IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/rasset/v10yi4p791-833..html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Mutual Fund Performance and Flows during the COVID-19 Crisis

Author

Listed:
  • Ľuboš Pástor
  • M Blair Vorsatz
  • Jeffrey Pontiff

Abstract

We present a comprehensive analysis of the performance and flows of U.S. actively managed equity mutual funds during the 2020 COVID-19 crisis. We find that most active funds underperform passive benchmarks during the crisis, contradicting a popular hypothesis. Funds with high sustainability ratings perform well, as do funds with high star ratings. Fund outflows surpass precrisis trends, but not dramatically. Investors favor funds that apply exclusion criteria and funds with high sustainability ratings, especially environmental ones. Our finding that investors remain focused on sustainability during this major crisis suggests they view sustainability as a necessity rather than a luxury good.Authors have furnished an Internet Appendix, which is available on the Oxford University Press Web site next to the link to the final published paper online.

Suggested Citation

  • Ľuboš Pástor & M Blair Vorsatz & Jeffrey Pontiff, 0. "Mutual Fund Performance and Flows during the COVID-19 Crisis," The Review of Asset Pricing Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 10(4), pages 791-833.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:rasset:v:10:y::i:4:p:791-833.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/rapstu/raaa015
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Andreas Schrimpf & Hyun Song Shin & Vladyslav Sushko, 2020. "Leverage and margin spirals in fixed income markets during the Covid-19 crisis," BIS Bulletins 2, Bank for International Settlements.
    2. Michael C. Jensen, 1968. "The Performance Of Mutual Funds In The Period 1945–1964," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 23(2), pages 389-416, May.
    3. Marcin Kacperczyk & Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh & Laura Veldkamp, 2014. "Time-Varying Fund Manager Skill," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 69(4), pages 1455-1484, August.
    4. Pástor, Ľuboš & Stambaugh, Robert F. & Taylor, Lucian A., 2021. "Sustainable investing in equilibrium," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 550-571.
    5. Mahyar Kargar & Benjamin Lester & David Lindsay & Shuo Liu & Pierre-Olivier Weill & Diego Zúñiga, 2021. "Corporate Bond Liquidity during the COVID-19 Crisis [The day coronavirus nearly broke the financial markets]," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 34(11), pages 5352-5401.
    6. Rüdiger Fahlenbrach & Kevin Rageth & René M Stulz, 2021. "How Valuable Is Financial Flexibility when Revenue Stops? Evidence from the COVID-19 Crisis [The risk of being a fallen angel and the corporate dash for cash in the midst of COVID]," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 34(11), pages 5474-5521.
    7. Valentin Haddad & Alan Moreira & Tyler Muir, 2020. "When Selling Becomes Viral: Disruptions in Debt Markets in the COVID-19 Crisis and the Fed’s Response," NBER Working Papers 27168, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Brad M. Barber & Xing Huang & Terrance Odean, 2016. "Which Factors Matter to Investors? Evidence from Mutual Fund Flows," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 29(10), pages 2600-2642.
    9. Pástor, Ľuboš & Stambaugh, Robert F. & Taylor, Lucian A., 2015. "Scale and skill in active management," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(1), pages 23-45.
    10. repec:bla:jfinan:v:55:y:2000:i:4:p:1655-1703 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 2015. "A five-factor asset pricing model," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(1), pages 1-22.
    12. Samuel M. Hartzmark & Abigail B. Sussman, 2019. "Do Investors Value Sustainability? A Natural Experiment Examining Ranking and Fund Flows," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 74(6), pages 2789-2837, December.
    13. Stefano Ramelli & Alexander F Wagner, 2020. "Feverish Stock Price Reactions to COVID-19," The Review of Corporate Finance Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 9(3), pages 622-655.
    14. Edwin J. Elton & Martin J. Gruber & Christopher R. Blake, 2001. "A First Look at the Accuracy of the CRSP Mutual Fund Database and a Comparison of the CRSP and Morningstar Mutual Fund Databases," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(6), pages 2415-2430, December.
