Saturday, June 30, 2012

CEF Portfolio Concentration vs. Yield


The way I was trained in credit, i.e. where there is default risk, is that since investors are only getting back par plus coupons there should be a strong bias toward reducing large losses.  This goal is achieved by lending in a way that defaults are not correlated (avoiding loading up on overlapping sectors, regions etc.) as well as portfolio size diversification so that idiosyncratic risks are reduced as well. 
This doctrine is different than equity investing, where there are much larger payoffs to portfolio concentration, since investors enjoy unlimited upside, and do not have good investments forcibly paid back (like a callable bond).
In that vein, I ran some numbers to compare the yields of CEF's I follow vs. a simplistic measure of their portfolio concentration (as a proxy for that risk of a large loss).  I pulled the sum of percentages of each funds top 10 positions.  That may not truly capture the risks as some funds (particularly those that use derivatives/govt bonds extensively) will show up as artificially riskier under this measure.  But I think, in the main, it's illustrative of the portfolio construction, and risks assumed, of the various management teams. 
My bias, all things being equal between yields, is to prefer the more diversified holdings.
Closed End Funds
NameYieldConc
JFRNUVEEN FLOATING RATE INCOME7.5116.59
EFTEATON VANCE FLOAT RT INC TR6.548.74
BGTBLACKROCK FLT RT INC6.4613.43
BSLBLACKSTONE/GSO SENIOR FLOAT6.8611.46
FCTFIRST TRUST SENIOR FLOATING6.7811.06
PPRING PRIME RATE TRUST7.2416.91
VVRINVESCO VAN KAMPEN SENIOR IN6.5811.45
DVFBLACKROCK DIVERSIFIED INCM S6.8612.09
AFTAPOLLO SENIOR FLOATING RATE6.94#N/A N/A
GDVGABELLI DIVIDEND & INCOME TR6.0713.99
MGUMACQUARIE GLOBAL INFR TOT RT5.3343.74
UTFCOHEN & STEERS INFRASTRUCTUR8.2129.36
RVTROYCE VALUE TRUST5.917.89
USALIBERTY ALL STAR EQUITY FUND6.9119.34
LGILAZARD GLOBAL TOT RT & INC6.8030.98
EVTEATON VANCE TAX-ADV DVD INC7.9219.80
NIEAGIC EQUITY & CONVERTIBLE IN6.6419.33
GLOCLOUGH GLBL OPPORTUNITIES FD9.9452.65
BDJBLACKROCK ENHANCED EQUITY DI9.4321.09
EOSEATON VANCE ENH EQT INC II9.9636.09
ETJEATON VANCE RISK-MANAGED DIV10.9528.76
EXGEATON VANCE TAX-MANAGED GLOB11.6719.89
JPZNUVEEN EQUITY PREMIUM INCOME8.8822.97
JSNNUVEEN EQUITY PREM OPP FUND9.2628.63
NFJNFJ DVD INTEREST & PR STRAT10.5025.32
DBLDOUBLELINE OPPORTUNISTIC CRE7.4525.44
JMTNUVEEN MTG OPPORT TERM FUND8.4115.58
DMOWESTERN ASSET MORTGAGE DEFIN8.0610.26
JLSNUVEEN MORTGAGE OPPORTUNITY8.4518.58
FMYFIRST TRUST MORTGAGE INCOME9.7542.82
EHIWESTERN ASSET GLOBAL HIGH IN8.6711.92
FLCFLAH & CRUM/CLYMORE TOT RET8.6529.46
JPSNUVEEN QUALITY PREFERRED II7.2421.51
JHSJOHN HANCOCK INCOME SECS TR6.9219.37
HPSJOHN HANCOCK PFD INCOME III7.6327.53
ACGALLIANCEBERNSTEIN INC FUND5.7354.36
AWFALLIANCEBERNSTEIN GL HI INC7.979.52
LBFDWS GLBL HIGH INCOME FD INC6.0730.60
GDOWESTERN ASSET GL CORP DEF OP7.9211.64
BNABLACKROCK INCOME OPPTY TRST6.2459.59
BPPBLACKROCK CREDIT ALLOC III6.6424.76
BTZBLACKROCK CREDIT ALLOC IV7.0824.26
PSWBLACKROCK CREDIT ALLOCAT I7.0326.28
PSYBLACKROCK CREDIT ALLOCAT II6.7621.45
MCRMFS CHARTER INCOME TRUST6.6611.15
MMTMFS MULTIMARKET INC TRUST6.7310.94
JQCNUVEEN CREDIT STRATEGIES INC8.6916.68
MTSMONTGOMERY ST INCOME SEC INC3.7245.87
ICBMORGAN STANLEY INCOME SECS4.6115.74
BHKBLACKROCK CORE BOND TRUST6.0356.36
JPCNUVEEN PREFERRED INCOME OPPO8.2022.04
GCFGLOBAL INCOME & CURRENCY6.8461.16
ERCWELLS FARGO ADVANTAGE MULTI7.8516.70
CSQCALAMOS STRAT TOT RETURN FD8.5726.41
GDFWESTERN ASSET GLOBAL PARTNER9.3717.87
EDDMORGAN STANLEY EMERGING MARK7.5071.62
CHWCALAMOS GLOBAL DYNAMIC INCOM8.7012.39
TEITEMPLETON EMERG MKTS INC FD6.1335.58
PHKPIMCO HIGH INCOME FUND10.6645.53
PCMPIMCO COMMERCIAL MTG SECS TR8.5736.03
PDIPIMCO DYNAMIC INCOME FUND8.24#N/A N/A
PKOPIMCO INCOME OPPORTUNITY FUN8.3631.28
PFNPIMCO INCOME STRATEGY FD II9.0833.68
PFLPIMCO INCOME STRATEGY FUND9.0135.31
RCSPIMCO STRATEGIC GLBL GOVT8.2626.94
PCNPIMCO CORPORATE & INCOME STR7.9637.55
PTYPIMCO CORPORATE & INCOME OPP8.1326.10
GOFGUGGENHEIM STRATEGIC OPPORTU8.6827.37


