Attractive niches in the Asia-Pacific region
Asian markets are less efficient and less crowded, because most quants focus on home markets in US and Europe due to operational ease.
Barriers-to-entry include language, culture, time-zone, and foreign regulations.
Recent growth and modernization of Asian exchanges
New trading platforms have greater liquidity and lower trading fees. In particular, China A-shares have enormous turnover. China already permits short selling, futures trading, and leverage.
Plentiful opportunities for finding alpha
Many quantitative hedge funds, despite reasonable performance in 2008-2009, forced to downsize or
shut down due to financial industry-wide issues. Competition decreased when U.S. proprietary trading desks
at investment banks were closed or spun out due to the Volcker rule.
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