Robert D. Arnott (born June 29, 1954) is an American businessman, investor, and writer who focuses on articles about

quantitative investing Quantitative analysis is the use of mathematical and statistical methods in finance and investment management. Those working in the field are quantitative analysts (quants). Quants tend to specialize in specific areas which may include derivative ...

. He is the founder and chairman of the board of

Research Affiliates Robert D. Arnott (born June 29, 1954) is an American businessman, investor, and writer who focuses on articles about quantitative investing. He is the founder and chairman of the board of Research Affiliates, an asset management firm. Research ...

, an asset management firm. Research Affiliates develops

investment strategies In finance, an investment strategy is a set of rules, behaviors or procedures, designed to guide an investor's selection of an investment portfolio. Individuals have different profit objectives, and their individual skills make different tactics ...

for other firms, and there are over US$166 billion assets under the management of firms using their strategies as of September 2021. He edited

CFA Institute The CFA Institute is a global, not-for-profit professional organization that provides investment professionals with finance education. The institute aims to promote standards in ethics, education, and professional excellence in the global investme ...

's ''Financial Analysts Journal'' from 2002 to 2006, and has edited three books on equity management and

tactical asset allocation Tactical asset allocation (TAA) is a dynamic investment strategy that actively adjusts a portfolio's asset allocation. The goal of a TAA strategy is to improve the risk-adjusted returns of passive management investing. Strategy descriptions TA ...

. Arnott is a co-author of the book ''The Fundamental Index: A Better Way to Invest'', and co-editor of three other books relating to asset allocation and equity market investing. Arnott has also served as a Visiting Professor of Finance at the UCLA Anderson School of Management, on the editorial board of the '' Journal of Portfolio Management'', the product advisory board of the

Chicago Mercantile Exchange The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) (often called "the Chicago Merc", or "the Merc") is an American derivatives marketplace based in Chicago and located at 20 S. Wacker Drive. The CME was founded in 1898 as the Chicago Butter and Egg Board ...

, and the

Chicago Board Options Exchange Cboe Global Markets, Inc. is an American company that owns the Chicago Board Options Exchange and the stock exchange operator BATS Global Markets. History Founded by the Chicago Board of Trade in 1973 and member-owned for several decades, the ...

. He previously served as Chairman of First Quadrant, LP, as global equity strategist at Salomon (now Salomon Smith Barney), president of TSA Capital Management (now TSA/Analytic), and as vice president at the Boston Company. Arnott has received seven Graham and Dodd Scrolls and Awards, awarded annually by the CFA Institute for best articles of the year, and has received four Bernstein-Fabozzi/Jacobs-Levy awards from the ''Journal of Portfolio Management'' and ''Institutional Investor'' magazine.

Education and personal life

Arnott graduated from the

University of California, Santa Barbara The University of California, Santa Barbara (UC Santa Barbara or UCSB) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Tracing its roots back to 1891 as an ...

in 1977, receiving a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

''summa cum laude'' with majors in economics, applied mathematics, and computer science. While a high school student in 1970, he attended the Summer Science Program. He is married with three children. As of 2019, Arnott lived in

Miami Beach, Florida Miami Beach is a coastal resort city in Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States. It is part of the Miami metropolitan area of South Florida. The municipality is located on natural and human-made barrier islands between the Atlantic Ocean ...

Writing

Arnott has published over 130 academic papers in refereed journals. Topics of these papers have included the following: mutual fund returns, the equity risk premium, tactical asset allocation, and alternative index investing.

Career

In college, Arnott contemplated a career in either astrophysics or finance. He opted for finance after deciding his math skills were inadequate for making serious contributions to science, but above average for finance or investing, as he later recalled, "where hardly anyone was using serious math at the time.” After college, he worked at

Salomon Brothers Salomon Brothers, Inc., was an American multinational bulge bracket investment bank headquartered in New York City. It was one of the five List of investment banks, largest investment banking enterprises in the United States and a very profitabl ...

and in 1998 became chairman of First Quadrant, LP. In 2002, Arnott founded Research Affiliates, a

Newport Beach, California Newport Beach is a coastal city of about 85,000 in southern Orange County, California, United States. Located about southeast of downtown Los Angeles, Newport Beach is known for its sandy beaches. The city's harbor once supported maritime indu ...

