IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jjrfmx/v13y2020i6p136-d375175.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Diversification and Fund Performance—An Analysis of Buyout Funds

Author

Listed:
  • Matthias Huss

    (Faculty of Business and Economics, University of Basel, Peter-Merian-Weg 6, 4002 Basel, Switzerland
    Informatics and Sustainability Research Group, University of Zurich, 8050 Zurich, Switzerland
    Center for Comparative and International Studies, ETH Zurich, 8006 Zurich, Switzerland)

  • Daniel Steger

    (de Pury Pictet Turrettini & Cie SA, Niederdorfstrasse 88, 8001 Zurich, Switzerland)

Abstract

This paper studies the relationship between portfolio diversification and fund performance, based on an unexplored, hand-collected dataset of buyout funds. The dataset comprises detailed information at the level of portfolio companies, which allows measuring the concentration of the fund portfolios towards individual companies, industrial, and geographical focus. Our results suggest that diversification within, but not across industries, associates with higher buyout fund performance. We do not find a significant relationship between geographical diversification and performance. These results partly contradict results documented in prior literature.

Suggested Citation

  • Matthias Huss & Daniel Steger, 2020. "Diversification and Fund Performance—An Analysis of Buyout Funds," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 13(6), pages 1-17, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jjrfmx:v:13:y:2020:i:6:p:136-:d:375175
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1911-8074/13/6/136/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1911-8074/13/6/136/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Arthur Korteweg & Stefan Nagel, 2016. "Risk‐Adjusting the Returns to Venture Capital," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 71(3), pages 1437-1470, June.
    2. Steven N. Kaplan & Antoinette Schoar, 2005. "Private Equity Performance: Returns, Persistence, and Capital Flows," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(4), pages 1791-1823, August.
    3. Thomas Hellmann & Manju Puri, 2002. "Venture Capital and the Professionalization of Start‐Up Firms: Empirical Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(1), pages 169-197, February.
    4. Humphery-Jenner, Mark, 2013. "Diversification in Private Equity Funds: On Knowledge Sharing, Risk Aversion, and Limited Attention," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(5), pages 1545-1572, October.
    5. Lossen, Ulrich, 2006. "The Performance of Private Equity Funds: Does Diversification Matter?," Discussion Paper Series of SFB/TR 15 Governance and the Efficiency of Economic Systems 192, Free University of Berlin, Humboldt University of Berlin, University of Bonn, University of Mannheim, University of Munich.
    6. Robinson, David T. & Sensoy, Berk A., 2016. "Cyclicality, performance measurement, and cash flow liquidity in private equity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(3), pages 521-543.
    7. Lopez-de-Silanes, Florencio & Phalippou, Ludovic & Gottschalg, Oliver, 2015. "Giants at the Gate: Investment Returns and Diseconomies of Scale in Private Equity," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 50(3), pages 377-411, June.
    8. Ludovic Phalippou, 2014. "Performance of Buyout Funds Revisited?," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 18(1), pages 189-218.
    9. Michael Ewens & Charles M. Jones & Matthew Rhodes-Kropf, 2013. "The Price of Diversifiable Risk in Venture Capital and Private Equity," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(8), pages 1854-1889.
    10. April Knill, 2009. "Should Venture Capitalists Put All Their Eggs in One Basket? Diversification versus Pure‐Play Strategies in Venture Capital," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 38(3), pages 441-486, September.
    11. Cumming, Douglas & Dai, Na, 2010. "Local bias in venture capital investments," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 17(3), pages 362-380, June.
    12. Alexander Ljungqvist & Matthew Richardson, 2003. "The cash flow, return and risk characteristics of private equity," NBER Working Papers 9454, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Paul Gompers & Anna Kovner & Josh Lerner, 2009. "Specialization and Success: Evidence from Venture Capital," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(3), pages 817-844, September.
    14. Gompers, Paul & Lerner, Josh, 2000. "Money chasing deals? The impact of fund inflows on private equity valuation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(2), pages 281-325, February.
    15. Berk A. Sensoy & Steven N. Kaplan, 2015. "Private Equity Performance: A Survey," Annual Review of Financial Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 7(1), pages 597-614, December.
    16. Marcin Kacperczyk & Clemens Sialm & Lu Zheng, 2005. "On the Industry Concentration of Actively Managed Equity Mutual Funds," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(4), pages 1983-2011, August.
