Higher Risk, Lower Returns: What Hedge Fund Investors Really Earn

43 Pages Posted: 5 Mar 2009 Last revised: 29 Aug 2010

See all articles by Ilia D. Dichev

Ilia D. Dichev

Emory University - Department of Accounting

Gwen Yu

University of Michigan

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: July 1, 2009

Abstract

The returns of hedge fund investors depend not only on the returns of the funds they hold but also on the timing and magnitude of their capital flows in and out of these funds. We use dollar-weighted returns (a form of IRR) to assess the properties of actual investor returns on hedge funds and compare them to buy-and-hold fund returns. Our main finding is that annualized dollar-weighted returns are on the magnitude of 3 to 7 percent lower than corresponding buy-and-hold fund returns. Using factor models of risk and the estimated dollar-weighted performance gap, we find that the real alpha of hedge fund investors is close to zero. In absolute terms, dollar-weighted returns are reliably lower than the return on the S&P 500 index, and are only marginally higher than the risk-free rate as of the end of 2008. The combined impression from these results is that the return experience of hedge fund investors is much worse than previously thought.

Keywords: Hedge fund, Investor capital flows, Dollar-weighting

JEL Classification: G11, G23, G31

Suggested Citation

Dichev, Ilia D. and Yu, Gwen, Higher Risk, Lower Returns: What Hedge Fund Investors Really Earn (July 1, 2009). Journal of Financial Economics (JFE), Forthcoming, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1354070

Ilia D. Dichev (Contact Author)

Emory University - Department of Accounting ( email )

1300 Clifton Road
Atlanta, GA 30322-2722
United States

Gwen Yu

University of Michigan ( email )

701 Tappan Street
R3350
Ann Arbor, MI MI 48109
United States
7347635934 (Phone)

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