Robert Carver got his start in finance working at trend following firm AHL in 2001 during his final year of college. He was introduced to quantitative trading while at AHL and for the first time began thinking of finance in a systematic way. He later went back to AHL, working there from 2006-2013. His newest book is “Smart Portfolios: A Practical guide to building and maintaining intelligent investment portfolios.” It took a lot of research and digging for Robert to decipher which financial tools available to traders were appropriate for him. He knew he was not the only trader with this problem so he decided to write a book laying out what he had found through his research. Robert gives actionable tips and guidelines for others who may need help finding what trading instruments are right for them. Robert also wanted “Smart Portfolios” to be a book for the average investor. He wrote it in a way that is not over complicated. Any trader, new or professional, can pick it up and find it useful. Robert bases portfolio selection around three questions: 1. What should you invest in? 2. How much of your capital goes into those investments? 3. Do you make changes to your portfolio along the way? Whenever he receives questions from people, those questions usually fall into one of the above categories. There is never perfection when trying to predict how a portfolio will perform but Robert stresses that if you start your investing answering the above questions, you will be on the right track. After the right portfolio and financial tools have been selected it’s necessary to understand different types of returns. Michael and Robert finish the podcast discussing differences between geometric and arithmetic returns. In this episode of Trend Following Radio: Portfolio selection Benchmarks International investing Fundamental trading Warren Buffett trading Expected average performance Leveraging a portfolio Luck vs. Skill Venture capitalism