This month, a research team from the Security Token Group delved into how security token holders faired against US equity investors. Interestingly, the report revealed a decoupling of the STO market from the US equities markets. As such, researchers demonstrated how investors can use security tokens to hedge against US equity markets during the Coronavirus pandemic.
Uncorrelated Assets – Security Token Group
The report begins with a eureka statement from researchers. Nicely, the Security Token Group takes a moment to let you know there’s some light at the end of the Covid-19 tunnel. Here, they explain the fruits of their research. Also, the main researcher, Jonah Schulman shares a heartfelt message when he states “have faith and remain positive during these hard times.”
Security Token Market InfoGraphics
The study includes a comparison of two hypothetical investors from the start of 2020. Importantly, the first investor has $1 million in US equities in their portfolio. The second investor holds only $750,000 in US equities and the remaining $250,000 is held in a diversified security token. The Security Token Group chose to distribute the funds evenly over the top 14 security tokens in the market.
Top Security Tokens
- Protos
- Mt Pelerin
- Lottery
- Lesure St, Detroit, MI
- Audubon Rd, Detroit, MI
- Fullerton Ave, Detroit, MI
- Marlowe St, Detroit, MI
- Appoline St, Detroit, MI
- Patton St, Detroit, MI
- tZERO
- Startupbootcamp
- SPiCE VC
- Blockchain Capital
The results from the report were an eye-opener. Researchers showed that the second investor outperformed the first by over 3%. Specifically, both investors took losses, but investor 2 was able to weather the storm better. The data showed investor one lost -9.50%, while investor 2 showed a return of -6.54%. In total, investor 2 held on to an additional $31,625 thanks to their security token investments.
Notably, Protos showed the most gains over 2020. The token is up 27% to date. Reversely, the worst performer in the portfolio was Blockchain Capital. This token showed a -10.03% loss over 2020. The report then breaks down the aggregate return for the total portfolio since the start of the year.
The data showed a +2.35 return. Importantly, researchers pointed out that an investor that followed this strategy would be up 12% versus investors that only held equities. Crucially, the data signals that if you were invested in the Dow Jones, S&P 500, and the NASDAQ exclusively for 2020, you may want to expand your horizons.
Security Token Group – Delving Deep
As part of this strategy, the group decided to calculate the correlation coefficient for all of the security tokens in the study. When you calculate a correlation number you examine varying factors and market movements to notice patterns. The higher the score, the more correlation you have between two financial instruments.
Security Token Group Coefficient
Amazingly, the security tokens correlation coefficient score was only -.19. To put this score in perspective, the report lists Apple stock as .88. Interestingly, researchers then show the data for each token independently. This data helps to indicate what security tokens unhinged from the US markets during the epidemic specifically.
The next step was to examine each tokens correlation to each of the major US markets independently. Interestingly, the largest security token in terms of market capital, tZERO showed the highest correlation among the tokens. SPecifically, tZERO ranked .74. The other tokens in the study scored much lower. For example, all of RealT’s tokenized properties scored just .21.
An Escape Pod
The Security Token Group’s research proves what blockchain-based financial instruments continue to make headway in the market. Notably, STG researchers plan to conduct further studies in the coming weeks to better understand the effect of these tokens in the sector. For now, savvy investors continue on their hunt for uncorrelated assets during the quarantine.
