Chicagoans are a hearty lot. Sandwiched between one of the world's largest lakes and the vast American plains, citizens of the Windy City endure blizzards, tornadoes, and droughts with alarming frequency. (It's "character building," they say.) So the first major storm of the winter was a poor match for the resolve of over 50 CAIA members, candidates and guests who attended a Holiday social here on Tuesday.

Chicago is the home of Mark Anson, author of CAIA's new Level I textbook and CIO of Nuveen Investments. Current CAIA members will also remember him as the author of the seminal book "Handbook to Alternative Assets" which formed the basis of the Level I curriculum until the launch of the new textbooks a few weeks ago. Nuveen attendees at the event joked about how staffers would hastily and conspicuously bury their faces in their own copies of the new Level I book whenever Anson walked by in the office – just to get a reaction. Kidding aside, these insiders tell me that Anson is renowned for playing a hands-on role in the firm. "He's everywhere," marvelled one.

Chicago is also home of AllAboutAlpha.com editorial board members Ranjan Bhaduri (Alphametrix) and Steve Deutsch (Morningstar). Bhaduri regaled us with tales of intrigue from the recent North American Bridge Championships in San Diego. Okay, maybe "intrigue" is the wrong word. But it turns out that bridge and asset management have a lot in common – which is actually kind of intriguing. According to Bhaduri, bridge is the only game that cannot be properly modelled and played by a computer. Even chess, the quintessential game of strategy, can now be played by computers at the highest levels of competition. But bridge? No-go. Apparently, the interplay between the two partners required by the game still confounds even the most powerful machines. It turns out that the human dimension of that teamwork defies codification.

When you think about it, this sounds a lot like the argument made by active managers about their alpha-generating abilities. Machines simply cannot model the "gut" feelings, intuition and teamwork that underpin so many investment decisions. Ergo, those decisions can't be codified and commoditized.

CAIA Curriculum Advisory Committee member and uber-connected researcher Hilary Till was also at the event. Till's latest paper on the role of speculation in oil futures has been generating a lot of interest. Check out her article in Monday's Financial Times.

This concluded my quick 2-day trip to the US Mid-west. Thankfully, those hearty Chicagoans were able to keep O'Hare Airport open, allowing me to escape more "character building" weather.

Christopher Holt, MBA, CAIA
Director of Industry Relations