IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/rqfnac/v50y2018i2d10.1007_s11156-017-0633-1.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The holdings markup behavior of mutual funds: evidence from an emerging market

Author

Listed:
  • Ching-Chang Wang

    (Southern Taiwan University of Science and Technology)

  • Jerry Yu

    (University of Baltimore)

Abstract

This paper uncovers a seasonal mutual fund holdings markup pattern in Taiwan’s market. Specifically, we find that fund’s equity holdings jump up significantly at the quarter-ends and year-end while drop back immediately to the previous level in the following month. While the holdings markup pattern found in this paper may look similar to the price markup phenomenon found by Carhart et al. (J Finance 57:661–693, 2002), the mechanism used by fund managers in the performance inflation may be quite different. In specific, while Carhart et al. (J Finance 57:661–693, 2002) document that fund managers use the stocks currently held in their portfolio to mark up the fund performance, we find that fund managers in fact use both the stocks already held in their portfolio and the new stocks to mark up their holdings. Furthermore, Carhart et al. (J Finance 57:661–693, 2002) do not explicitly examine if there exists a holdings markup in addition to the price markup. In this study, we fill this gap by directly exploring the holdings markup behavior by the fund managers. We also identify the specific stock characteristics that fund managers prefer in their holdings markup. In specific, fund managers prefer to trade growth stocks, stocks with larger market capitalization, higher institutional ownership, higher quality of earnings, and stocks in the high-tech industry, to inflate the fund performance. We also find that fund managers tend to avoid stocks that are herded by other funds.

