Picking Winners? Investment Consultants' Recommendations of Fund Managers

51 Pages Posted: 18 Sep 2013 Last revised: 8 Oct 2014

See all articles by Tim Jenkinson

Tim Jenkinson

University of Oxford - Said Business School; European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI)

Howard Jones

University of Oxford, Saïd Business School

Jose Vicente Martinez

University of Connecticut

Date Written: September 26, 2014

Abstract

Investment consultants advise institutional investors on their choice of fund manager. Focusing on U.S. actively managed equity funds, we analyze the factors that drive consultants’ recommendations, what impact these recommendations have on flows, and how well the recommended funds perform. We find that investment consultants’ recommendations of funds are driven largely by soft factors, rather than the funds’ past performance, and that their recommendations have a very significant effect on fund flows. However, we find no evidence that these recommendations add value, suggesting that the search for winners, encouraged and guided by investment consultants, is fruitless.

Keywords: asset management, investment consultants, fund performance, asset flows

JEL Classification: G20, G23, G30

Suggested Citation

Jenkinson, Tim and Jones, Howard and Martinez, Jose Vicente, Picking Winners? Investment Consultants' Recommendations of Fund Managers (September 26, 2014). Journal of Finance, Forthcoming, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2327042 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2327042

Tim Jenkinson (Contact Author)

University of Oxford - Said Business School ( email )

Park End Street
Oxford, OX1 1HP
United Kingdom
+44 1865 288916 (Phone)
+44 1865 288831 (Fax)

HOME PAGE: http://www.sbs.oxford.edu/timjenkinson

European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI) ( email )

c/o the Royal Academies of Belgium
Rue Ducale 1 Hertogsstraat
1000 Brussels
Belgium

HOME PAGE: http://www.ecgi.org

Howard Jones

University of Oxford, Saïd Business School ( email )

Park End Street
Oxford, OX1 1HP
Great Britain

HOME PAGE: http://www.sbs.ox.ac.uk/about-us/people/howard-jones

Jose Vicente Martinez

University of Connecticut ( email )

2100 Hillside Road, Unit 1041
Storrs, CT 06269
United States

HOME PAGE: http://https://www.business.uconn.edu/person/jose-martinez/

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