Tracker fund actual performance history

Prism

gadgetmind wrote: »

A quick look at Best Invest's "Spot The Dog" will show plenty of previous star funds/managers underperforming for longer than most people would be happy with.

Who'd have labelled Woodford as "poor" previously and avoided investing in his equity income fund, which just closed itself to withdrawals?

I think a lot of the problem is that people choose an active fund mostly based on past performance without trying to understand the reason for that performance. Or they pick it off HL's wealth list or similar. To select an active fund well you really need to do some reseach of the managers ethos and performance during different market cycles. Plus some research into the actual holdings and fund breakdown. Most people likely don't. However if you do weed out all the closet trackers and bad ideas you can have better results.

For example I decided a long time ago that Woodford wasn't for me as I didn't agree with his style and didn't like the look of the fund holdings (looked like junk to me). I watched quite a few videos and researched the fund (and top holdings) to come to my decision.

AnotherJoe

The scale of Woodfords incompetence comes into focus when you consider that unlike the average punter making their bets on companies or sectors, he has a team of analysts behind him investigating the fine detail of all the companies he's invested in, only for them to spectacularly crash and burn within just a few months, plus he's made huge bets into many of these companies, owning significant percentages of equity and making it a nightmare to exit them.


p.s. just read about the 6% investment in a cold fusion [STRIKE]scam[/STRIKE] company. O.M.G. What a berk.