Why You Can Beat the Market — But Hedge Funds Can’t (2024)

FAQs

Why You Can Beat the Market — But Hedge Funds Can’t? ›

They might not want to outperform the market

Every hedge fund's goal is to generate market-beating returns for its clients. Fund managers are often paid based on how their fund performs. However, the nature of the business forces most hedge funds to focus on the short term, which is much more challenging because the stock market can be pretty darn irrational.

Investment fees are one major barrier to beating the market. If you take the popular advice to invest in an S&P 500 index fund rather than on individual stocks, your fund's performance should be identical to the performance of the S&P 500, for better or worse.

The more money you have, the harder it will be to beat the market. As a small investor, no one is keeping track of what you are buying or selling. And the amounts you are trading are way too small to move the prices of the stocks.

Key Points. Less than 10% of active large-cap fund managers have outperformed the S&P 500 over the last 15 years. The biggest drag on investment returns is unavoidable, but you can minimize it if you're smart.

The bottom line

Hedge funds and index funds take almost diametrically opposed approaches to investing. Hedge funds use active management strategies to try and beat markets, though they often don't succeed. Index funds seek merely to match a benchmark with a low-cost, passive approach.

Hedge funds seem to rake in billions of dollars a year for their professional investment acumen and portfolio management across a range of strategies. Hedge funds make money as part of a fee structure paid by fund investors based on assets under management (AUM).

Rowe Price U.S. Equity Research fund (ticker: PRCOX) is in this exclusive club, having bested—along with a team of about 30 research analysts—the S&P 500 index for the past five years on an annualized basis. U.S. Equity Research is a Morningstar five-star gold-medal fund.

Reality Check: S&P 500 Outperforms Hedge Funds 🚀

Data shows that hedge funds consistently underperformed the S&P 500 every year since 2011. The average annual return for hedge funds was about 4.956%, while the S&P 500 averaged 14.4%.

For the 14th year in a row, the S&P 500 did better than the majority of actively managed U.S. large-cap stock funds. A majority of active funds focused on U.S. large-cap stocks failed to beat the S&P 500 index last year, extending their track record of underperformance, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices.

Who has consistently beat the market? ›

Warren Buffett

Those who invested $10,000 in Berkshire Hathaway in 1965 are above the $60.2 million mark today. 1314 Buffett's investing style of discipline, patience, and value has consistently outperformed the market for decades.

Consistently beating the returns of the S&P 500 index is quite difficult for most investors. Here are some of the key reasons why outperforming the index is challenging: The S&P 500 is composed of 500 of the largest, most established companies in the U.S. These tend to be highly efficient and competitive firms.

Unsurprisingly, the majority do not beat those benchmarks, and even the ones who do don't keep their lead for long. Over its 23-year history, the SPIVA report shows that, on average, 64% of active large-cap fund managers fare worse than their benchmark (the S&P 500) in any given year.

It's a shocking statistic — approximately 90% of retail investors lose money in the stock market over the long run. With the rise of commission-free trading apps like Robinhood, more people than ever are trying their hand at stock picking.

If you had invested in Netflix ten years ago, you're probably feeling pretty good about your investment today. According to our calculations, a $1000 investment made in February 2014 would be worth $9,138.15, or a gain of 813.81%, as of February 12, 2024, and this return excludes dividends but includes price increases.

The thing is that beating the market isn't just incredibly difficult. It's also incredibly dangerous. According to a 2023 Visual Capitalist study, 95% of large-cap actively managed funds have underperformed their benchmark over the past 20 years₂.

Some of the highest-performing funds were Greenlight Capital, Viking Global Investors, Bridgewater Associates and Two Sigma Investments. These funds had a diversified portfolio of investments, so they were able to benefit from both the strong performance of tech stocks and a broader market rally.

Some strategies, such as managed futures and short-only funds, typically have higher probabilities of failure given the risky nature of their business operations. High leverage is another factor that can lead to hedge fund failure when the market moves in an unfavorable direction.

The average investor may not have a very good chance of beating the market. Regular investors may be able to achieve better risk-adjusted returns by focusing on losing less. Consider using low-cost platforms, creating a portfolio with a purpose, and beware of headline risk.