Sticking to Principles
A famous American football coach once said, “You don’t rise to the occasion, you sink to the level of your training.”1 The implication is that, in times of great stress, the most reliable recipe for success is sticking to a set of fundamental principles.
From February 20 to March 20, the S&P 500 Index returned –37.4%, with daily returns ranging from –12.0% to +9.4%. A drop of nearly 40% in the stock market combined with a spike in volatility can make many investors reconsider their investment approach. Some might suddenly find stock-picking approaches more alluring. After all, who has not heard the claim that a volatile market is precisely the environment in which many traditional active managers thrive? But is there any truth to this claim?
To explore this issue, we looked at the performance of active US mutual fund managers over the past two decades. We considered two different ways of measuring stock market stress: market volatility (or how much stocks rise or fall in a given month) and return dispersion (or the range of returns across all US stocks). In each case, active managers underperformed their index benchmarks.
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Robert J. Pyle, CFP®, CFA is president of Diversified Asset Management, Inc. (DAMI). DAMI is licensed as an investment adviser with the State of Colorado Division of Securities, and its investment advisory representatives are licensed by the State of Colorado. DAMI will only transact business in other states to the extent DAMI has made the requisite notice filings or obtained the necessary licensing in such state. No follow up or individualized responses to persons in other jurisdictions that involve either rendering or attempting to render personalized investment advice for compensation will be made absent compliance with applicable legal requirements, or an applicable exemption or exclusion. It does not constitute investment or tax advice. To contact Robert, call 303-440-2906 or e-mail info@diversifiedassetmanagement.com.
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