Benchmarking mutual fund alpha

2016 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 227-239
Author(s):  
Qiang Bu
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Fund ◽  
Fund Performance ◽  
Excess Return ◽  
Market Models ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Fund Managers ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Manager Skill ◽  
Fund Investment ◽  
Manager Compensation

Purpose The standard market models assume that all investors are rational with the same level of risk aversion, whereas investors in the real world are neither rational nor homogeneous. This contrast makes these models inappropriate for evaluating manager skill. The purpose of this paper is to attempt to bridge the gap between model assumption and fund investment practice. Design/methodology/approach This study proposes a series of modified models using the excess return of peer funds to estimate fund alpha. In these models, the market excess return in the standard market models is replaced with the average excess return of bootstrapped funds. In addition, the author examines the reasons for the difference between the modified models and the standard models. Findings The modified models better explain the variation of fund returns, and they exhibit that a considerably higher percentage of funds can earn positive alpha, thus the skill of fund managers is underestimated based on the standard market models. Originality/value The proposed models provide a more reliable method for investors to identify skilled fund managers, and they can also serve as an objective benchmark in evaluating fund performance and in designing manager compensation packages.

Is there a Ramadhan effect on Sharia mutual funds? Evidence from Indonesia and Malaysia

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-146
Author(s):  
Rofikoh Rokhim ◽  
Irma Octaviani
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Fund ◽  
Strong Predictor ◽  
Abnormal Returns ◽  
Fund Performance ◽  
Excess Return ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Fund Managers ◽  
Daily Data ◽  
Value Effect ◽  
Timing Strategies

Purpose This paper aims to examine whether Sharia mutual fund managers are able to gain abnormal returns from what is called the Ramadhan effect. Design/methodology/approach The authors use GARCH regression on daily data of domestic Sharia mutual fund performance in Indonesia and Malaysia over the period of 2007-2017. Findings The authors find that the Ramadhan effect is not a strong predictor of Sharia fund excess return in Indonesia and Malaysia, and they identify a positive Ramadhan abnormal return on the Malaysia Sharia Equity Fund. This result shows there is size effect on sharia fund excess return in Indonesia and value effect on Sharia Balanced Fund in both markets. It is suggested that the effect of market excess return in Indonesia is stronger than in Malaysia. Research limitations/implications The samples are limited to Sharia Funds over the period 2007-2017. Practical implications The authors suggest that size and value effect could be considered to develop the selection and timing strategies to explore the Ramadhan effect. Originality/value This study focuses on Indonesia and Malaysia, the two largest Islamic Stock Markets in Southeast Asia and examines specific on Sharia Mutual Fund (equity and balanced fund). It also compares differences in total performance measures between the Ramadhan period and non-Ramadhan period.

Mutual fund manager turnover: an empirical investigation of performance

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Avinash Ghalke ◽  
Shripad Kulkarni
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Fund ◽  
Emerging Market ◽  
Investment Strategy ◽  
Fund Performance ◽  
Fund Manager ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Fund Managers ◽  
Fund Families ◽  
Study Methodology ◽  
Factor Alpha

PurposeWhen a fund manager leaves, the investment strategy of the fund changes or remains the same. The departing fund manager's resignation is either forced or voluntary. The study investigates the relationship between the portfolio manager's transition and the fund's investment strategy and how the change affects the mutual fund returns in the subsequent period.Design/methodology/approachThe authors examine 148 fund manager changes in India between April 2005–March 2018 using three performance measures: abnormal return (fund return minus benchmark return), Jensen's alpha and Carhart four-factor alpha. The analysis includes an event study methodology, followed by a two-step Fama–MacBeth regression approach.FindingsContrary to the previous studies conducted in the developed markets, the authors find that fund performance improves irrespective of whether the fund manager change is forced or voluntary. The outperformance after the fund manager's exit is significant for funds belonging to the larger fund families.Originality/valueIn the context of investment management, the authors provide a conceptual framework to understand the effect of fund manager exit on mutual fund performance. The authors substantiate their arguments with empirical evidence. To the best of the authors' understanding, this is the first research to examine the effect of changing mutual fund managers in an emerging market setting.

Mutual fund trading around mergers and fund performance

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Margarita Kaprielyan ◽  
Md Miran Hossain ◽  
Charles Armah Danso
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Fund ◽  
Predictive Power ◽  
Fund Performance ◽  
Wealth Creation ◽  
Publicly Traded ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Fund Managers ◽  
Portfolio Holdings ◽  
Subsequent Risk

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether mutual funds (MFs) take positions in companies that subsequently engage in M&As and whether fund managers adjust portfolio holdings in the same direction as wealth creation from mergers. Further, the study is the first to examine the relation between active trading surrounding M&As and risk-adjusted performance in MFs. Design/methodology/approach The sample includes mergers conducted by publicly traded acquirers of public and private targets over 2003–2016. Several measures of MF managerial activeness in M&As are introduced: merger trading intensity (proportional change in fund’s holdings of M&A stocks), active merger weight (deviation of the fund’s actual weights in M&A stocks and value weights) and active merger trading (deviation of the fund’s actual weights in M&A stocks from the average weights in M&A stocks across the funds within the same Center for Research in Security Prices objective). Findings Fund managers who are more vested in the firms engaged in M&As and who are more active in their trades of M&A firms generate higher contemporaneous and subsequent risk-adjusted performance, indicative of managerial skill. Active M&A trading effect on performance is economically meaningful. Originality/value This is the first study to examine whether previously documented predictive power of active institutions regarding M&As’ profitability leads to higher risk-adjusted returns for MF investors. The study introduces several measures to gauge how actively fund managers trade companies engaged in M&As and contributes to the literature on MF managers’ ability to pick stocks.

