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Mutual Fund Managers are Supposed to Make Money
Stock Market News
October 2002
Mutual Fund Managers are Supposed to Make Money
The last two years have been challenging times for investors. The corporate accounting scandals of the past six months have compounded the confusion and frustration felt by many investors. Itâs not as easy to make money in equities in general or in equity mutual funds as it was in the late 1990âs. However, that is the fund managersâ job. Obviously they need to work harder when the general market is down, but thatâs what they get paid for.
Recently, fund managers invented style boxes, such as large-cap, small-cap, growth, value, blend, etc. Then they told us that if they stayed in their box and did as well as everyone else in that box, that meant they were doing okay. Do these boxes help investors? No. They are a cop out. Style boxes put the onus on the client or advisor to guess right, to know in advance what is going to make money and what is going to lose money. But thatâs not our job. That is the fund managerâs job. It is our job to pick fund managers who know how to make money for investors.
There are no investors who a willing to gamble with their life savings. They donât have to guess or âfigure outâ the future. All they have to do is keep track of what is happening today. William OâNeil, a wise investor and the founder of Investors Business Daily, recommends this approach: âSell your stock if it drops 7% to 8% below your buy price.â Fund managers should use the same rule.
If the fund goes up as expected and hits a nice high, then starts to fall the manager should certainly sell it by the time it has fallen 20% below its peak. OâNeil suggests selling when a stock or mutual fund is 15% below its peak. If 10 stocks in a portfolio drop 20% from their high, the manager should sell all ten. If all the stocks are down 20%, they should sell all and hold all cash. We will thank them.
There are some good fund managers out there who make money for their investors. Check a fundâs performance for the last one-, three-, five-, and ten-year periods before you invest your money.
These articles are intended to provide general resources for the tax and accounting needs of small businesses and individuals. Service2Client LLC is the author, but is not engaged in rendering specific legal, accounting, financial or professional advice. Service2Client LLC makes no representation that the recommendations of Service2Client LLC will achieve any result. The NSAD has not reviewed any of the Service2Client LLC content. Readers are encouraged to contact their CPA regarding the topics in these articles.
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