    15. Ľuboš Pástor & Robert F. Stambaugh & Lucian A. Taylor, 2017. "Do Funds Make More When They Trade More?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(4), pages 1483-1528, August.
    16. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1993. "Common risk factors in the returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 3-56, February.
    17. Ľuboš Pástor & Robert F. Stambaugh, 2012. "On the Size of the Active Management Industry," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 120(4), pages 740-781.
    18. Russ Wermers, 2000. "Mutual Fund Performance: An Empirical Decomposition into Stock‐Picking Talent, Style, Transactions Costs, and Expenses," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(4), pages 1655-1695, August.
    19. Nofsinger, John & Varma, Abhishek, 2014. "Socially responsible funds and market crises," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 180-193.
    20. Elton, Edwin J, et al, 1993. "Efficiency with Costly Information: A Reinterpretation of Evidence from Managed Portfolios," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 6(1), pages 1-22.
    21. Pagano, Marco & Wagner, Christian & Zechner, Josef, 2023. "Disaster resilience and asset prices," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 150(2).
    22. Albuquerque, Rui & Koskinen, Yrjo & Yang, Shuai & Zhang, Chendi, 2020. "Love in the Time of COVID-19: The Resiliency of Environmental and Social Stocks," CEPR Discussion Papers 14661, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    23. Robert Kosowski, 2011. "Do Mutual Funds Perform When It Matters Most to Investors? US Mutual Fund Performance and Risk in Recessions and Expansions," Quarterly Journal of Finance (QJF), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 1(03), pages 607-664.
    24. Karl V. Lins & Henri Servaes & Ane Tamayo, 2017. "Social Capital, Trust, and Firm Performance: The Value of Corporate Social Responsibility during the Financial Crisis," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(4), pages 1785-1824, August.
    25. Pastor, Lubos & Stambaugh, Robert F., 2002. "Mutual fund performance and seemingly unrelated assets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(3), pages 315-349, March.
    26. Carhart, Mark M, 1997. "On Persistence in Mutual Fund Performance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 57-82, March.
    27. Niels Joachim Gormsen & Ralph S J Koijen & Nikolai Roussanov, 0. "Coronavirus: Impact on Stock Prices and Growth Expectations," The Review of Asset Pricing Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 10(4), pages 574-597.
    28. Richard B. Evans, 2010. "Mutual Fund Incubation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 65(4), pages 1581-1611, August.
    29. Malkiel, Burton G, 1995. "Returns from Investing in Equity Mutual Funds 1971 to 1991," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(2), pages 549-572, June.
    30. Jędrzej Białkowski & Laura T. Starks, 2016. "SRI Funds: Investor Demand, Exogenous Shocks and ESG Profiles," Working Papers in Economics 16/11, University of Canterbury, Department of Economics and Finance.
    31. Ding, Wenzhi & Levine, Ross & Lin, Chen & Xie, Wensi, 2021. "Corporate immunity to the COVID-19 pandemic," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 141(2), pages 802-830.
    32. Sensoy, Berk A., 2009. "Performance evaluation and self-designated benchmark indexes in the mutual fund industry," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(1), pages 25-39, April.
    33. Eugene F. Fama & Kenneth R. French, 2010. "Luck versus Skill in the Cross‐Section of Mutual Fund Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 65(5), pages 1915-1947, October.
    34. Laura Alfaro & Anusha Chari & Andrew N. Greenland & Peter K. Schott, 2020. "Aggregate and Firm-Level Stock Returns During Pandemics, in Real Time," NBER Working Papers 26950, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    35. Ramelli, Stefano & Ossola, Elisa & Rancan, Michela, 2020. "Climate Sin Stocks: Stock Price Reactions to Global Climate Strikes," Working Papers 2020-03, Joint Research Centre, European Commission.
    36. Ferson, Wayne E & Schadt, Rudi W, 1996. "Measuring Fund Strategy and Performance in Changing Economic Conditions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(2), pages 425-461, June.
