Beating the market is hard. Not even the pros can do it with any kind of consistency, despite what the investment fund industry would have you believe.
And still, much of the pull of industry revolves around the idea of the visionary manager who can extract market-beating returns year after year. 68 of them at the start of its analysis in July, 2017. How many of them stayed in the top half of performers for the next five years? Just one. This is not a shortcoming specific to Canada. S&P’s report for the U.S. market also found a zero rate of survivorship in the top quartile over five years. Many other studies consistently show that fund managers everywhere struggle to put up market-beating performance with any kind of regularity.
globeinvestor A) What is the market in portfolio terms; hint: in Canada weighted to commodities, oil, & gas. B) mutual funds are managed to target a risk, return, and time profile: expect less volatility. The Canadian media is awful, if not amateur, on the subject. As well as economics.
That's why I hate and despise them.