Some things that stuck out to me:  how much idiosyncratic risk the PIMCO CEF's tend to have. (Just punch up some of their holdings list to see what I'm talking about)  I realize they have excellent credit analysts, but one can compare a typical HY offering in their lineup to something like Alliance's HY funds and see that there is much more security selection diversification in the A-B product -- albeit at a cost in yield.  What I find a little odd is that for a shop that prides itself on macro calls (PIMCO secular forum and all that...) they are using their security selection expertise in driving their strong FI CEF performance. It comes down to what you are looking for in your CEFs -- security selection conviction or portfolio diversification.  The average concentration number across the funds I'm tracking (clearly many kinds) is 26%.
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Just to clarify what my proxy for the idea of large loss is very simply: concentration risk = sum of top ten positions percent weight.
For example, looking at PFN:
BACR 14 11/29/49BACR5.556
AIG 8.175 05/15/58AIG4.821
PNC 12 12/29/49PNC3.768
NTHRN CA PWR-TXB-B-LONORPWR3.194
COBKAC 11 12/31/49COBKAC2.982
RABOBK 6 ⅞ 03/19/20RABOBK2.858
PPL 9 ½ 07/01/13PPL2.806
WFC 7.98 03/29/49WFC2.657
AIG 6.765 11/15/17AIG2.556
AMERN MUN PWR-B-BABSAMEPWR2.487
PFN's concentration is the sum of the final column: 33.68%
Adding more funds -- that do not have overlapping portfolios -- will reduce the concentration risk across one's holdings.  This can be an argument for diversifying across multiple management companies.  
I'm trying to figure out how to get a portfolio VaR* and then compare that to the yield, but that only covers the NAV, ...and I can't automate that into a spreadsheet.  One can look at long run comparisons of market price volatility to NAV volatility and scale them, as well.  
*VaR has lots of issues too I know.
PS: I've run some sample numbers on VaR and CVaR, which are not perfect, since CEF holdings do not get modeled in toto, but they loosely line up with the concentration numbers.  That is: funds with high concentration metrics seem to show higher VaR numbers for their portfolios.  That makes intuitive sense.

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