In recent years the field of finance has exploded with innovation. New products, services and techniques abound. The risks of inflation, the volatility of interest rates, the deregulation of financial intermediaries and the unbundling of financial services have combined to present investment managers with challenges and opportunities far greater than in the past. For trustees and managers of pension, trust, endowment, and similar funds, the task of meeting the challenges and exploiting the opportunities is much more difficult. These fiduciaries must measure their investment decisions against constrained interpretations of a legal standard--the prudent man rule--that have caused it to lag far behind changes in investment theory and the marketplace. Drawing on financial history, a major opinion survey of institutional investors, and comprehensive reviews of the law and of the lessons of modern portfolio theory for prudence, this book presents a powerful case that the prudent man rule as elaborated in legal treatises and much of the case law would virtually compel a fiduciary to act imprudently in terms of financial theory and marketplace reality. In proposing a modern paradigm of investment prudence, the book uses illustrations drawn from such traditionally suspect categories of investment fiduciaries as securities lending, real estate, venture capital, options and futures and repurchaser agreements. An unusual examination of the interaction of the worlds of law and finance, this work will be of interest to fiduciaries who are subject to some from of prudent man rule and all others, including judges, lawyers and investment managers, who are called upon to interpret and apply that legal standard.

Introduces the modern investment management techniques used by Goldman Sachs asset management to a broad range of institutional and sophisticated investors. * Along with Fischer Black, Bob Litterman created the Black-Litterman asset allocation model, one of the most widely respected and used asset allocation models deployed by institutional investors. * Litterman and his asset management group are often a driving force behind the asset allocation and investment decision-making of the world's largest 100 pension funds.

This book is not for the do-it-yourself investor or the amateur speculator, but for the serious investor seeking a professional investment approach to money management. This bestselling guide explores all the variables critical to the orchestration of a successful investment program.

"Timely and practical. This book brings the leading edge of investment information to the prudent investor in an understandable way." - Charles Schwab, Chairman, Charles Schwab Corporation. "to write a book like this on Modern Portfolio Theory and make it understandable would be a very difficult job. John Bowen went ahead and did it. Congratulations." - Merton Miller, Nobel Laureate in Economics. Individual investors today must fend for themselves as they seize control of their own portfolios. In this authoritative and ill-researched book, investors learn how to simply and effectively use popular asset allocation strategies - in combinations with mutual funds - to greatly increase their returns. The reader is walked step-by-step through a low-risk, high-return approach using model portfolios and case histories, plus timely information on emerging markets, tax-saving moves, annuity products, and more.