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Most equity portfolios are built to pick stocks. Not to handle macro regimes. And when macro takes over — as it has repeatedly in 2026 — those portfolios bleed alpha they never knew they were losing. The construction process is the problem. Macro screening has to come first, not last.

Start with the Regime

Before screening a single security, you need to know what kind of market you are operating in. Quant Insight's Macro Risk Pulse (MRP) gives you a daily reading of the proportion of total S&P 500 risk currently explained by macro factors. A high MRP reading means macro is dominating return dispersion. A low reading means fundamentals are in control. That single indicator governs how much of your active risk budget should go toward macro factor tilts versus stock-specific positions.

Screen for Macro Factor Sensitivity

Once the regime is established, MFERM (Macro Factor Equity Risk Model) screens the investable universe for macro factor sensitivities — across 18,000+ securities, updated daily, validated on 15 years of data. You are looking for two things: macro alignment, where a security's exposures match your regime view; and macro divergence, where price has moved away from macro-implied fair value, creating an actionable signal.

Isolate Genuine Alpha

A position that has performed well may have done so because the macro backdrop was favourable, not because stock selection was correct. MFERM's alpha isolation tools decompose returns into macro-driven and idiosyncratic components at the security level, daily. Without this step, macro beta gets misattributed as stock selection skill. The quantified cost of that misattribution: a +2.5% annual alpha differential between portfolios that get it right and those that do not.

Time Entries and Exits with Macro Valuation

The Macro Valuation engine flags divergences between current price and macro-implied fair value across the full 18,000+ security universe. When price has run ahead of macro fundamentals, mean-reversion risk is elevated. When price has lagged, a long entry with macro tailwinds already conservatively priced in becomes compelling. This is not a traditional valuation screen. It is a continuous, model-driven signal updated as macro conditions shift.

Monitor and Stress Test Daily

Macro factor sensitivities are not static. A position with neutral rates exposure today may carry significant sensitivity tomorrow as capital structure or earnings mix shifts. MFERM updates every security daily, so portfolio-level macro exposure reflects current conditions, not lagged data. Scenario analysis — modelling the impact of a 50 basis point rate spike, a sharp credit spread widening, or a growth repricing — becomes a quantitative exercise grounded in 15 years of validated factor data, not a qualitative overlay.

MFERM is additive to existing platforms including Barra and Axioma. It provides the daily macro-versus-idiosyncratic decomposition at the single-stock level that those platforms do not prioritise. For portfolio managers, risk teams, and CROs who need to know whether a drawdown is macro-driven or idiosyncratic before they act, it is the missing layer.

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