Decision-making in formation of mean-VaR optimal portfolio by selecting stocks using K-means and average linkage clustering

Stock is one of the investment assets that has its charm for investors. It is very liquid and has a high rate of return, but it has a high risk. The strategy commonly used to minimize investment risk is to diversify through portfolio formation. A good allocation of funds must be determined in forming an optimal portfolio. In addition, the method of stock selection needs to be considered so the stocks are well diversified and the portfolio developed has good performance. This study aims to compare stock selection between K-Means and Average Linkage clustering approaches in forming an investment portfolio. Clustering analysis is used to group IDX80 stocks based on their attributes. In forming a portfolio with the Mean-VaR model, the stock selection decision criteria used are by selecting stocks with the highest positive returns from each cluster. As a result, the two clustering techniques show the superiority of the Silhouette score for a certain number of clusters, but there are still more advantages in Average Linkage. The portfolio approached by Average Linkage resulted in a better performance than the portfolio approached by K-Means. Therefore, Average Linkage clustering can be used as a better recommendation in decision-making to select stocks so as to produce optimal portfolio performance.