scholarly journals Do Managers Of Global Equity Funds Outperform Their Respective Style Benchmarks? Evidence From South Africa

2012 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 269
Author(s):  
Heng-Hsing Hsieh ◽  
Kathleen Hodnett ◽  
Paul Van Rensburg

The results of our prior research on internationally-domiciled global equity funds suggest that active managers do not provide economic benefits, in addition to their underlying investment style benchmarks. This finding implies that the performances of global equity funds are derived mainly from the broad investment styles followed by the active managers rather than the stock-picking activities of the managers. We replicate our earlier research to investigate the performances of the six well-established global equity funds in the South African unit trust industry. Our results indicate that four out of the six South African fund managers under examination substantially underperform their passively-replicated style benchmarks. Our prior study results indicate that there is no significant difference between the performances of the internationally-domiciled global equity funds and their respective style benchmarks. By contrast, the stock-picking decisions of the South African fund managers are found to destroy value created by their respective style benchmarks in this study. Our findings suggest that investors who wish to follow particular investment styles would be better off by investing in exchange traded funds (ETF) that passively track the performances of their mandated investment styles in the global equity market with minimal costs.

Author(s):  
Heng-Hsing Hsieh ◽  
Kathleen Hodnett

Empirical literature suggests that stock-picking of fund managers do not provide economic benefits in addition to passively-replicated style benchmarks. This paper constructs a 4-factor style model using the Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) World Index and the global size, value and momentum proxies to replicate the style benchmark returns of 12 actively-managed global equity funds based on the return-decomposition approach of Sharpe (1992). In line with prior literature, it is found that the returns of the global equity funds under investigation are primarily driven by their respective style benchmarks. The selection returns of the analyzed funds are insignificant after adjustments for the inherent style risks. We thus conclude that active stock-picking of fund managers do not provide significant value in addition to asset and style allocation decisions.


Viruses ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (6) ◽  
pp. 1005
Author(s):  
Guoxiu Li ◽  
Ashenafi Kiros Wubshet ◽  
Yaozhong Ding ◽  
Qian Li ◽  
Junfei Dai ◽  
...  

An alternative vaccine design approach and diagnostic kits are highly required against the anticipated pandemicity caused by the South African Territories type 2 (SAT2) Foot and Mouth Disease Virus (FMDV). However, the distinct antigenicity and immunogenicity of VP1, VP0, and VP3 of FMDV serotype SAT2 are poorly understood. Similarly, the particular roles of the three structural proteins in novel vaccine design and development remain unexplained. We therefore constructed VP1, VP0, and VP3 encoding gene (SAT2:JX014256 strain) separately fused with His-SUMO (histidine-small ubiquitin-related modifier) inserted into pET-32a cassette to express the three recombinant proteins and separately evaluated their antigenicity and immunogenicity in mice. The fusion protein was successfully expressed and purified by the Ni-NTA resin chromatography. The level of serum antibody, spleen lymphocyte proliferation, and cytokines against the three distinct recombinant proteins were analyzed. Results showed that the anti-FMDV humoral response was triggered by these proteins, and the fusion proteins did enhance the splenocyte immune response in the separately immunized mice. We observed low variations among the three fusion proteins in terms of the antibody and cytokine production in mice. Hence, in this study, results demonstrated that the structural proteins of SAT2 FMDV could be used for the development of immunodiagnostic kits and subunit vaccine designs.


1995 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 583 ◽  
Author(s):  
RJQ Tarr

Growth rates of a number of Haliotis midae populations around the South African coast were studied by means of tagging. These populations ranged from the cool waters of the western coast to the more temperate environment of the eastern Cape. Standard von Bertalanffy growth curves were fitted and growth parameters derived. These ranged from 0.19 to 0.25 for K, the average rate at which L∞ is approached, and from 156 to 173 for L∞, the average theoretical maximum length. These indicate far higher growth rates than were previously published for this commercially fished species, and the reasons for this difference are discussed. The expectation that growth rates would be fastest in the warmer eastern Cape waters was not realized, there being no significant difference in growth between the Bird Island population on the eastern coast and the Robben Island population on the western coast. These new growth parameters indicate that H. midae in the commercial fishery grounds is attaining sexual maturity some four years earlier, and the minimum legal size some five years earlier, than previously considered. This has considerable significance for modelling studies presently underway. Movement of a small population of adult H. midae was studied over a three-year period, after which 47% of the original abalone were still present on the study site. Of these, 81.5% still occupied exactly the same position on the rocks. This indicates that H. midae that have located an optimum habitat, and that are not disturbed, tend not to move.


1996 ◽  
Vol 78 (3) ◽  
pp. 851-859 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin Smith ◽  
Angina Parekh

This study has two aims, to examine aspects of Kohlberg's claims of universality within a unique research context and to explore differences in moral development between black and white South Africans. 81 participants from four different age groups were administered Form A of Kohlberg's moral judgement interviews. Analysis supported the age-relatedness of Kohlberg's stages of moral development and provided some support for the notion that the stages should be evident in various cultures. A significant difference in moral development between black and white groups in the 19- to 28-yr. age group was found. Further, black and white groups had different concerns when justifying moral choices. The results were discussed in the context of the South African system, which until recently has been one of institutionalised racial division.


