Given their simplicity and presumed commodity-like nature, institutional Samp;P 500 Index mutual funds should be subject to active price competition, resulting in only nominal size-adjusted differences in expenses. We find a wide disparity among fund expense ratios and their corresponding...

The actual returns on mutual funds earned by investors are much lower than the rational behavior paradigm of financial economics would suggest. Certainly this is evidenced in the performance of funds distributed through the advisor channel. From the evidence here and elsewhere, much (if not...

We investigate the relation between the performance and characteristics of 1,779 domestic, actively managed retail equity mutual funds with diverse expense ratios. We show that using expense ratio standard deviation classes is an effective method for characterizing fund expenses for investors....

Given their simplicity and presumed commodity-like nature, institutional Samp;P 500 Index mutual funds should be subject to active price competition, resulting in only nominal size-adjusted differences in expenses. We find a wide disparity among fund expense ratios and their corresponding...

In this study, we provide extensive evidence on the performance characteristics of 1,118 U.S. domestic, actively managed institutional equity mutual funds. We measure performance using such measures as three-year Sharpe ratios, Jensen's alphas, and Miller's active alphas as well as annualized...

This study documents why mutual fund markets reflect “imperfect competition.” Discussions include fund industry and legal performance, fund distribution, fund share classes, attributes of imperfect competition, actively managed funds and index funds, fund advertising, financial literacy, and...

The research provides the mutual fund Total Cost Construct that would provide “normative transparency of disclosure" to shareholders if adopted by the fund industry and by the SEC for fund reporting and disclosure. Full disclosure would enhance analysis to estimate each cost item for samples,...

The purpose of this study is to discuss various types of agency conflicts that negatively impact mutual fund shareholder interests. In so doing, shareholders should get an improved understanding of conflicts that place them at such a disadvantage in fund investing. Many fund advisers are...

For investor and institutional class index mutual funds that track the S&P 500 Index, there are just 25 funds with statistically low expense ratios (management fee findings are found above). However, there are only five index funds - all investor class - with statistically very high and...