What Defines True Alpha? Sharath Sury Chairs Panel at Alternative Investment Summit 2009.

SANTA CLARA, Calif. Dec.10/Everything-Finance.net/— Today, Everything-Finance.net announced that the website intends gain insight for its users regarding the popular investment terms, “alpha” and “beta”, in finance. Everything-Finance.net anticipates interviewing several prominent experts in the field, including noted finance professor Sharath M. Sury.

Earlier this month, Mr. Sharath Sury led a highly distinguished panel of experts at the Alternative Investment Summit 2009 held in Southern California. Sharath Sury, a well regarded professor of finance and internationally recognized expert in asset allocation and risk management, led the panel in a diverse discussion that addressed the definition of “alpha,” the misuse of the term by many fund managers, and where the best opportunities for finding “alpha” currently exist.

So-called “alpha” measures the excess risk adjusted return on an investment as compared to the return of its benchmark (e.g., the S&P 500). Alpha is commonly used to identify the performance of manager-specific skills, as opposed to “beta” which measures the extent to with the manager had exposure to the movements (positive or negative) of the general markets.

The relative levels of alpha and beta are used to estimate the effectiveness of investment managers. However, the precise measurements of both alpha and beta are the subject of great debate.

In the coming weeks, Everything-Finance.net intends to contact notable finance professionals, like Sharath Sury, in attempts to conceptually clarify and define special investment terms that have great importance for today’s investment public. As a blogger recently suggested in a comment on blog.suryonline.net, “given the importance of evaluating manager skill, discussions of this kind are vital.” Professionals like Professor Sury, whose background includes extensive academic, research, and practitioner experience this field, can offer valuable insights.