2016 ◽  
Vol 182 ◽  
pp. 98-115 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philippe Lallemand ◽  
Mike Bergh ◽  
Margaret Hansen ◽  
Martin Purves

2013 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 510-517
Author(s):  
Jeevarathnam Parthasarathy Govender

The South African telecommunications market is vibrant and growing, dominated by two players. It is recognised that service quality plays an important role in establishing a competitive advantage. The aim of this paper is to assess ratings of service quality among mobile telecommunications customers. To this end, a survey was conducted among 400 customers using the SERVQUAL questionnaire to measure customers’ expectations and perceptions based on the five dimensions of service quality. The findings indicate that there are gaps between customer expectations and perceptions of service quality. The tangibles dimension exhibited the smallest gap for both companies and the assurance and empathy dimensions revealed the largest gap scores. There were no significant differences in overall expectations between the two companies, but there were significant differences between the companies on overall perceptions of service quality. There was no significant difference in the overall expectations and perceptions between males and females.


2013 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 22-28
Author(s):  
Rousseau Lötter

The persistence of risk levels of local General Equity unit trusts is evaluated. Variations in absolute and market-adjusted returns are measured to determine whether investors can use historical risk as a proxy for future risk levels. The General Equity funds are fairly homogenous, and different funds should exhibit stable risk levels if the fund managers’ investment mandates and investment styles remain stable over time. The results indicate a degree of absolute and market-adjusted risk stability over time. The market-adjusted risk and return relationship remained stable through the 2008 global crises, indicating that, on average, the fund managers maintained their benchmark-related risk exposures. Both the absolute and market-adjusted results indicate no statistically significant relationship between risk and return for the 2000 to 2012 period.


Author(s):  
Lee-Anne Naicker ◽  
Evangeline Nortje ◽  
Michael Kleynhans ◽  
Andre Stander ◽  
Yvette Hlophe ◽  
...  

Current research in the area of wellness in the workplace is fragmented and requires a holistic, integrated and systemic understanding of employee wellness in order for health and wellness care to be effectively managed. The growing burden of noncommunicable conditions in South Africa highlights the necessity for prevention strategies such as wellness programmes to be implemented. The workplace provides an ideal setting as a large proportion of the population will be targeted, including those who require lifestyle improvement. Therefore this study sought to evaluate various health and wellness components among employees of a medical aid company in an attempt to identify risk areas which require further intervention. Participants were 140 employees of a medical aid company who work a minimum of 40 h per week and who were subjected to a wellness assessment battery, consisting of anthropometrical, health-related and physical capacity measurements. The results indicate that intervention is required in terms of alcohol and drug usage, dietary habits, heart health, body composition, muscular endurance, cardiorespiratory endurance, and individual perceptions towards the company. This study produced results which corroborate the findings of a great deal of previous research in this field. However, the scope for applying wellness programmes to the South African population is limited. The success of wellness programmes which emphasise physical activity has been well documented in high-income countries, with evidence of economic benefits and return on investment. And so it is proposed that implementation of wellness programmes will have a positive effect on the South African workforce.


2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 214
Author(s):  
Jun-Hao Li ◽  
Chun-Fan You

This paper examines Chinese mutual fund managers’ market, volatility, and liquidity abilities. Using a daily frequency sample of Chinese open-end equity funds from 2015 to 2019, we find evidence that mutual fund managers can time the market. Among the funds with different investment styles, the active funds have better market and liquidity timing ability, whereas the steady funds have better volatility timing ability. In different investment periods, there are more funds with timing ability in the fall period than in the rise period. We find the same results in the market (T-M), volatility, and liquidity timing models. It is especially for the active funds, nearly half of which have liquidity timing ability in the fall period. Among the funds with stock selection ability, the funds with market timing ability can outperform than the funds with other timing ability.


2007 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Burger ◽  
C. Rensleigh

The information workers of today have a wide range of information sources available to make valuable decisions, so much so that it can lead to information overload. The purpose of this research was to investigate the extent of information overload in the South African banking industry. The empirical part of this study was done at the Standard Bank of South Africa, where 115 questionnaires were distributed to three categories of employees. It was found that e-mail is one of the most used computer-mediated applications and is used more than the World-Wide Web, instant messaging or peer-to-peer file sharing. Of the respondents, 65% felt overwhelmed by the amount of e-mails they received as 25% received more than 60 e-mails per day. A third of the respondents dedicated three hours or more to e-mails per day. Respondents agreed that the implementation of policies is important to ensure compliance with legislation, protection of privacy rights and copyright, and the filtering of spam. In conclusion, the respondents indicated that formal training in e-mail management should make a significant difference in the usage of e-mail within the organization and reduce e-mail overload. 


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