
To determine the beta of an entire portfolio of stocks, you can follow these four steps:
- Add up the value (number of shares multiplied by the share price) of each stock you own and your entire portfolio.
- Based on these values, determine how much you have of each stock as a percentage of the overall portfolio.
- Multiply those percentage figures by the appropriate beta for...
How to easily calculate the beta of a stock?
Top 3 Formula to Calculate Beta
- Covariance/Variance Method. To calculate the covariance Calculate The Covariance Covariance is a statistical measure used to find the relationship between two assets and is calculated as the standard deviation ...
- By Slope Method in Excel. We can also calculate Beta by using the slope function in excel. ...
- Correlation Method. ...
How do you calculate the beta of a stock?
Part 1 Part 1 of 4: Calculating Beta Using a Simple Equation
- Find the risk-free rate. This is the rate of return an investor could expect on an investment in which his or her money is not at risk, such as ...
- Determine the respective rates of return for the stock and for the market or appropriate index. These figures are also expressed as percentages.
- Subtract the risk-free rate from the stock's rate of return. ...
What stocks have the highest beta?
- Microsoft has a beta of around 1.25. This means an investor can reasonably expect that this stock is 25% more volatile than the market. ...
- Walt Disney Company has a beta right around 1.03. This puts its volatility right in line with the broader market. ...
- In contrast, Duke Energy has a beta of around 0.27. ...
How do you calculate beta of stock?
Stock Beta formula. Stock’s Beta is calculated as the division of covariance of the stock’s returns and the benchmark’s returns by the variance of the benchmark’s returns over a predefined period. Below is the formula to calculate stock Beta. Stock Beta Formula = COV(Rs,RM) / VAR(Rm)

What is the beta of a stock?
Beta is a way of measuring a stock's volatility compared with the overall market's volatility. The market as a whole has a beta of 1. Stocks with a value greater than 1 are more volatile than the market (meaning they will generally go up more than the market goes up, and go down more than the market goes down).
How do you find the beta of a stock in Excel?
To calculate beta in Excel:Download historical security prices for the asset whose beta you want to measure.Download historical security prices for the comparison benchmark.Calculate the percent change period to period for both the asset and the benchmark. ... Find the variance of the benchmark using =VAR.More items...
What is the best way to calculate beta?
Beta can be calculated by dividing the asset's standard deviation of returns by the market's standard deviation. The result is then multiplied by the correlation of the security's return and the market's return.
How do you find the beta and alpha of a stock?
Alpha = R – Rf – beta (Rm-Rf) R represents the portfolio return. Rf represents the risk-free rate of return. Beta represents the systematic risk of a portfolio. Rm represents the market return, per a benchmark.
How do you find the beta of a stock in NSE?
To calculate the beta value of a stock, a spreadsheet program is useful for calculating the covariance of the stock and index returns, then dividing that by the variance of the index. If a stock returned 8% last year and the index returned 5%, a rough estimate of beta is: 8 / 5 = 1.6.
How do I find high beta stocks?
Finding beta of a stock using formulaGet the historical prices for the desired stock.Get the historical prices for the comparison benchmark index.Calculate % change for the same period for both the stock and the benchmark index. ... Calculate the Variance of the stock.Find the covariance of the stock to the benchmark.
How do you use beta for stocks?
Key Takeaways A beta greater than 1 indicates a stock's price swings more wildly (i.e., more volatile) than the overall market. A beta of less than 1 indicates that a stock's price is less volatile than the overall market. A beta of 1 indicates the stock moves identically to the overall market.
What is the beta of Apple stock?
1.20Stock Price HistoryBeta (5Y Monthly)1.2052 Week High 3182.9452 Week Low 3129.0450-Day Moving Average 3150.94200-Day Moving Average 3158.842 more rows
What is beta in stock market?
Stock Beta is one of the statistical tools that quantify the volatility in the prices of a security or stock with reference to the market as a whole or any other benchmark used for comparing the performance of the security. It is actually a component of Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM)
What does it mean when the beta of a stock is negative?
The Stock Beta can have three types of values: Beta < 0: If the Beta is negative, then this implies an inverse relationship between the stock and the underlying market or the benchmark in comparison. Both stock and the market or the benchmark will move in the opposite direction. Beta = 0: If the Beta is equal to zero, ...
What does a beta of 1 mean?
