What does "skin in the game" actually look like inside an index? Most benchmarks weight companies by free-float-adjusted market capitalization which is a methodology that, by design, strips out insider-held shares. Haren Bhakta's Inside Ownership Index does close to the opposite, weighting on the very stakes the standard approach removes.

In this conversation, Haren walks through how the IO 100 Index, calculated and published by S&P Dow Jones Indices as a custom index service, was built, what makes insider ownership a legitimate factor rather than a marketing narrative, and how the alignment effect holds up against the standard controls for size, value, and quality. We also explore how investors are currently accessing the methodology (separately managed accounts now, with an ETF pathway on the horizon) and what the broader move toward incentive-aligned investing means for governance, allocator decisions, and the next generation of index construction.

This is the first live guest episode of Expanding Frontiers, and a fitting one, with a conversation that sits squarely at the intersection of factor research, governance, and institutional credibility that the show is built to explore.

About the Guest

Haren Bhakta, CFA, is the Founder and CEO of Inside Ownership Index, a company that constructs equity indices weighted by insider-held share value rather than free-float market cap. The IO 100 Index (Inside Ownership's flagship benchmark) is calculated and published by S&P Dow Jones Indices, with sector-specific variants spanning Financials, Healthcare, Technology, Industrials, Consumer, and Energy. Haren's work centers on the thesis that companies whose leaders hold meaningful personal stakes outperform over time, and that ownership-based benchmarks can complement traditional cap-weighted approaches in institutional portfolios.

Website: https://insideownership.com ABOUT THE SHOW Expanding Frontiers is hosted by Kathryn Wilkens, PhD, CAIA, an alternative investments educator at Rutgers University and founder of Pearl Quest LLC. New episodes Wednesdays.

Episode Note
Tis content is intended for educational purposes only and does not constitute investment or financial advice.