Suggested Citation

  • Ching-Chang Wang & Jerry Yu, 2018. "The holdings markup behavior of mutual funds: evidence from an emerging market," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 50(2), pages 393-414, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:rqfnac:v:50:y:2018:i:2:d:10.1007_s11156-017-0633-1
    DOI: 10.1007/s11156-017-0633-1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11156-017-0633-1
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11156-017-0633-1?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ippolito, Richard A, 1992. "Consumer Reaction to Measures of Poor Quality: Evidence from the Mutual Fund Industry," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 35(1), pages 45-70, April.
    2. Mark M. Carhart & Ron Kaniel & David K. Musto & Adam V. Reed, 2002. "Leaning for the Tape: Evidence of Gaming Behavior in Equity Mutual Funds," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(2), pages 661-693, April.
    3. Athanasios Orphanides, "undated". "Compensation Incentives and Risk Taking Behavior: Evidence from Mutual Funds," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 1996-21, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.), revised 10 Dec 2019.
    4. Bhargava, Rahul & Gallo, John G & Swanson, Peggy E, 2001. "The Performance, Asset Allocation, and Investment Style of International Equity Managers," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 17(4), pages 377-395, December.
    5. repec:bla:jfinan:v:53:y:1998:i:5:p:1589-1622 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Russ Wermers, 1999. "Mutual Fund Herding and the Impact on Stock Prices," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 54(2), pages 581-622, April.
    7. Mark Grinblatt & Sheridan Titman, 1989. "Adverse Risk Incentives and the Design of Performance-Based Contracts," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 35(7), pages 807-822, July.
    8. David K. Musto, 1999. "Investment Decisions Depend on Portfolio Disclosures," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 54(3), pages 935-952, June.
    9. Grinblatt, Mark & Titman, Sheridan & Wermers, Russ, 1995. "Momentum Investment Strategies, Portfolio Performance, and Herding: A Study of Mutual Fund Behavior," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(5), pages 1088-1105, December.
    10. Keim, Donald B., 1983. "Size-related anomalies and stock return seasonality : Further empirical evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 13-32, June.
    11. Falkenstein, Eric G, 1996. "Preferences for Stock Characteristics as Revealed by Mutual Fund Portfolio Holdings," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(1), pages 111-135, March.
    12. Susan I. Cohen & Laura T. Starks, 1988. "Estimation Risk and Incentive Contracts for Portfolio Managers," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 34(9), pages 1067-1079, September.
    13. Gang Hu & R. David McLean & Jeffrey Pontiff & Qinghai Wang, 2014. "The Year-End Trading Activities of Institutional Investors: Evidence from Daily Trades," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(5), pages 1593-1614.
    14. Sugato Bhattacharyya & Vikram Nanda, 2013. "Portfolio Pumping, Trading Activity and Fund Performance," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 17(3), pages 885-919.
    15. Starks, Laura T., 1987. "Performance Incentive Fees: An Agency Theoretic Approach," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 22(1), pages 17-32, March.
    16. Brown, Keith C & Harlow, W V & Starks, Laura T, 1996. "Of Tournaments and Temptations: An Analysis of Managerial Incentives in the Mutual Fund Industry," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(1), pages 85-110, March.
    17. Chan, Louis K C & Jegadeesh, Narasimhan & Lakonishok, Josef, 1996. "Momentum Strategies," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(5), pages 1681-1713, December.
    18. Jegadeesh, Narasimhan & Titman, Sheridan, 1993. "Returns to Buying Winners and Selling Losers: Implications for Stock Market Efficiency," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(1), pages 65-91, March.
    19. Golec, Joseph H., 1992. "Empirical Tests of a Principal-Agent Model of the Investor-Investment Advisor Relationship," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 27(1), pages 81-95, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dimitrios Koutmos & Bochen Wu & Qi Zhang, 2020. "In search of winning mutual funds in the Chinese stock market," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 54(2), pages 589-616, February.
    2. Md. Saifur Rahman & Farihana Shahari, 2019. "Does the Financial Integration in ASEAN+3 Respond to Financial Cooperation Agreement and Influence the Real Sectors?," Review of Pacific Basin Financial Markets and Policies (RPBFMP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 22(01), pages 1-18, March.
    3. Li Xian Liu & Fuming Jiang & Jizhong Li & Omar Al Farooque, 2021. "Antecedents of Equity Fund Performance: A Contingency Perspective," Review of Pacific Basin Financial Markets and Policies (RPBFMP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 24(01), pages 1-40, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Agarwal, Vikas & Gay, Gerald D. & Ling, Leng, 2014. "Window dressing in mutual funds," CFR Working Papers 11-07 [rev.3], University of Cologne, Centre for Financial Research (CFR).
    2. Éric Jondeau, 2004. "Gestion institutionnelle et volatilité des marchés financiers," Revue d'Économie Financière, Programme National Persée, vol. 74(1), pages 157-175.
    3. Agarwal, Vikas & Gay, Gerald D. & Ling, Leng, 2013. "Window dressing in mutual funds," CFR Working Papers 11-07 [rev.2], University of Cologne, Centre for Financial Research (CFR).
    4. Agarwal, Vikas & Gay, Gerald D. & Ling, Leng, 2012. "Performance inconsistency in mutual funds: An investigation of window-dressing behavior," CFR Working Papers 11-07 [rev.], University of Cologne, Centre for Financial Research (CFR).
    5. Nerissa C. Brown & Kelsey D. Wei & Russ Wermers, 2014. "Analyst Recommendations, Mutual Fund Herding, and Overreaction in Stock Prices," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(1), pages 1-20, January.
    6. Raphaëlle Bellando, 2008. "Le conflit d'agence dans la gestion déléguée de portefeuille : une revue de littérature," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 118(3), pages 317-339.
    7. Bank for International Settlements, 2003. "Incentive structures in institutional asset management and their implications for financial markets," CGFS Papers, Bank for International Settlements, number 21, december.
    8. Casavecchia, Lorenzo, 2016. "Fund managers' herding and the sensitivity of fund flows to past performance," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 205-221.
    9. Mark M. Carhart & Ron Kaniel & David K. Musto & Adam V. Reed, 2002. "Leaning for the Tape: Evidence of Gaming Behavior in Equity Mutual Funds," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(2), pages 661-693, April.
    10. Jun, Xiao & Li, Mingsheng & Yugang, Chen, 2017. "Catering to behavioral demand for dividends and its potential agency issue," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 46(PB), pages 269-291.
    11. Lukas Menkhoff, 2002. "Institutional Investors: The External Costs of a Successful Innovation," Journal of Economic Issues, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(4), pages 907-933, December.
    12. Eichberger, Jurgen & Grant, Simon & King, Stephen P., 1999. "On relative performance contracts and fund manager's incentives," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 135-161, January.
    13. Agarwal, Vikas & Gay, Gerald D. & Ling, Leng, 2011. "Window dressing in mutual funds," CFR Working Papers 11-07, University of Cologne, Centre for Financial Research (CFR).
    14. Daniel, Kent & Hirshleifer, David & Teoh, Siew Hong, 2002. "Investor psychology in capital markets: evidence and policy implications," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(1), pages 139-209, January.
    15. Cohen, Randolph B. & Gompers, Paul A. & Vuolteenaho, Tuomo, 2002. "Who underreacts to cash-flow news? evidence from trading between individuals and institutions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2-3), pages 409-462.
    16. Ferson, Wayne E., 2013. "Investment Performance: A Review and Synthesis," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 969-1010, Elsevier.
    17. Edelen, Roger M. & Ince, Ozgur S. & Kadlec, Gregory B., 2016. "Institutional investors and stock return anomalies," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 119(3), pages 472-488.
    18. Guo, Xu & Gu, Chen & Zebedee, Allan A. & Chiu, Li-ting, 2024. "The effect of institutional herding on stock prices: The differentiating role of credit ratings," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 163(C).
    19. Karen L. Benson & David R. Gallagher & Patrick Teodorowski, 2007. "Momentum investing and the asset allocation decision," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 47(4), pages 571-598, December.
    20. Françoise Le Quéré, 2010. "L’habillage de portefeuille par les gérants de fonds dans la littérature : incitations, effets et risques," Revue d'Économie Financière, Programme National Persée, vol. 97(2), pages 275-293.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Mutual funds; Holdings markup; Price markup; Return seasonality;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G20 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - General
    • G23 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Non-bank Financial Institutions; Financial Instruments; Institutional Investors

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:rqfnac:v:50:y:2018:i:2:d:10.1007_s11156-017-0633-1. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.