The risk inherent to the entire market or entire market segment - Interest rates, recession and wars all represent sources of systematic risk because they affect the entire market and cannot be avoided through diversification. Whereas this type of risk affects a broad range of securities, unsystematic risk affects a very specific group of securities or an individual security. Systematic risk can be mitigated only by being hedged.
(Source: Investopedia)
Too much of a good thing, or not enough of The Right thing?
The market normal is not what it used to be. 2008 & 2009 showed that everything can become correlated and the 'flash crash' shows that they can do it very quickly. So, regardless of how many layers of allocation or diversification are applied, the tremendous pressures on the market today generate a risk level that is much greater than what allocation & diversification can mitigate. If your portfolio does not include some sort of hedge, like a Defined Risk Strategy, you have no way to defend or limit the systematic risk that looms large in today's market.
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Drew of TX 3:50PM February 18, 2011