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Author
Erik Ogard, CFA
Founder · BufferLABS
Areas of Expertise
Buffered ETFs, portfolio construction, investment research, risk-managed strategies
18 articles
Erik Ogard, CFA, is the founder of BufferLABS and an investment professional specializing in buffered ETFs, portfolio construction, and risk-managed investment strategies. His experience includes investment research, manager analysis, and the development of tools and methodologies for evaluating buffered ETF outcomes. Erik writes about buffered ETF structure, selection, portfolio applications, and industry trends.
Articles by Erik Ogard, CFA
Valuation Risk
Valuation Risk rarely announces itself with a market crash. Instead, paying unusually high prices can quietly reduce future return potential and increase vulnerability to market corrections.
Market Risk — Black Swans and Extended Bear Markets
Black swans and prolonged bear markets can inflict severe portfolio losses while testing investor discipline. Understanding how these events unfold is an important part of managing market risk.
Introducing the Four Core Investor Risks
Investors often focus on returns while overlooking the risks that can permanently impair them. Here are four core investor risks—and why understanding how they interact is essential to...
Beyond the Terminal Payoff Diagram: How the Industry Explains Buffered ETFs — and Why It Falls Short
Traditional buffered ETF payoff diagrams show what investors can expect at the end of an outcome period, but they reveal much less about how these products behave along...
Buffered ETFs and Retirement Risk: Erik Ogard Discusses Downside Protection with TheStreet
TheStreet explores how buffered ETFs use options strategies to provide defined downside protection in exchange for limited upside. The article examines their potential role in retirement portfolios, particularly...
Revisiting Risk Management in Modern Portfolio Theory
As concentration in the S&P 500 grows, traditional asset allocation may no longer provide sufficient diversification. OCMR examines concentration risk, equal-weight indexing, and explicit ETF strategies investors can...
Why Buffered ETFs Require Ongoing Analysis and Monitoring
Even buffered ETFs with nearly identical structures can deliver very different results because of reset timing and market path. OCMR examines how path dependency affects buffered ETF performance...
Seek First to Understand – The Pleasure of Finding Things out
Understanding how buffered ETFs behave across changing market conditions is at the heart of OCMR’s research. Volume 1.2 explores the questions that led to BufferLABS’ research tools, models,...
U.S. Stock Market Returns and Valuations in Historical Perspective
How unusual are today’s stock market returns? OCMR compares the S&P 500’s recent performance with more than 75 years of market history, examining returns, volatility, valuations, and the...