Posted By Gbaf News
Posted on February 27, 2018
New firm delivers portfolio construction tools aimed at helping investors gain magnified exposure without derivatives or borrowing
Salt Financial LLC, a provider of data, ETF and index products, today announced the launch of the Salt truBeta High Exposure Index. Powered by the firm’s truBeta discovery, the Index is designed to demonstrate to retail and institutional investors the accuracy of truBeta and its ability to deliver portfolio construction tools that provide magnified exposure without the use of risky derivatives or expensive borrowing.
Founded in 2017 by industry veterans Tony Barchetto and Alfred Eskandar, Salt Financial is the financial industry’s first and only provider of truBeta ETFs. Using a machine learning algorithm, truBeta blends recent intraday with longer term historical data to forecast how sensitive a specific stock or portfolio is to the overall market, delivering what we believe is a far more accurate forecast of beta than traditional methods. truBeta is Salt Financial’s foundation for creating data, ETF and index products.
The Salt truBeta High Exposure Index selects stocks with the highest truBeta forecast, increasing exposure to the underlying market with simply targeted stock selection instead of derivatives or leverage. With an average truBeta estimate of approximately 1.50, the index is designed to capture 50 percent more of the variation in the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY).
“Salt was created to help traders and investors capitalize on their best ideas and get rewarded for the risks they take without the complicated structures embedded in some other investment products,” said Tony Barchetto, Founder of Salt Financial. “Our first index targets exposure to the US large cap market but the same core methodology will be used to introduce similar high exposure indices based other market segments, sectors, and geographies.”
The Salt truBeta High Exposure Indexis available on Bloomberg and Thomson Reuters under ticker symbols SFMGX (price return) and SFMGXT (gross total return).
“Active retail and institutional investors and RIAs need powerful products that are simple to implement,” said Alfred Eskandar, co-founder of Salt Financial. “Today, investors generally have to choose between using complex products that reset daily or borrow on margin to enhance their exposure—we aim to provide a better alternative. “
As part of its expansion strategy, Salt Financial also announced the appointment of Dom DeCarlo, an asset management and mutual fund veteran, as director of sales and business development. DeCarlo joins the firm from WisdomTree Asset Management, where he served as head of internal distribution/strategic accounts in New York and London. Earlier in his career he held positions at Legg Mason and AXA Advisors.
“Dom brings a wealth of international, smart beta and leveraged ETF experience to Salt and we are excited to welcome him to the team as we prepare to launch additional indices and products in the first half of 2018,” Eskandar said.
