Martijn Cremers Unveils ActiveShare.info Fund Website 2.0

SOUTH BEND, Ind., Sept. 15, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Martijn Cremers, Martin J. Gillen Dean and Bernard J. Hank Professor of Finance of the Mendoza College of Business at The University of Notre Dame, today unveiled new features of his ActiveShare.info site, a free online resource to evaluate actively managed mutual funds.

Based on years of extensive academic research by Cremers and his co-authors, the site contains data from nearly 1500 U.S. equity funds. Cremers' work introduced the Active Share concept over a decade ago, and identified a set of characteristics historically associated with active management performance, such as skill, conviction, opportunity, patience and reasonable expenses.

In addition to illuminating how active a fund is, the site also helps users answer questions such as:

• Is the fund's benchmark relevant to how it is invested?
• Is the fund delivering one's preferred exposure to various criteria? For example, what percentage of the fund is invested in benchmark securities; in large, medium or small-sized companies; or in U.S. stocks?
• Does the manager evidence conviction by limiting the number of holdings?
• Has the fund reflected patience in stock holding periods?
• How much am I paying for the degree of activeness the fund has delivered?

"ActiveShare.info is designed to help advisors and investors identify active strategies with specific characteristics informed by my academic research," said Cremers. "The latest enhancements go beyond answering the question: 'Are the active funds I'm using truly active'?"

"As an advocate of distinctively active strategies and supporter of Professor Cremers' efforts to enlighten investors regarding active management, we recognize the importance of understanding what you own when it comes to active management," said Tim Paulin, senior vice president of Touchstone Investments. "With Professor Cremers' latest research and updates to ActiveShare.info, mutual fund investors can access unique lenses to differentiate active strategies."

ActiveShare.info continues to deliver one of the few resources available to investors to discover a fund's Active Share.  In addition to new data, the site's enhancements introduce options for selecting funds based on various criteria, printing, comparing and data exporting.  For those seeking more information on Cremers' academic research, About ActiveShare.info includes abstracts and links to specific published research.

The investment return and principal value of an investment in the Funds will fluctuate so that an investor's shares, when redeemed, may be worth more or less than their original cost.

Active Share measures the percentage of the Fund's holdings that differ from those of the benchmark. It is calculated by taking the sum of the absolute difference between all of the holdings and weights in the portfolio and those of the benchmark holdings and weights and dividing the result by two. Index performance is not indicative of fund performance. Investing in an index is not possible. Active Share is not a performance measurement. There are no assurances that any strategy or investment approach will meet its objectives. This information should not be considered as investment advice or a recommendation of any particular security, strategy or investment product. Past performance is not indicative of future results. 

About www.ActiveShare.info
The ActiveShare.info website is maintained and copyrighted by Martijn Cremers, Martin J. Gillen Dean and Bernard J. Hank Professor of Finance of the Mendoza College of Business at The University of Notre Dame. The content, provided for informational purposes only, is given on a best-effort basis and without charge.

About Martijn Cremers, Ph.d.
K.J. Martijn Cremers is the Martin J. Gillen Dean and the Bernard J. Hank Professor of Finance at the University of Notre Dame's Mendoza College of Business. He joined the college in 2012. Prior to that, he was a faculty member at Yale School of Management from 2002 – 2012, after obtaining his PhD in finance from the Stern School of Business at New York University. Hailing from the Netherlands, he earned his undergraduate degree in Econometrics at VU University Amsterdam.

Professor Cremers acknowledges Touchstone for its support throughout the development of and maintenance of the ActiveShare.info website. Touchstone Securities, Inc. and Martijn Cremers are independent of each other. Professor Cremers serves as an external, independent consultant for Touchstone Securities, Inc.

Media Contact: Siobhan Nolan, [email protected], 862-217-9585

SOURCE Martijn Cremers, Ph.d.