-based investment management firm. As of June 30, 2021, about $171 billion in assets are managed worldwide using investment strategies developed by Research Affiliates. The firm has been involved with fundamentally based indexes since mid-2004 and has worked with the

FTSE Group FTSE International Limited trading as FTSE Russell ( "Footsie") is a British provider of stock market index, stock market indices and associated data services, wholly owned by the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and operating from premises in Canary ...

to create indices based on this methodology. Research Affiliates licenses its indexes to Schwab,

Invesco Invesco Ltd. is an American independent investment management company headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, with branch offices in 20 countries. Its common stock is a constituent of the S&P 500 and trades on the New York Stock Exchange. Invesco oper ...

and

PIMCO Pacific Investment Management Company LLC (PIMCO) is an American investment management firm. While it has a specific focus on active fixed income management worldwide, it manages investments in many asset classes, including fixed income, share ca ...

. In November, 2009, Research Affiliates was granted a patent for their index methodology that selects and weights securities using fundamental measures of company size. Arnott co-manages the

All Asset Fund, a tactical

fund of funds A "fund of funds" (FOF) is an investment strategy of holding a portfolio of other investment funds rather than investing directly in stocks, bonds or other securities. This type of investing is often referred to as multi-manager investment. A f ...

with $16 billion in assets as of March 2022, which can invest in any of PIMCO's many

mutual fund A mutual fund is an investment fund that pools money from many investors to purchase Security (finance), securities. The term is typically used in the United States, Canada, and India, while similar structures across the globe include the SICAV in ...

s. This fund is intended to feature what Arnott calls "Third Pillar" options, meant to diversify beyond mainstream stocks and investment-grade bonds, and may include

master limited partnership In the United States, a master limited partnership (MLP) or publicly traded partnership (PTP) is a publicly traded entity taxed as a partnership. It combines the tax benefits of a partnership with the liquidity of publicly traded securities. To o ...

s, high-yield bonds,

emerging markets An emerging market (or an emerging country or an emerging economy) is a market that has some characteristics of a developed market, but does not fully meet its standards. This includes markets that may become developed markets in the future or we ...

debt, or liquid alternatives with the goal of boosting long-term portfolio performance.

Political contributions

Arnott has given $750,000 to support the Club for Growth, a politically conservative group advocating lower tax rates. Arnott considers himself a

libertarian Libertarianism (from ; or from ) is a political philosophy that holds freedom, personal sovereignty, and liberty as primary values. Many libertarians believe that the concept of freedom is in accord with the Non-Aggression Principle, according ...

, and opposes the

Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act A patient is any recipient of health care services that are performed by healthcare professionals. The patient is most often ill or injured and in need of treatment by a physician, nurse, optometrist, dentist, veterinarian, or other health ...

. In 2015, Arnott donated $100,000 to America's Liberty PAC, a

political action committee In the United States, a political action committee (PAC) is a tax-exempt 527 organization that pools campaign contributions from members and donates those funds to campaigns for or against candidates, ballot initiatives, or legislation. The l ...

formed in support of Representative

Rand Paul Randal Howard Paul (born January 7, 1963) is an American politician serving as the Seniority in the United States Senate, junior United States senator from Kentucky since 2011. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican ...

's 2016 presidential bid.

References

External links

Research Affiliates, LLCRAFI Indices, LLC
{{DEFAULTSORT:Arnott, Robert D. 1954 births Living people American business writers American chief executives of financial services companies American finance and investment writers American financial company founders American investors American money managers PIMCO Summer Science Program University of California, Santa Barbara alumni