Beta of 1 implies that the volatility of the stock is exactly the same as that of the underlying market or the index in both qualitative and quantitative terms. Beta of greater than 1 implies that the stock is more volatile than the underlying market or index. A negative Beta is possible but highly unlikely.
What does it mean when the beta is greater than zero?
Beta > 0: If the Beta is greater than zero, then there is a strong direct relationship between the stock and the underlying market or the benchmark. Both stock and the market or the benchmark will move in the same direction. Some further insight is as follows:
What does it mean when the beta is 0?
Beta = 0: If the Beta is equal to zero, then this implies that there is no relation between the movement of the returns of the stock and the market or the benchmark, and hence both are too dissimilar to have any common pattern in price movements . Beta > 0: If the Beta is greater than zero, then there is a strong direct relationship between ...
What is a statistical tool?
It is one single statistical tool that investors frequently use to assess the risk that the stock may add to their portfolio, allowing them to gauge the risk in both qualitative and quantitative terms and to assess the risk and rewards associated with the stock.
Is a negative beta of gold a good thing?
A negative Beta is possible but highly unlikely. Most investors believe that gold and stock based on gold tend to perform better when the market dives. Whereas a Beta of zero is possible in the case of government bonds acting as risk-free securities providing a low yield to the investors.
How to calculate beta of a stock?
Here is a straightforward formula for calculating the Beta Coefficient of a Stock: 1 Obtain the stock’s historical share price data. 2 Obtain historical values of a market index, e.g., S&P 500. 3 Convert the share price values into daily return values using the following formula: return = (closing share price − opening share price)/opening share price. 4 Convert historical stock market index values in a similar way. 5 Align the share return data with index return such that there is a 1-on-1 correspondence between them. For share price return, there should be a corresponding index return. 6 Using the SLOPE function in a financial calculator to find the slope between both arrays of data and the resultant figure is Beta.
What does beta mean in stocks?
Beta can give you an estimate of the stock’s risk and some idea of market volatility. Ideally, the Beta will tell you the difference between a stock’s risk and the risk of an entire index market.
What is the beta coefficient?
Generally, analysts regard the Beta Coefficient as a measure of systematic or “general market” risk. Analysts often use the mathematical symbol β to represent the Beta in calculations. To explain, systematic is the level of risk or volatility of equity in the entire market or index.
Why do analysts use the beta coefficient?
Analysts examine the Beta Coefficient, or Beta of stock, because the Beta measures risk and volatility. Specifically, the Beta can give you an estimate of the stock’s risk and some idea of market volatility. Ideally, the Beta will tell you the difference between a stock’s risk and the risk of an entire index market.
Why is beta a limited tool?
Hence, the Beta is a limited tool because it only measures some risks associated with individual stocks or indexes. However, a rough estimate of risk is better than no estimate of risk.
Can you use beta in stock analysis?
In the final analysis, the Beta is only one of many stock analysis tools you can use. In fact, some analysts and investors never use the Beta. On the other hand, there are many analysts who swear by the Beta. Hence using the Beta is a matter of choice.
Does the beta coefficient tell you the future price of a stock?
Or the effect of news stories about an accounting scandal; or lousy sales at a company. Consequently, the Beta will not tell you the future price of a stock. Instead, the Beta Coefficient provides a comparison of a stock’s risks to the entire market.
What is beta in stock?
Stock beta is a metric that can help you gauge a stock’s relationship to the overall market. But beta has its limits and should be considered alongside other performance data before an investment decision is made.
Why is beta important?
Stock beta can be an important metric in helping you determine a stock’s volatility and risk. But there are other factors to consider before you add a stock to your portfolio, like analyst ratings, time in business, free cash flow and more.
What is the beta of a stock?
The stock beta definition is the covariance of the stock's price and a broad market index's price divided by the variance of the index price. A stock more volatile than the market has a beta value greater than 1, and one that's less volatile than the market has a beta value less than 1.
What is beta in stock market?
Beta is a measure of an investment's volatility relative to the market as a whole. For the stock market, that usually means a benchmark broad market index like the S&P 500. You can compute beta values of stocks yourself using a statistical formula and details about the price of the stock and the benchmark, or you can use an online stock beta ...
Why are beta values less useful?
Beta values can also be less useful if the risk of the market itself changes, since beta values are relative to market prices. Also note that it can be hard to directly compare beta values determined from two different indexes. For instance, if you compute the beta value of a French stock using a French stock market index and a U.S.
