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The Market Theory, Meaning, And Market

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DFA has had a very consistent strategy since its inception in 1987. They use academic research as the backbone of their decisions. At the heart of their strategy is the efficient market theory, meaning that in liquid markets, prices reflect all available information. This is contrary to most mutual funds that attempt to continually beat the market. Instead DFA looks to academic research to invest in asset classes that historically produced higher expected returns and structure their holdings around those classes. This enables them to stay passive but add alpha over index funds. Other sources of alpha are contributed by block trading and buying in bulk at a discounted price, and finally by constructing products for niche tax advantages. Ultimately DFA is not looking to profit by exposing arbitrage in the market but instead building strategies under the assumption of fair pricing allowing them to focus their attention on investments that compensate investors for taking. Under these assumptions, the market risks come at a premium which may allow for higher expected returns. They put a strong weight on academic research and results from practicing investors that show robust long term strategies. The research behind their beliefs show that small companies have higher expected returns than large companies, high B/M “value” companies have higher expected returns than low B/M “growth” companies, and finally companies with high profitability have higher expected returns than

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