Holding Horizon: A New Measure of Active Investment Management

Abstract

This paper introduces a new holding horizon measure of active management and examines its relation to future risk-adjusted fund performance (alpha). Our measure reveals a wide cross-sectional dispersion in mutual fund investment horizons, and shows that long-horizon funds exhibit positive future long-term alphas by holding stocks with superior long-term fundamentals. Further, stocks largely held by long-horizon funds outperform stocks largely held by short-horizon funds by more than 3% annually, adjusted for risk, over the following five-year period. We also find a clientele effect: to reduce liquidity costs, long-horizon funds attract more long-term investors through share classes that carry load fees.

Keywords: mutual funds, performance evaluation, investment horizons, selection skills

JEL Classification: G11, G23