We empirically identify stocks which make flows into mutual funds holding them more performance-sensitive, and show that fund managers dislike holding these stocks; these stocks earn positive abnormal returns of around 3.5% annually; and, the sensitivity premium has increased over time as the...

We examine the daily activity and performance of a large panel of individual investors in Sweden's Premium Pension System. We find that active investors earn significantly higher returns and risk-adjusted returns than inactive investors. A performance decomposition analysis reveals that most of...

This study measures the financial impact of screening for environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria on corporate bond portfolios. Specifically, risk-adjusted financial performance of 103 US and Eurozone socially responsible bond funds is compared with a matched sample of conventional...

This study investigates how the quality of stocks owned by mutual funds affects the performance of those funds during 2000-2009. The quality of a stock is positively related to its size, while quality is inversely related to volatility. Evidently, stocks in the lowest quality decile perform...

Following the Pension Protection Act of 2006, there was a sharp increase in the use of TDFs as default investment options in defined contribution retirement plans. We document large differences in realized TDF returns and risk profiles, even for funds with the same target retirement date. Using...

Exploiting a unique opportunity offered by the Italian private equity (PE) market, we examine the hitherto largely unexplored internal rate of return (IRR) of PE investments. Our database covers the entire universe of transactions sponsored by Italian PE investors in Italy up to 2007 and offers...

In this article we discuss the topic of benchmarks in alternative investment strategies. For many years, firms in the US and Europe have been trying to develop hedge fund indices. Many argue that hedge fund indices will help develop the industry, make it more transparent, accessible and...

This paper investigates mutual funds’ potential “greenwashing” behavior. Funds profiled as ESG- based receive higher inflows compared to other similar funds. Importantly, we show this is true also for ESG labeled funds having inferior objective ESG profiles, as based on Morningstar...

We find that active global mutual funds in the U.S. can use foreign information to select U.S. multinationals’ stocks. To invest internationally, these funds collect information from the foreign countries where they invest. Such foreign information helps funds invest in U.S. multinationals...

We evaluate the performance of artificial intelligence (AI)-powered mutual funds. We find that these funds do not outperform the market per se. However, a comparison shows that AI-powered funds significantly outperform their human-managed peer funds. We further show that the outperformance of AI...