    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. Ľuboš Pástor & Robert F. Stambaugh & Lucian A. Taylor, 2017. "Do Funds Make More When They Trade More?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(4), pages 1483-1528, August.
    2. Jiang, George J. & Zaynutdinova, Gulnara R. & Zhang, Huacheng, 2021. "Stock-selection timing," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    3. Alda, Mercedes & Andreu, Laura & Sarto, José Luis, 2017. "Learning about individual managers’ performance in UK pension funds: The importance of specialization," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 654-667.
    4. Pástor, Ľuboš & Stambaugh, Robert F. & Taylor, Lucian A., 2015. "Scale and skill in active management," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(1), pages 23-45.
    5. Cai, Biqing & Cheng, Tingting & Yan, Cheng, 2018. "Time-varying skills (versus luck) in U.S. active mutual funds and hedge funds," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 81-106.
    6. Manuel Ammann & Sebastian Fischer & Florian Weigert, 2018. "Risk Factor Exposure Variation and Mutual Fund Performance," Working Papers on Finance 1817, University of St. Gallen, School of Finance, revised Nov 2018.
    7. Pástor, Ľuboš & Stambaugh, Robert F. & Taylor, Lucian A., 2015. "Scale and skill in active management," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(1), pages 23-45.
    8. DeMiguel, Victor & Gil-Bazo, Javier & Nogales, Francisco J. & Santos, André A.P., 2023. "Machine learning and fund characteristics help to select mutual funds with positive alpha," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 150(3).
    9. Hung, Pi-Hsia & Lien, Donald & Kuo, Ming-Sin, 2020. "Window dressing in equity mutual funds," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 338-354.
    10. Pagano, Marco & Wagner, Christian & Zechner, Josef, 2023. "Disaster resilience and asset prices," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 150(2).
    11. Livingston, Miles & Yao, Ping & Zhou, Lei, 2019. "The volatility of mutual fund performance," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 1-1.
    12. Victor DeMiguel & Javier Gil-Bazo & Francisco J. Nogales & André A. P. Santos, 2021. "Can Machine Learning Help to Select Portfolios of Mutual Funds?," Working Papers 1245, Barcelona School of Economics.
    13. Dahm, Laura K. & Sorhage, Christoph, 2015. "Milk or wine: Mutual funds' (dis)economies of life," CFR Working Papers 15-05, University of Cologne, Centre for Financial Research (CFR).
    14. Ferson, Wayne & Mo, Haitao, 2016. "Performance measurement with selectivity, market and volatility timing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 121(1), pages 93-110.
    15. Shafiqur Rahman & Cheng-Few Lee & Yaqing Xiao, 2017. "The investment performance, attributes, and investment behavior of ethical equity mutual funds in the US: an empirical investigation," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 49(1), pages 91-116, July.
    16. Viktoriya Lantushenko & Edward Nelling, 2020. "Active Management in Real Estate Mutual Funds," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 61(2), pages 247-274, August.
    17. Glode, Vincent, 2011. "Why mutual funds "underperform"," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(3), pages 546-559, March.
    18. Greppmair, Stefan & Jank, Stephan & Smajlbegovic, Esad, 2023. "On the importance of fiscal space: Evidence from short sellers during the COVID-19 pandemic," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 147(C).
    19. Suresh Nallareddy & Maria Ogneva, 2017. "Accrual quality, skill, and the cross-section of mutual fund returns," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 22(2), pages 503-542, June.
    20. Feldman, David & Saxena, Konark & Xu, Jingrui, 2020. "Is the active fund management industry concentrated enough?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 136(1), pages 23-43.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • G01 - Financial Economics - - General - - - Financial Crises
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G23 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Non-bank Financial Institutions; Financial Instruments; Institutional Investors

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:oup:rasset:v:10:y::i:4:p:791-833.. 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: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://academic.oup.com/raps .

    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.