Optimal consumption and investment strategies with partial and private information in a multi-asset setting (Q2392018)

The author studies the value of having the private information about stock returns (instantaneous or long-run) in a financial market with incomplete information about the expected returns of \(n\) assets. The mathematical framework for coping with partial and private information, applied in the paper, is based on filtering theory developed by \textit{R. S. Lipster} and \textit{A. N. Shiryaev} in their book [Statistics of random processes. 1: General theory. Berlin: Springer (2001; Zbl 1008.62072)], and the problem amounts to estimating the market price of risk vector from observations of the stock price processes and additional signals. Then the usual techniques for solving the optimal consumption and investment problem are applied. The obtained solutions to the optimization problems of informed and uniformed investors, derived analytically, turn out to be structurally identical, even though the two types of signals can give very difficult results. The interplay between partial and private information is illustrated by a numerical example showing that information acquisition is more important for long-term investors and the ones acting in a very uncertain market.