Computational Stock-Picking

In today's confusing market, the best strategy may be to sit back and let the computer decide where to invest.

At least that's the approach Mike Mara, portfolio manager for the (PSRPX Quote)Penn Street Advisors Sector Rotational fund, has successfully taken since developing his stock-picking model at Vanguard a few years ago.

Mara takes the top 1,250 U.S. companies, with $1 billion or more market capitalization, and runs them through his quantitative model. He then ranks them based on valuation metrics such as absolute price to earnings, price to book, earnings surprise, growth and price trends. ...