Let’s look at some of the evidence S&P presented in its webinar, beginning with the performances of actively managed funds. For the 10-year period ending in 2014, S&P found that after fees, the majority of actively managed funds in all major categories underperformed their respective benchmarks. For those familiar with the evidence, this shouldn’t come as any surprise. However, what may be surprising is that with the sole exception of the asset class of large value stocks, this held true even when considering gross, rather than net, returns. In other words, active funds underperformed even after their expense ratios were added back. Even in the asset class of large-cap value stocks, only a slim majority (53%) of actively managed funds beat their benchmarks, while just 41% did so – net of fees.

This serves as pretty strong evidence that the markets are highly efficient in setting prices. It also shows the importance of considering the total costs of active management. With that in mind, let’s look at the total costs of active management.

Other costs include trading costs – bid-offer spreads, market impact costs and commissions – as well as what is referred to as the “cost of cash.” While index funds always are fully invested, actively managed funds typically hold some percentage of their assets in cash, either because they are attempting to time the market or because they are waiting to find a good stock to buy.

Wermers found that on average, the cost of cash for actively managed funds was 0.7%. And total trading costs easily can exceed 1%, especially for small-cap funds and emerging market funds. Plus, for taxable investors, the higher turnover of actively managed funds would add still another heavy burden to overcome.

Over the 10 years ending December 31, 2014, less than 14% of actively managed small-cap funds – in growth, core or value – beat their respective benchmarks, and just 7% of actively managed high-yield funds did so. With stocks, this is looking only at pretax returns. Given that taxes often are the greatest expense for actively managed funds, even this dismal figure overstates their performances for taxable investors.

The S&P researchers analyzed the performances of actively managed domestic equity funds ranked in the top quartile for two consecutive five-year periods. They found that at best, only 1% of multi-cap funds in the top quartile for the first five-year period managed to remain there for the second five-year period, which ended March 2015. And not a single one of the funds in the other categories – small-cap, mid-cap and large-cap – beat their benchmarks the second time around. The proverbial monkey throwing darts would be expected to do better than that.

• Academic research is converting alpha into beta (a systematic factor such as size, value, momentum and profitability) that can be accessed through low-cost, passively managed funds such as index mutual funds and ETFs. This eliminates sources of alpha that active managers can access.
• The number of “suckers at the poker table” who can be exploited has collapsed, with institutional investors controlling the vast majority of equity holdings and doing as much as 90% of the trading. The problem is the size of the sheep herd waiting to be sheared is persistently shrinking.
• The competition has increased not only in quality, but quantity. Sixty years ago, there were less than 100 mutual funds, and hedge funds were a nascent industry. Today, we have more than 8,000 mutual funds and 10,000 hedge funds. Twenty years ago, hedge funds controlled about $300 billion. Today, that figure is approaching 10 times that amount.

The impact of these trends can be summarized in the following data. Twenty years ago, about 20% of actively managed funds generated statistically significant alphas. Today, that figure is down to about 2%. And that’s before considering the impact of taxes.

The conclusion I hope you’ll draw is that just as it’s OK to set up a small entertainment account for a visit to the racetrack or the casino, you wouldn’t take your retirement account to either of those places – because doing so is playing a loser’s game. The same is true of the game of active management. If you want to learn more about this subject, pick up a copy of “The Incredible Shrinking Alpha.”