    17. Robert S. Harris & Tim Jenkinson & Steven N. Kaplan, 2014. "Private Equity Performance: What Do We Know?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 69(5), pages 1851-1882, October.
    18. Tim Jenkinson & Stefan Morkoetter & Thomas Wetzer, 2018. "Buy Low, Sell High? Do Private Equity Fund Managers Have Market Abilities?," Working Papers on Finance 1813, University of St. Gallen, School of Finance.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Robinson, David T. & Sensoy, Berk A., 2016. "Cyclicality, performance measurement, and cash flow liquidity in private equity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(3), pages 521-543.
    2. Buchner, Axel & Mohamed, Abdulkadir & Schwienbacher, Armin, 2017. "Diversification, risk, and returns in venture capital," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 32(5), pages 519-535.
    3. Ljungqvist, Alexander & Bircan, Cagatay & Biesinger, Markus, 2020. "Value Creation in Private Equity," CEPR Discussion Papers 14676, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    4. Tereza Tykvová, 2018. "Venture capital and private equity financing: an overview of recent literature and an agenda for future research," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 88(3), pages 325-362, May.
    5. Rin, Marco Da & Hellmann, Thomas & Puri, Manju, 2013. "A Survey of Venture Capital Research," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 573-648, Elsevier.
    6. Korteweg, Arthur & Sorensen, Morten, 2017. "Skill and luck in private equity performance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(3), pages 535-562.
    7. Buchner, Axel, 2016. "How much can lack of marketability affect private equity fund values?," Review of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 35-45.
    8. Axel Buchner, 2016. "How much can lack of marketability affect private equity fund values?," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 28(1), pages 35-45, January.
    9. Arpit Gupta & Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh, 2019. "Valuing Private Equity Strip by Strip," NBER Working Papers 26514, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Stanfield, Jared, 2020. "Skill, syndication, and performance: Evidence from leveraged buyouts," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    11. Andrew Metrick & Ayako Yasuda, 2011. "Venture Capital and Other Private Equity: a Survey," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 17(4), pages 619-654, September.
    12. Arpit Gupta & Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh, 2021. "Valuing Private Equity Investments Strip by Strip," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 76(6), pages 3255-3307, December.
    13. Dyaran Bansraj & Han Smit & Vadym Volosovych, 2020. "Can Private Equity Funds Act as Strategic Buyers? Evidence from Buy-and-Build Strategies," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 20-041/IV, Tinbergen Institute.
    14. Aleksandar Andonov & Roman Kräussl & Joshua Rauh & Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh, 2021. "Institutional Investors and Infrastructure Investing [Pension fund asset allocation and liability discount rates]," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 34(8), pages 3880-3934.
    15. Alexander Ljungqvist & Matthew Richardson & Daniel Wolfenzon, 2020. "The investment behavior of buyout funds: Theory and evidence," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 49(1), pages 3-32, March.
    16. Robert S. Harris & Tim Jenkinson & Steven N. Kaplan & Ruediger Stucke, 2020. "Has Persistence Persisted in Private Equity? Evidence from Buyout and Venture Capital Funds," Working Papers 2020-167, Becker Friedman Institute for Research In Economics.
    17. Boyer, Brian & Nadauld, Taylor D. & Vorkink, Keith P. & Weisbach, Michael S., 2018. "Private Equity Indices Based on Secondary Market Transactions," Working Paper Series 2018-21, Ohio State University, Charles A. Dice Center for Research in Financial Economics.
    18. Arthur Korteweg & Stefan Nagel, 2016. "Risk‐Adjusting the Returns to Venture Capital," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 71(3), pages 1437-1470, June.
    19. Niklas Hüther & David T. Robinson & Sönke Sievers & Thomas Hartmann-Wendels, 2020. "Paying for Performance in Private Equity: Evidence from Venture Capital Partnerships," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(4), pages 1756-1782, April.
    20. Lossen, Ulrich, 2006. "The Performance of Private Equity Funds: Does Diversification Matter?," Discussion Paper Series of SFB/TR 15 Governance and the Efficiency of Economic Systems 192, Free University of Berlin, Humboldt University of Berlin, University of Bonn, University of Mannheim, University of Munich.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jjrfmx:v:13:y:2020:i:6:p:136-:d:375175. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.