What level of outperformance would you consider meaningful? And what performance would you expect from a basket of stocks across industry sectors, of varying market cap and growth prospects?
It’s a real-time illustration of how overconfidence creeps into pricing. The more investors believe a company can do no wrong, the more risk they unknowingly assume.
The h-factor isolates that risk before it shows up in returns and removes it without relying on prediction or opinion.
In 2025, up to November 19, an equal-weight portfolio of low h-factor S&P 500 stocks had gained 9.2%, while the high h-factor group managed only 2.6%. That six-point spread is the clearest proof of all: when you avoid overpriced expectations, returns take care of themselves.
The graph compares two equal-weighted portfolios drawn from the S&P 500: stocks in the lowest h-factor quintile and stocks in the highest h-factor quintile. Over the period shown, the lower h-factor portfolio delivered higher returns, consistent with lower exposure to expectation-driven pricing risk.
For a $1 million portfolio, that gap equates to roughly $66,000 left on the table in less than a year. Not because of market turmoil, but because of human behavior embedded in prices.