As an investment advisor you are primarily responsible for 1) having a view on the markets and 2) how to position your portfolios (given their unique constraints) according to those views.  Too often more attention is paid to the vehicles used to implement those decisions. In other words, rather than spending the bulk of your time deciding how much to allocate to Equities, you spend the bulk of your time picking Equity fund managers.

The article below is a perfect example of this.  Though it is a good article, from the Financial Times Fund Management section, it should not be groundbreaking news to investment advisors. It should be met with a shrug of the shoulders.

The wrong question still has a good answer!

Too often outperforming Equity managers still cost portfolios to suffer substantial drawdowns in a bear market. Too often the best bond fund outperforms its benchmark by 300 bps annually during a market cycle that saw Equities double.  You see where this is going? Start asking the right questions:

In general, here is our view …