Realism, skill, and incentives: Current and future trends in investment management and investment performance

Abstract

We review the recent trends in investment management and performance research and highlight the fields expected to develop further in the future. The trend to adapt the classic CAPM and factor models seems likely to continue, with the drive for realistic factors, which best proxy the drivers of investment performance, playing a key role. The search for skill, based on enhanced benchmarks, is also a developing area, with new concepts of identification and verification at the fore. The availability of more qualitative data has allowed corporate finance themes such as agency conflict and incentives to be explored. These are some of the areas where we have seen major developments in recent years and where we expect to see continuing development.