Performance of Australian Active Funds Worsened: SPIVA

S&P Dow Jones Indices has been the de facto scorekeeper of the ongoing active versus passive debate since the first publication of the U.S. SPIVA Scorecard in 2002. Over the years, we have built on our decade of experience publishing the report by expanding scorecard coverage into Australia, Canada, Europe, India, Japan, and Latin America. While the report will not end the debate on active versus passive investing in Australia, we hope to make a meaningful contribution by examining market segments in which one strategy works better than the other.

The SPIVA Australia Scorecard reports on the performance of actively managed Australian mutual funds against their respective benchmark indices over one-, three-, and five-year investment horizons. In this scorecard, we evaluated returns of more than 620 Australian equity funds (large-, mid-, and small-cap, and A-REIT), 280 international equity funds, and 70 Australian bond funds.

There is no consistent trend in the yearly active versus index figures, but we have consistently observed that the majority of Australian active funds in most categories fail to beat the comparable benchmark indices over three- and five- year horizons. In 2014, the majority of funds in all categories, except Australian small-cap funds, underperformed their respective index benchmarks over the one-, three-, and five-year periods. Australian A-REIT and Australian bond funds had the worst relative performances, with more than 90% of funds underperforming the S&P/ASX 200 A-REIT and the S&P/ASX Australian Fixed Interest Index.

READ FILL SPIVA REPORT