury bills (for which the expected return is the risk-free rate), has a Sharpe ratio of exactly zero. Generally, the greater the value of the Sharpe ratio, the more attractive the risk-adjusted return.'

Using this definition on our asset we see for example:
  • Looking at the risk / return profile (Sharpe) of 0.99 in the last 5 years of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy, we see it is relatively higher, thus better in comparison to the benchmark GLD (0.84)
  • Compared with GLD (0.96) in the period of the last 3 years, the Sharpe Ratio of 1.15 is greater, thus better.

Sortino:

'The Sortino ratio improves upon the Sharpe ratio by isolating downside volatility from total volatility by dividing excess return by the downside deviation. The Sortino ratio is a variation of the Sharpe ratio that differentiates harmful volatility from total overall volatility by using the asset's standard deviation of negative asset returns, called downside deviation. The Sortino ratio takes the asset's return and subtracts the risk-free rate, and then divides that amount by the asset's downside deviation. The ratio was named after Frank A. Sortino.'

Applying this definition to our asset in some examples:
  • The ratio of annual return and downside deviation over 5 years of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy is 1.4, which is higher, thus better compared to the benchmark GLD (1.22) in the same period.
  • During the last 3 years, the excess return divided by the downside deviation is 1.67, which is greater, thus better than the value of 1.43 from the benchmark.

Ulcer:

'The ulcer index is a stock market risk measure or technical analysis indicator devised by Peter Martin in 1987, and published by him and Byron McCann in their 1989 book The Investors Guide to Fidelity Funds. It's designed as a measure of volatility, but only volatility in the downward direction, i.e. the amount of drawdown or retracement occurring over a period. Other volatility measures like standard deviation treat up and down movement equally, but a trader doesn't mind upward movement, it's the downside that causes stress and stomach ulcers that the index's name suggests.'

Using this definition on our asset we see for example:
  • The Ulcer Ratio over 5 years of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy is 5.95 , which is smaller, thus better compared to the benchmark GLD (9.75 ) in the same period.
  • Compared with GLD (6.66 ) in the period of the last 3 years, the Ulcer Ratio of 6.52 is lower, thus better.

MaxDD:

'Maximum drawdown measures the loss in any losing period during a fund’s investment record. It is defined as the percent retrenchment from a fund’s peak value to the fund’s valley value. The drawdown is in effect from the time the fund’s retrenchment begins until a new fund high is reached. The maximum drawdown encompasses both the period from the fund’s peak to the fund’s valley (length), and the time from the fund’s valley to a new fund high (recovery). It measures the largest percentage drawdown that has occurred in any fund’s data record.'

Which means for our asset as example:
  • Looking at the maximum DrawDown of -15.2 days in the last 5 years of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy, we see it is relatively greater, thus better in comparison to the benchmark GLD (-22 days)
  • Looking at maximum drop from peak to valley in of -15.2 days in the period of the last 3 years, we see it is relatively larger, thus better in comparison to GLD (-18.1 days).

MaxDuration:

'The Drawdown Duration is the length of any peak to peak period, or the time between new equity highs. The Max Drawdown Duration is the worst (the maximum/longest) amount of time an investment has seen between peaks (equity highs). Many assume Max DD Duration is the length of time between new highs during which the Max DD (magnitude) occurred. But that isn’t always the case. The Max DD duration is the longest time between peaks, period. So it could be the time when the program also had its biggest peak to valley loss (and usually is, because the program needs a long time to recover from the largest loss), but it doesn’t have to be'

Applying this definition to our asset in some examples:
  • Looking at the maximum days under water of 471 days in the last 5 years of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy, we see it is relatively lower, thus better in comparison to the benchmark GLD (897 days)
  • During the last 3 years, the maximum days under water is 471 days, which is greater, thus worse than the value of 235 days from the benchmark.

AveDuration:

'The Drawdown Duration is the length of any peak to peak period, or the time between new equity highs. The Avg Drawdown Duration is the average amount of time an investment has seen between peaks (equity highs), or in other terms the average of time under water of all drawdowns. So in contrast to the Maximum duration it does not measure only one drawdown event but calculates the average of all.'

Using this definition on our asset we see for example:
  • Compared with the benchmark GLD (348 days) in the period of the last 5 years, the average days below previous high of 141 days of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy is lower, thus better.
  • Compared with GLD (63 days) in the period of the last 3 years, the average time in days below previous high water mark of 168 days is greater, thus worse.

Performance (YTD)

Historical returns have been extended using synthetic data.

Allocations ()

Allocations

Returns (%)

  • Note that yearly returns do not equal the sum of monthly returns due to compounding.
  • Performance results of Leveraged Gold-Currency Strategy are hypothetical and do not account for slippage, fees or taxes.
  • Results may be based on backtesting, which has many inherent limitations, some of which are described in our Terms of Use.