Look for people, not for alpha: mutual funds success and managers intellectual capital

2015 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 57-71 ◽  
Author(s):  
Iuliia Naidenova ◽  
Petr Parshakov ◽  
Marina Zavertiaeva ◽  
Eduardo Tomé
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Funds ◽  
Intellectual Capital ◽  
Mutual Fund ◽  
Personal Information ◽  
Fund Performance ◽  
Economic Education ◽  
Individual Characteristics ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Fund Managers

Purpose – This paper aims to explore whether individual intellectual capital of a fund manager allows mutual fund to outperform market. Design/methodology/approach – The sample includes 85 Russian equity funds for the period of 2013. First, Jensen’s alpha for each fund has been calculated, and then cross-sectional regression analysis has been used. While only a part of fund managers publish biographic sketches, the authors use the Heckman procedure to control for self-selection issues. Findings – The results support the idea that the individual characteristics indicate the possibility to earn abnormal alpha. Managers with economic education and with Moscow education perform better than others. Relationship between both fund performance measures and manager’s experience has inverted U-shape. Jensen’s alpha reaches its highest level at the point of 9 years, whereas beta – at 10 years of manager’s experience. Research limitations/implications – Investigation can be improved by including more variables that influence the disclosure of managers’ personal information, for example, by conducting surveys. Additionally, cross-sectional data restrict the analysis. Practical implications – The discovered characteristics of managers’ intellectual capital can be used as additional screening tool for the investor who is deciding on mutual fund choice in Russia. While individual intellectual capital is observable and more persistent in time in comparison with the past fund performance, such tool allows better decision-making. Originality/value – This is the first paper that explores which characteristics of Russian fund managers are connected with higher abnormal return (measured by Jensen’s alpha) and risk (beta) of mutual funds.

Comparing sentiment measures in mutual fund performance

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Qiang Bu ◽  
Jeffrey Forrest
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Fund ◽  
Design Methodology ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Fund Performance ◽  
Mutual Fund Performance ◽  
Market Models ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Science Theory ◽  
Market Factors

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to investigate whether the direct and indirect sentiment measures are similar in explaining mutual fund performance.Design/methodology/approachThe authors examine the role of direct and indirect sentiment measures on fund performance in two scenarios. One is when a sentiment measure is added to market models, and the other is when it used independently. Also, the authors propose a system science theory to explain the findings.FindingsThe authors find that both direct and indirect sentiment measures are integral to the benchmark models to explain fund performance. However, while the explanatory power of the direct sentiment index is robust when used independently or collectively, the indirect sentiment measures can explain fund performance only when used along with other market factors.Originality/valueGiven the number of sentiment measures, it is critical to determine whether these measures contain the same information of sentiment. This paper represents the first study on this topic.

Modeling brand resonance score (BRS) – an application in financial services

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-136 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ande Raja Ambedkar ◽  
Punniyamoorthy Murugesan ◽  
N. Thamaraiselvan
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Fund ◽  
Financial Services ◽  
Structural Equation ◽  
Analytic Network Process ◽  
Equation Modeling ◽  
Service Firms ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Fund Managers ◽  
Network Process ◽  
Brand Resonance

Purpose The experts in industry and academicians value brand resonance is the prerequisite factor in the firms of financial services. In this regard, the purpose of this paper is to model the brand resonance score (BRS) for modified customer-based brand equity (CBBE) model in mutual fund financial services using structural equation modeling (SEM) and analytic network process (ANP). Design/methodology/approach Criteria and sub-criteria relative weights are calculated from the SEM and sub-sub-criteria relative weights are measured through pair-wise comparison matrix for BRS modeling using ANP approach. Findings The brand resonance using ANP has been quantified, and BRSs of each brand through brand judgments and brand feelings criteria are calculated using two renowned Indian mutual fund services brands State Bank of India and Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation. Research limitations/implications Interdependency between sub-criteria are not explored. This research study is specific to Indian bank mutual fund services context. Practical implications Research findings provide useful guidelines for fund managers/analysts of mutual fund service firms to improve the brand resonance to investors. Originality/value The paper explained modeling BRS using ANP technique which helps organizations quantify the brand resonance effectively.

