Tag Archives: SPIVA U.S.
Active Managers: No Place to Hide
In the first quarter of 2020, the global economy experienced not a slowdown, but a shutdown. As COVID-19 swept the world, outsized market movements became the new norm. The S&P 500® finished its worst quarter (-19.6%) since 2008’s global financial crisis. International equities fared even worse as the S&P International 700 lost 22.4%. While investors were catching their breath after the February-March sell-off, the S&P 500 rebounded in April and posted its largest monthly gain (12.8%) since 1987.
- Categories Equities, Fixed Income
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- Equities, Fixed Income
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Outcome-Oriented Solutions: Where Active and Passive Meet
What do presidential debates and an argument between passive and active investors have in common? They are both thrilling, demand the highest levels of rhetorical skills, don’t change audience opinions, and everyone goes home entertained. While presidential debates remain as exciting as ever, the shrillness of conversation between active and passive investors seems to have…
- Categories Equities
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Risk-Reward Analysis of Selecting Active Managers
Although there seems to be more research on economic forecast and market analysis than manager selection, selecting investment managers is just as challenging as direct investing and requires considerable experience and expertise. In this blog, we investigate the return distribution of fixed income and equity funds to highlight the challenge of successfully selecting outperforming active…
- Categories Equities
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- Equities
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Unreliable Investment Strategies
S&P Dow Jones Indices produces a semi-annual report comparing the performance of active managers to their target indices or benchmarks. The report is referred to as the SPIVA Scorecard (SPIVA standing for S&P Indices Versus Active Managers). So, what does the SPIVA Scorecard tell us about performance? As illustrated in the table above, for any regional equity class…
- Categories Equities
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- Categories
- Equities
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Market Conditions Favored Government Bond Funds in Second Half of 2018
The SPIVA® U.S. Year-End 2018 Scorecard shows a reversal of the relative short-term performance of fixed income funds at the end of 2018 from six months prior. Combined with the interest rates move, this might shed some light on understanding the duration positioning of active funds. We focus on government bond funds for our analysis,…
- Categories Equities, Fixed Income
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- Categories
- Equities, Fixed Income
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Confusing Style and Selection
A headline from yesterday was very intriguing: “Why investors crave a return to the art of stock-picking.” Copious data demonstrate the peril of placing hope in active management. The article argues that since we seem to be in a trend that favors value, it is a good time for managers to pick stocks based on…
An Unexpected Outcome for Stock Pickers?
Active managers were welcomed by a disheartening headline this morning. “The 2018 Comeback That Wasn’t for Stock Pickers” highlights that “just 38% of actively managed U.S. stock funds tracked by Morningstar outperformed their counterparts at passively managed funds last year.” This should hardly have been considered shocking. Both long-term and more recent data (notably including…
- Categories Equities
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- Equities
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SPIVA® U.S. Mid-Year 2018 Summary
The latest results from the SPIVA U.S. Mid-Year 2018 Scorecard show improvement in the relative performance of actively managed domestic equity funds against their respective benchmarks. During the one-year period ending June 30, 2018, the overall percentage of all domestic funds outperforming the S&P Composite 1500® increased to 42.02%, compared with six months prior (36.57%)….
- Categories Equities
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The Impact of Style Classification on Active Management Performance in 2017: Part 2
In our previous blog, we highlighted the contribution to domestic equity market returns by mega-cap stocks in 2017 and the implications for active management. In this blog, we focus our discussion on investment style classification. Specifically, we analyze the impact of the style classification scheme on managers’ performance analysis, such as in the SPIVA® U.S….
The Impact of Size on Active Management Performance in 2017: Part 1
U.S. equity markets finished 2017 on a strong note, with the S&P 500® returning 21.83% during the one-year period ending on Dec. 31, 2017. This was followed by the S&P MidCap 400® and S&P SmallCap 600® returning 16.24% and 13.23%, respectively. Despite market-cap weighting being a dominant form of indexing, equal weighting has outperformed on…
- Categories Equities, Factors, S&P 500 & DJIA
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