What is beta value?
The quantity called beta, sometimes written using the Greek letter as β, is a measure of the volatility of a stock or another investment. It's not an absolute measure of volatility but one determined based on the market as a whole. It's used in what's called the capital asset pricing model, ...
How to calculate alpha of a stock?
You can easily calculate alpha if you have the rate of return of a stock and of the index of your choice for a given period of time simply by dividing the stock's return by the index's return and multiplying by 100 to generate a percentage . By definition, the index itself has an alpha of 0. Naturally, you will do well if you invest in opportunities ...
What does it mean when a stock's beta is 1?
While knowing that a particular stock's beta value is 1 tells you that it is roughly as volatile as the market itself, knowing that the index's beta value is 1 is not a useful piece of information, since it is always 1 by definition.
What is beta in investing?
Beta is one of the many factors that you may look at it in deciding to make investments. You'll usually not want to pick a stock investment solely based on beta, since you'll also be interested in the fundamentals of the company behind the stock and how it's performing relative to other businesses in its same sector.
What is beta coefficient?
The Beta coefficient is a measure of sensitivity or correlation of a security. Marketable Securities Marketable securities are unrestricted short-term financial instruments that are issued either for equity securities or for debt securities of a publicly listed company. The issuing company creates these instruments for the express purpose ...
What are the drawbacks of beta?
The largest drawback of using Beta is that it relies solely on past returns and does not account for new information that may impact returns in the future. Furthermore, as more return data is gathered over time, the measure of Beta changes, and subsequently, so does the cost of equity.
What is the benefit of using beta coefficient?
Advantages of using Beta Coefficient. One of the most popular uses of Beta is to estimate the cost of equity (Re) in valuation models. The CAPM estimates an asset’s Beta based on a single factor, which is the systematic risk of the market.
Why do stocks have beta?
The beta is the number that tells the investor how that stock acts compared to all other stocks, or at least in comparison to the stocks that comprise a relevant index.
What does it mean when a stock has a beta of over 100?
If you see a beta of over 100 on a research site it is usually a statistical error or the stock has experienced a wild and probably fatal price swing. For the most part, stocks of established companies rarely have a beta higher than 4.
Why should gold stocks have negative beta?
Some investors argue that gold and gold stocks should have negative betas because they tend to do better when the stock market declines.
What does a beta of utility mean?
Many utility sector stocks have a beta of less than 1. Essentially, beta expresses the trade-off between minimizing risk and maximizing return. Say a company has a beta of 2. This means it is two times as volatile as the overall market. We expect the market overall to go up by 10%.
What is the beta of cash?
Beta of 0: Basically, cash has a beta of 0. In other words, regardless of which way the market moves, the value of cash remains unchanged (given no inflation). Beta between 0 and 1 : Companies that are less volatile than the market have a beta of less than 1 but more than 0. Many utility companies fall in this range.
What does beta mean in investing?
In investing, beta does not refer to fraternities, product testing, or old videocassettes. Beta is a measurement of market risk or volatility. That is, it indicates how much the price of a stock tends to fluctuate up and down compared to other stocks.
What does a beta of 1 mean?
A beta of 1 indicates that the security's price tends to move with the market. A beta greater than 1 indicates that the security's price tends to be more volatile than the market. A beta of less than 1 means it tends to be less volatile than the market.
What does it mean when a stock is beta?
Beta is a measure of how sensitive a firm's stock price is to an index or benchmark. A beta greater than 1 indicates that the firm's stock price is more volatile than the market, and a beta less than 1 indicates that the firm's stock price is less volatile than the market. A beta may produce different results because of ...
What is beta in finance?
In finance, the beta of a firm refers to the sensitivity of its share price with respect to an index or benchmark. ...
Why do low beta stocks dove down?
This is because their market correlation was much lower, and thus the swings orchestrated through the index were not felt as acutely for those low beta stocks.
What does a beta of less than one mean?
If the opposite is the case, its beta will be a value less than one. A company with a beta of greater than one will tend to amplify market movements (for instance the case for the banking sector), and a business with a beta of less than one will tend to ease market movements.
Is low beta stock volatile?
Low beta stocks are much less volatile; however, another analysis must be done with intra-industry factors in mind. On the other hand, higher beta stocks are selected by investors who are keen and focused on short-term market swings. They wish to turn this volatility into profit, albeit with higher risks.