Mutual Fund Performance Using Unconditional Multifactor Models: Evidence from India

2018 ◽  
Vol 17 (2_suppl) ◽  
pp. S157-S184 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pankaj K. Agarwal ◽  
H. K. Pradhan
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Fund ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Fund Performance ◽  
Superior Performance ◽  
Capital Asset Pricing ◽  
Multifactor Models ◽  
Asset Pricing Model ◽  
Fund Managers ◽  
Equity Mutual Funds ◽  
Stock Picking

In contrast to developed countries, Indian capital markets do not exhibit strong efficiency and therefore it appears possible that fund managers beat the benchmarks. We examine the existence of superior performance of open-ended equity mutual funds in India with various models including traditional Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM)-based as well as recent Fama–French–Carhart (FFC)-factors-based models. We use a survivorship-bias free database including all schemes since inception till recently. We found evidence of stock picking and timing abilities in Indian fund managers. Our results are robust to changes in benchmarks, return frequency, and effects of heteroscedasticity and autocorrelation (HAC).

Does Fund Managers's Human Capital Add Value for The Fund Performance in Malaysia

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 92-92
Author(s):  
Venny Sin-Woon Chong ◽  
Ming-Ming Lai ◽  
Lee-Lee Chong
Keyword(s):  
Human Capital ◽  
Least Squares ◽  
Mutual Fund ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Fund Performance ◽  
Ordinary Least Squares ◽  
Performance Model ◽  
Fund Managers ◽  
Developed Markets ◽  
Three Stage Least Squares

This study examines the integration of fund managers' human capital characteristics (including education, gender, race, experience, age, team manager) relative to the fund performance model. A few previous empirical studies paid attention to human capital characteristics and mutual fund performances based on developed markets and have obtained mixed result findings. However, very little attention has focused on fund managers' human capital characteristics in the Malaysian mutual funds industry. Hence, this study attempts to fill this research gap.Based on a sample of Malaysian mutual fund managers, data is sourced from fund management companies, Thomson One database and fund master prospectus, from January 2012 to December 2014. The study employing ordinary least squares (OLS) and three-stage least squares (3SLS) methods to integrate fund performances and human capital characteristics with single and simultaneous equations based on asset pricing models. Keywords: Human capital, fund manager, fund performance.

Style and Skill: Hedge Funds, Mutual Funds, and Momentum

2020 ◽  
Vol 66 (12) ◽  
pp. 5505-5531 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Grinblatt ◽  
Gergana Jostova ◽  
Lubomir Petrasek ◽  
Alexander Philipov
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Funds ◽  
Hedge Funds ◽  
Mutual Fund ◽  
Hedge Fund ◽  
Fund Performance ◽  
Short Sales ◽  
Fund Managers ◽  
Liquidity Provision ◽  
Stock Picking ◽  
Hedge Fund Performance

Classifying mandatory 13F stockholding filings by manager type reveals that hedge fund strategies are mostly contrarian, and mutual fund strategies are largely trend following. The only institutional performers—the two thirds of hedge fund managers that are contrarian—earn alpha of 2.4% per year. Contrarian hedge fund managers tend to trade profitably with all other manager types, especially when purchasing stocks from momentum-oriented hedge and mutual fund managers. Superior contrarian hedge fund performance exhibits persistence and stems from stock-picking ability rather than liquidity provision. Aggregate short sales further support these conclusions about the style and skill of various fund manager types. This paper was accepted by Tyler Shumway, finance.

Market states and mutual fund risk shifting

2017 ◽  
Vol 43 (7) ◽  
pp. 828-838 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marius Popescu ◽  
Zhaojin Xu
Keyword(s):  
Mutual Fund ◽  
The State ◽  
Risk Level ◽  
Risk Shifting ◽  
Portfolio Risk ◽  
Past Performance ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Fund Managers ◽  
Bear Markets ◽  
Bull Markets

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the motivation behind mutual funds’ risk shifting behavior by examining its impact on fund performance, while jointly considering fund managers’ compensation incentives and career concerns. Design/methodology/approach The study uses a sample of US actively managed equity funds over the period 1980-2010. A fund’s risk shifting is estimated as the difference between the fund’s intended portfolio risk in the second half of the year and the realized portfolio risk in the first half of the year. Using the state of the market to identify the dominating type of incentive that fund managers face, we examine the relationship between performance and risk shifting in a cross-sectional regression setting, using the Fama and MacBeth (1973) methodology. Findings The authors find that poorly performing (well performing) funds are likely to increase (decrease) their risk level in bull markets, while reducing (increasing) it during bear markets. Furthermore, we find that funds that increase risk underperform, while those that decrease their portfolio risk do not. In addition, we find that poorly performing funds that increase (or decrease) their risk underperform across bull and bear markets, while well performing funds that reduce risk during bull markets subsequently outperform. Originality/value The paper contributes to the literature on mutual fund risk shifting by providing evidence that the performance consequence of such behavior is dependent on the state of the market and on the funds’ past performance. The results suggest that loser funds tend to be agency prone or be managed by managers with inferior investment skill, and that winner funds exhibit superior investment ability during bull markets. The authors argue that both the agency and investment ability hypotheses are driving fund managers’ risk shifting behavior.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document