Philosophers have long argued that courage is the most essential human virtue, because without courage, all other virtues lie in jeopardy. Remarkably, the theorizing of ethicists has an implication for practical portfolio management. We can illustrate this with a simple example in Exhibit 1. It’s Dec. 31, 1999, and a professional investor is considering buying…
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Many advisors feel that their favorite active manager will guide them through market volatility and limit drawdowns during times of market stress. But is that how things played out at the beginning of 2020? S&P DJI’s Brent Kopp and Berlinda Liu take a closer look at COVID-19’s impact on active vs. passive performance.
I had the privilege to sit down, albeit virtually, with Larry Swedroe, Chief Research Officer at Buckingham Wealth Partners, after he participated in our webinar for financial advisors, “How Has COVID-19 Affected Active vs. Passive Performance?” to dig deeper into his thoughts on SPIVA® results during the first four months of 2020. Brent Kopp (BK)…
The contentious debate of active versus passive is perpetual. Over the past 15 years, SPIVA® Scorecard results have reflected on the trends of active fund management vis a vis benchmarks, wherein statistics tilt the balance in favor of indexing. This recurring feature of benchmark outperformance is contributing to the adoption and growth of the passive…
In 1973, Princeton professor Burton Malkiel wrote the book, A Random Walk Down Wall Street, laying out a case against the mutual funds of the time as persistently underperforming market indices. Malkiel recommended[i] that the New York Stock Exchange create a fund that simply bought and held stock in the companies comprising the indices. Somewhat…
Why are the market environments most conducive to generating positive absolute returns the least conducive to producing positive relative returns? Explore the active manager’s conundrum with S&P DJI’s Craig Lazzara and Anu Ganti.
We recently held a webinar examining the relevance of the S&P 500 to India-based investors, the potential diversification benefits of incorporating U.S equity exposure to an existing allocation, as well as showing how difficult active managers have found it to beat the index, historically. You can watch a replay of the webinar here; here are…
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…
What happens to active manager performance when risk is factored in? S&P DJI’s Gaurav Sinha takes a closer look at SPIVA data from markets around the globe.
The SPIVA® Canada Year-End 2019 Scorecard was released recently. Despite the strong performance of broad equities, 2019 proved to be yet another challenging year for active funds in Canada. Here are a few highlights from the report. Strong Market Performance Did Not Translate to Active Fund Outperformance The S&P/TSX Composite posted its highest annual return…
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