What is the Treynor Ratio? Investing Definitions

what is the treynor ratio

In reality, though, it is highly unlikely, as that means the return of your portfolio is lower than the risk-free rate. We have prepared this article to help you understand what Treynor ratio is and how to calculate it using the Treynor ratio formula. By demonstrating some Treynor ratio examples, we aim to instill you with the concept. So, the market index yielded a better risk-adjusted return during that period. Note that the S&P 500 is given a beta value of 1 because it is a broad market index.

  1. The Treynor ratio captures the difference between a portfolio’s total return and the risk-free rate, which is subsequently adjusted for the amount of risk undertaken on a per-unit basis.
  2. From the comparison Treynor ratio vs. Sharpe ratio, the former is generally considered more accurate as investors are normally only compensated by taking on more systematic risk.
  3. By measuring the excess returns of a portfolio per unit systemic risk taken, the Treynor Ratio is a measurement of efficiency, utilizing the relationship between risk and returns.
  4. The Sharpe ratio measures the return of your portfolio against the total risk, whereas the Treynor ratio uses systematic risk.

The 10-year and 20-year US Treasury yields have typically been used as the proxies for the risk-free rate. However, there are a few limitations that you should keep in mind when using the metric. Its reliability is hence heavily dependent on the accuracy of the historical data. Although we can rank the Treynor ratios, as the higher Treynor ratios are generally better, we cannot say that a Treynor ratio of 5 is 2 times better than a Treynor ratio of 2.5. As a financial analyst, it is important to not rely on a single ratio for your investment decisions. Other financial metrics should be considered before making a final decision.

Hakan Samuelsson and Oddmund Groette are independent full-time traders and investors who together with their team manage this website. If interested, download the Navi app by clicking here, explore funds based on your goals and risk tolerance, and start investing in a few minutes in a 100% paperless manner. Additionally, there are no dimensions upon which to rank the Treynor ratio. When comparing similar investments, the higher Treynor ratio is better, all else equal, but there is no definition of how much better it is than the other investments.

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The Treynor ratio is a measure of the amount of excess return each unit of risk in an investment or portfolio can yield. So, This is one of the critical performance metrics that analysts and investors widely use for calculating returns generated by investment portfolios. The term “Treynor ratio” refers to the financial metric that helps assess how much excess return has been generated for each unit of portfolio-level risk. Jack Treynor, an American economist and one of the developers of the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM), is credited with naming the Treynor ratio after himself. A security’s or portfolio’s beta is a measurement of the volatility of returns relative to the overall market. It shows how sensitive the portfolio’s returns are to movements in the market.

what is the treynor ratio

A higher Treynor Ratio is preferable, as it shows that the portfolio is a more suitable investment on a risk-adjusted basis. Of course, an investor deserves a return for taking a risk, and the Treynor Ratio can tell him/her how much return the investment has earned per unit risk. Unlike the Sharpe ratio, which uses the total risk as the denominator, the Treynor ratio uses the systematic risk. When we compare the Treynor ratio vs. Sharpe ratio, the former is usually considered to be the fairer variant. This is because, according to the efficient market theory, investors will only be compensated by taking on more systematic risk.

You can check out our risk calculator and investment calculator to understand more about this topic. The major drawback of the Treynor Ratio is that it uses historical returns, which may not be indicative of future performance. Another concern is that the market benchmark used to measure the beta must be appropriate for the fund you are https://www.currency-trading.org/ analyzing as that can determine the accuracy of the measurement. The basis of the Treynor Ratio calculation is historical data, and it is, thus, indicative of the past behaviour of portfolios. Treynor Ratio portfolio performance doesn’t take future risks into account and there is no guarantee that the past performance will be repeated.

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One of them has sold 30,000 copies, a record for a financial book in Norway. Want to put your savings into action and kick-start your investment journey 💸 But don’t have time to do research? Invest now with Navi Nifty 50 Index Fund, sit back, and earn from the top 50 companies. The Treynor ratio was developed by Jack Treynor, an American economist who was one of the inventors of the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM).

what is the treynor ratio

The Treynor ratio captures the difference between a portfolio’s total return and the risk-free rate, which is subsequently adjusted for the amount of risk undertaken on a per-unit basis. From the table above, Fund C has the least volatile returns as indicated by the lowest beta value. In fact, it is less volatile than the market benchmark is normally given a beta value of 1. But it turned out to offer the best return per unit risk taken as shown by the Treynor Ratio. While the Treynor ratio uses beta as a risk assessment tool, the Sharpe ratio assesses risk using the standard deviation of returns. Standard deviation is a measure of the extent of dispersion of returns from the mean or average.

The Treynor Ratio is a portfolio performance measure that adjusts for systematic – “undiversifiable” – risk. An alternative method of ranking portfolio management is Jensen’s alpha, which quantifies the added return as the excess return above the security market line in the capital asset pricing model. As these two methods both determine rankings based on systematic risk alone, they will rank portfolios identically.

Treynor Ratio Example

A portfolio with a higher beta has a bigger return potential, but it also has a bigger risk. So, beta is a measure of systemic risk, which is the risk in a portfolio that cannot be offset by diversification https://www.investorynews.com/ within the same market. The Treynor Ratio is also referred to as Treynor Index or risk-adjusted return. It measures the excess return that each unit of risk in a portfolio can yield.

How is Treynor Ratio Calculated?

The Treynor Ratio measures portfolio performance and is part of the Capital Asset Pricing Model. While the Sharpe ratio measures all elements within the total portfolio risk (i.e. systematic and unsystematic), the Treynor ratio https://www.forex-world.net/ only captures the systematic component. From the perspective of an investor, the insights derived from comparing the risk-adjusted fund returns contributes toward the selection of which funds to allocate their capital to.

Market dynamics will impact the vulnerability of the portfolio based on the volatility of constituent securities. In the case of multiple assets, portfolio return, the average beta of the portfolio and risk-free rate are required for the calculation. The average calculation involves multiplying the returns with the weighting of stock in account and adding up all the returns. Similarly, for beta, multiply it by weight in the portfolio and add the numbers to yield the average beta of the portfolio.

While comparing two investments, investors can calculate the Treynor ratio of each to evaluate which one offers more returns for every unit of risk. If the investments yield similar returns, a higher Treynor ratio is better. If a portfolio has a negative beta, however, the ratio result is not meaningful. A higher ratio result is more desirable and means that a given portfolio is likely a more suitable investment.