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November 28, 2016 at 10:01 AM
Despite the recovery of global financial markets since the crisis of 2007-2008, there has been little change in the percentage of women managing mutual funds. According to a newly released study from Morningstar on mutual funds across 56 countries, women accounted for about one in five portfolio managers in 2008, and they still do today.
“The fund industry as a whole is not becoming more gender-inclusive,” the study concludes.
That’s certainly true for the U.S., where 10% of fund managers are women – far fewer than in Singapore (30%), Portugal (28%), Spain (26%) and Hong Kong (26%).
Among the 28 biggest fund markets, the U.S. ranks among the bottom five for the percentage of female fund managers. Only Germany, Brazil, India and Poland place lower. Moreover, the percentage of female fund managers in the U.S. and Germany are lower today – 10% and 9%, respectively — than they were in 2008 — 11% and 12%, respectively.
“In most geographic regions, after controlling for all other factors, women had higher likelihoods of managing equity or allocation funds in January 2008 than they do today,” the study notes. That’s not the case with fixed income funds, where they “have made modest gains,” according to Morningstar. But “women are still far less likely to manage a fixed income fund than men, regardless of time period or country.”
The Morningstar study doesn’t examine why there are still so few female fund managers but references previous research suggesting that “the financial industry may be less tolerant of career interruptions, which are more typical for women, or may be less conducive to balancing career and family;” that “women in the financial services find a lack of support at midcareer, which may prompt them to leave the industry” before being named a portfolio manager.
Morningstar also cites research referencing “a weak talent pipeline for fund managers as measured by masters of business administration enrollment and CFA charterholders” but, according to the Morningstar study, female fund managers are more likely to be chartered financial analysts than their male counterparts.
Despite the overall underrepresentation of women in the ranks of mutual fund managers, Morningstar found that certain types of funds offer women better odds of becoming fund managers, including:
Socially Responsible Funds.
If the fund has a socially responsible investing mandate, women are 24% more likely than their male peers to manage it, but that advantage is decreasing as more men are named managers in this increasingly hot investment area, according to Morningstar.
Passive Funds and Funds of Funds
