In this episode of "What's the Risk" we take a look at the Fama French US Small Value Research Index. It is a research index from the Fama French model that tracks the performance of stocks with low price-to-book ratios.

While over the long term, the value factor has shown outstanding performance, in recent years it has underperformed generally against large cap growth, but was stronger at least globally in 2025. Critics of various factors will point to such periods of underperformance as evidence that they no longer work, but this is often done during those periods of underperformance, and factors, such as value, have had many periods of underperformance against the wider market, but over the longer term performance has emerged.

For investors who want to tilt their portfolio to target higher expected returns, this is a lesson in risk. Factors are not going to always perform as you wish,

and they have historically required patience and discipline to capture.

The index was created by academics Eugene Fama and Kenneth French, the Fama French US Value Research Index is not an investible index, but the research by Fama and French has, and continues to inform Dimensional

Fund Advisors, where Fama and French are board members.

Want to learn more about investing? Search for "Your Investment Philosophy" on Amazon, Australian link: https://www.amazon.com.au/Your-Investment-Philosophy-Protecting-Fraudsters-ebook/dp/B0BCPJ8BGC/

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