A Communication Theoretic Interpretation of Modern Portfolio Theory Including Short Sales, Leverage and Transaction Costs

Abstract

Modern Portfolio Theory is the ground upon which most works in portfolio optimization context find their foundations. Many studies attempt to extend the Modern Portfolio Theory to include short sale, leverage and transaction costs, features not considered in Markowitz’s seminal work from 1952. The drawback of such theories is that they complicate considerably the simplicity of the original technique. Here, we propose a simple and unified method, which takes inspiration from, and shows connections with the matched filter theory in communications, to evaluate the best portfolio allocation with the possibility of including a leverage factor and short sales. Finally, we extend the presented method to also consider the transaction costs.