Greg

Behavioural Economics is a rapidly expanding field and everyday new research is being developed in academia, tested and implemented by practitioners in financial organisation, development agencies, government 'nudge' units and more.

These are the core principles that define Oxford Risk's approach to suitability. These principles are united by applying academic insights to improve investor outcomes. They are about behavioural finance in real life.

The lowered valuations of assets is not important, only the value when you need to withdraw years in the future. You're much better to sit tight and wait, rather than to exit when markets are down.

Risk appetite questionnaires need not be (indeed, should not be) elaborate. Over-engineered and superficially sophisticated 'revealed preference' approaches result in exactly the same problem for investors as Kids do for investments:

Profiling outputs should not be set to match the 7-point scale used in KIIDs. There is little point to profiling investors with more granularity than you can provide solutions for;

Classical finance asks us to believe the investment journey does not matter. That is a mistake. Ignoring strong intuitions of the investors who have to endure the journey is always a mistake. When we lack comfort with our portfolio, we will act in costly ways to acquire it.

Oxford Risk collaborated with Standard Chartered on a report into interest in sustainable investing: what's the current state of play, and how can it be improved?