01 Objective
Seeks long-term capital appreciation by investing in non-U.S. country and regional equity indexes, overweighting where valuation, fundamentals and catalyst align and underweighting where they do not.
International
International rotates across developed and emerging-market countries, applying valuation discipline and macro catalysts to the world outside the U.S.
How most portfolios hold international
The default non-U.S. allocation is a single passive fund that owns each country in proportion to its market cap, which puts most of the weight in Europe and Japan.
We start somewhere else. Each country is its own opportunity set, with its own valuation history, its own macro setup, and its own catalyst path. Some are structurally cheap, some are riding a policy turn, some are pricing in problems that are already known. The job is to tell them apart and weight accordingly.
We believe the lens that drives our sector work, which weighs valuation against history, fundamental momentum and an observable catalyst, can be applied to country baskets. The result is a non-U.S. equity sleeve whose country weights differ meaningfully from the benchmark.
Overview
02 Approach
Country and region selection driven by valuation and growth metrics – P/E, GDP, current account, PEG – refined with a review of policy direction, macro trends, and currency. The strategy stays invested in non-U.S. equity and rotates between countries.
03 Implementation
Each country view is expressed through the most exposure-pure, cost-efficient country or regional ETF available, across developed and emerging markets. Each country basket holds dozens of underlying names, so the exposure stays broad while the country weights are active.
Home bias in advisor portfolios
Advisor portfolios hold less non-U.S. equity than the global market does. The global opportunity set is roughly two-thirds U.S. and one-third everything else, while the average advisor portfolio is closer to four-fifths U.S.
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Percentage-point gap between the two non-U.S. weights
How the country rotation works
Every region and country is read on the same three inputs (macro, valuation and currency), and its weight reflects what that read supports.
Illustrative region scorecard
Developed Europe
Macro
Valuation
Currency
Japan
Macro
Valuation
Currency
Emerging Markets
Macro
Valuation
Currency
Developed Asia
Macro
Valuation
Currency
Example country exposures
Japan Developed
Germany Developed Europe
India Emerging
Mexico Emerging, Latin America
Region reads and country examples illustrate the framework. They are not the current allocation.
Where it fits in a portfolio
A typical client allocation (left) and its growth bucket (right), with International as the non-U.S. equity sleeve.
Sample portfolio allocation
Illustrative portfolio, not a recommendation.
Talk with us about International
Walk through the current country positioning, the philosophy, or how the non-U.S. sleeve would fit alongside your existing core.