Tim Edwards
Managing Director, Index Investment Strategy, S&P Dow Jones Indices
Turtle Returns: The Hare and the Tortoise
The tale of a footrace between a determined tortoise and a swift but ultimately complacent hare has been with us for a long time. The earliest known version is two and a half thousand years old; it begins with the hare mocking the tortoise’s slow feet, which leads to a challenge and a contest, and…
Introducing the Dispersion Index (DSPX)
At 9:45 am Eastern Time on Sept. 27, 2023, a new index began publishing under the ticker DSPXSM, with an initial live value of 26.81. This index, the Cboe S&P 500® Dispersion Index (the Dispersion Index to its friends), might be loosely described as a “VIX® for dispersion.” But what is it? Why is it…
SPIVA Europe 2022: Singing the Bear Market Blues
After 83% of euro-denominated pan-regional equity funds failed to outperform the S&P Europe 350® in the 10 years leading up to the start of 2022, last year brought an intriguing change in the market winds, including the end of near-zero interest rates and, along with it, higher hopes for stock-picking. There was higher dispersion and,…
SPIVA U.S. Scorecard 2022: Fewer Excuses
For over a decade, our SPIVA® Scorecards have shown a majority of actively managed U.S. large-cap equity funds underperforming the S&P 500®. According to the freshly published SPIVA U.S. Year-End 2022 Scorecard, the annual underperformance rate dropped to the slimmest of margins last year: just 51% of large-cap U.S. managers lagged the S&P 500 in…
A Spider Spins a SPIVA Special
Thirty years ago, Bill Clinton was getting ready for his inauguration as the 42nd U.S. president, the S&P 500® closed a little over 430 and the latest edition of Business Week was trumpeting that 1993 would be “The Year of Picking Wisely” in the stock market. Meanwhile, a different kind of security was about to…
SPIVA Institutional and the Pharaohs of Finance
Ptolemy I (367 BC-282 BC), one-time companion of Alexander the Great and later pharaoh of Egypt, has an important role in intellectual history. Among other contributions, he is credited with founding the library at Alexandria, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, and for personally sponsoring the work of Euclid, a mathematician whose…
What Canada Is Missing
Canadian investors have long participated in U.S. equity markets, but are materially underweight in U.S. mid- and small-cap companies. In this respect, Canadians resemble their European counterparts, whose investments in the U.S. rarely range beyond those companies included in the S&P 500®. This underinvestment is surprising for several reasons. European market participants are no stranger…
Something New with Something Old: DIY DJIA®
The growth of index funds has, in the main, helped to lower the costs and improve the performance of the average investor’s portfolio. Now, some are seeking to improve upon even the relatively low costs of conventional index funds via so-called “direct indexing”, by which investors purchase securities to match an index themselves, disintermediating the…
Hidden in Plain Sight
International equity investors have long participated in the U.S. market, but their interest has often focused on the globally recognized blue chips included in benchmarks such as the Dow® and the S&P 500®. In doing so, they may be missing out on the long-term outperformance of smaller companies; presently, they may also be missing out…
A Reversal, or Two
For many equity investors, the stand-out theme of last year was the reversal in the market’s initial response to, and recovery from, the COVID-19 pandemic: the dramatic price declines in March, the wild swings around the bottom as VIX® marked its highest closing level ever, and the just-as-dramatic recovery to new all-time highs by late…