Detraction Levels in Portfolios Workout
- 02:42
How to calculate detraction levels in portfolios.
Glossary
ESG portfolio riskTranscript
In this workout, we've been told that the ESG metrics of a portfolio and its holdings are rated on a scale of 1 to 100%, with 100% being the highest possible score. Now, this could be based on an external rating system or an internal rating system of the fund manager. We've also been told that the portfolio is rated below average on the environmental or E score, which is prompting further investigation by a prospective investor. And we've been asked to calculate detraction level of the holdings A, B, and C, and D in the portfolio. Now, before we do any calculation, let's have a look at the information we've been given. And we can see that we've got the E, S and G scores of the portfolio and also the benchmark index. Now, we can see simply by glancing at these numbers that the portfolio's E score is well below that of the benchmark, whereas the S score and the G score actually exceed the benchmark numbers. And we can see that we can actually calculate the difference between the portfolio and the benchmark, and that's been done for us in column E. And that just reinforces the point that the E score is well below that benchmark number. Now, the question tells us that this is prompting further investigation by a prospective investor, and what we would expect to do is to investigate all of the holdings where the E score for the holding is below that of the portfolio. And we can see that companies A, B, C and D all have an E score which is below that portfolio E score of 48%. However, what we want to actually do is to calculate the detraction level. And the detraction level is the difference between the E score of each holding and the benchmarks E score. So let's first of all just grab the benchmark E score from above, and I'm just going to include that in each of the rows below. And then I can calculate the detraction level simply by taking the benchmark E score and deducting the E score for each holding. And we can copy that formula down for each of the companies that we're investigating. And we can see the detraction level there for each company, with company A, having the highest level of detraction, that's the highest variance, or the highest delta between their E score and that of the benchmark. But all of those companies, A, B, C, and D, have significant detraction levels. So all of those companies are pulling down the overall E score for the portfolio. Now, it depends very much on what the strategy is for the portfolio as to what would be done with this. It could be that the strategy could be to divest of companies with significant detraction levels, or it could be that this prompts engagement with those companies.