Universal Return - Rethinking Investment Performance for a Diverse Investor Base

Synopsis: You are fresh out of college, ready to invest, and every fund report gives you an average return and a Sharpe ratio - but these numbers are unreliable. Why? Because it is only true for the one lucky person who invested on day one. If you bought in last year, last decade, or any time in between, the reported return is irrelevant to you. This talk is about ensuring the investment reports you see actually reflect your experience, not just the experience of a privileged few. We introduce the concept of "Universal Return", moving beyond a single, unrepresentative story to provide a clear, comprehensive, and universally relevant picture of an investment's true performance and risk. When we apply this new lens to popular strategies, we will see that what looks like rock-solid performance in investment reports often reveals a much more nuanced, time-dependent reality.