Fund manager contracts and financial markets’ short-termism

This paper investigates the extent to which the delegation of funds management prevents long-term information acquisition, inducing short-termism in financial markets. The authors, Catherine Casamatta and Sebastien Pouget also study the design of long-term fund managers’ compensation contracts. Under moral hazard, fund managers’ compensation optimally depends on both short-term and long-term fund performance. Short-term performance … Read more

Agent provocateur

Paul Smith, the Hong Kong based chief executive of the Global CFA Society is on an evangelical mission to change the culture within the investment industry. Not only is he looking to curb the frequency of excess behaviour that leaves the public cynical of high paid finance professionals, but he is a persuasive advocate for … Read more

Factor investing: it works for credits too

Pension funds, insurance companies and sovereign wealth funds increasingly apply factor investing to equities in their portfolios. And now institutional investors would also like to apply this concept to credits. A research study ( ‘Factor investing in the corporate bond market’) shows that factor strategies can be attractive in credit markets. How does this work … Read more

Sovereign Development Funds: designing strategic investment institutions

The hunt for alpha is leading traditional investors toward more innovative strategies and operating models. And, significantly, one potential source of inspiration for long-term investors has come from an unconventional place: the community of sovereign development funds (SDFs). In this paper academics from Stanford University provide readers with analytical frameworks that can assist in the … Read more

Do long-term mandates produce better results?

About 11 years ago, the Towers Watson’s Thinking Ahead Group came up with the concept of investors appointing managers for 10-year mandates. The consulting arm then started talking to clients about it in 2004/05 and the early mandates have now matured. So did it work? Do longer-term mandates produce outperformance, better behaviour and more security? … Read more

Beyond backtests: considering the robustness of smart beta

Systematic equity investment strategies – so-called smart beta strategies – are usually marketed on the basis of outperformance. However, it is important to recognise that performance analysis is typically conducted on backtests that apply the smart beta methodology to historical stock returns. Concerning actual investment decisions, a relevant question, therefore, is how robust the outperformance … Read more