Consider the following information regarding the performance of a money manager in a recent month. The table presents the actual return of each sector of the manager’s portfolio in column (1), the fraction of the portfolio allocated to each sector in column

(2), the benchmark or neutral sector allocations in column (3), and the returns of sector indexes in column (4).

(1)

Actual Return

(2)

Actual Weight

(3)

Benchmark Weight

(4)

Index Return Equity 2.0% 0.70 0.60 2.5% (S&P 500)

Bonds 1.0 0.20 0.30 1.2 (Aggregate Bond index)

Cash 0.5 0.10 0.10 0.5

a. What was the manager’s return in the month? What was her over- or underperformance?

b. What was the contribution of security selection to relative performance?

c. What was the contribution of asset allocation to relative performance? Confi rm that the sum of selection and allocation contributions equals her total “excess” return relative to the boge y.

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