a)The concepts are explained as follows:
The Foundation's portfolio currently holds a number of securities from two asset classes. Each of the individual securities has its own risk (and return) characteristics, described as specific risk. By including a sufficiently large number of holdings, the specific risk of the individual holdings offset each other, diversifying away much of the overall specific risk and leaving mostly nondiversifiable or market-related risk.
Systematic risk is market-related risk that cannot be diversified away. Because systematic risk cannot be diversified away, investors are rewarded for assuming this risk.
The variance of an individual security is the sum of the probability-weighted average of the squared differences between the security's expected return and its possible returns. The standard deviation is the square root of the variance. Both variance and standard deviation measure total risk, including both systematic and specific risk. Assuming the rates of return are normally distributed, the likelihood for a range of rates may be expressed using standard deviations. For example, 68 percent of returns may be expressed using standard deviations. Thus, 68 percent of returns can be expected to fall within + or -1 standard deviation of the mean, and 95 percent within 2 standard deviations of the mean.
Covariance measures the extent to which two securities tend to move, or not move, together. The level of covariance is heavily influenced by the degree of correlation between the securities (the correlation coefficient) as well as by each security's standard deviation. As long as the correlation coefficient is less than 1, the portfolio standard deviation is less than the weighted average of the individual securities' standard deviations. The lower the correlation, the lower the covariance and the greater the diversification benefits (negative correlations provide more diversification benefits than positive correlations).
The capital asset pricing model (CAPM) asserts that investors will hold only fully diversified portfolios. Hence, total risk as measured by the standard deviation is not relevant because it includes specific risk (which can be diversified away).
Under the CAPM, beta measures the systematic risk of an individual security or portfolio. Beta is the slope of the characteristic line that relates a security's returns to the returns of the market portfolio. By definition, the market itself has a beta of 1.0. The beta of a portfolio is the weighted average of the betas of each security contained in the portfolio. Portfolios with betas greater than 1.0 have systematic risk higher than that of the market; portfolios with betas less than 1.0 have lower systematic risk. By adding securities with betas that are higher (lower), the systematic risk (beta) of the portfolio can be increased (decreased) as desired.
(b).Without performing the calculations, one can see that the portfolio return would increase because: (1) Real estate has an expected return equal to that of stocks. (2) Its expected return is higher than the return on bonds.
The addition of real estate would result in a reduction of risk because: (1) The standard deviation of real estate is less than that of both stocks and bonds. (2) The covariance of real estate with both stocks and bonds is negative.
The addition of an asset class that is not perfectly correlated with existing assets will reduce variance. The fact that real estate has a negative covariance with the existing asset classes will reduce risk even more.
(c). Capital market theory holds that efficient markets prevent mispricing of assets and that expected return is proportionate to the level of risk taken. In this instance, real estate is expected to provide the same return as stocks and a higher return than bonds. Yet, it is expected to provide this return at a lower level of risk than both bonds and stocks. If these expectations were realistic, investors would sell the other asset classes and buy real estate, pushing down its return until it was proportionate to the level of risk.
Appraised values differ from transaction prices, reducing the accuracy of return and volatility measures for real estate. Capital market theory was developed and applied to the stock market, which is a very liquid market with relatively small transaction costs. In contrast to the stock market, real estate markets are very thin and lack liquidity.