Fund performance

If clients “looked just three months ago, these numbers would be glaringly different,” an expert says.

The firm has struggled to make money this year amid the market volatility sparked by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The funds have recorded $248 billion in net inflows in 2020, up about 5% from this time last year.

The alternative asset manager surpassed its previous peak from the fourth quarter of 2017.

The 20 top-performers have generated gains well over 50% in the first seven months of the year.

A combination of GLD’s higher fees and an almost relentless demand for the yellow metal have catapulted it from fourth on the revenue leader board in 2017.

Despite growing to about $1.1 trillion in AUM, senior executives made a series of bets to keep pace in a changing industry that have yet to pay off.

An iShares ETF investing in companies it says has “positive environmental, social and governance characteristics” has more than tripled gains of the S&P 500.

Despite besting the broader market over the long-term, those at the top have underperformed in the first half of 2020.

“The primary drawback of fewer hedge fund filings is lack of clarity around crowding risk,” strategists from the firm write.

“No one could have envisioned what this virus was going to do to the commercial real estate space,” an expert says.

The $217 billion alternative asset manager reported its biggest loss as a public company in the first quarter.

Investors may be put off by the costs associated with these funds, which had an average expense ratio of more than triple their peers.

Mass exodus from the market has forced managers to dump securities to raise cash, sending prices tumbling the most in at least four decades.

The leaders raked in a combined $949 billion over the past decade.

A “distribution bump” from the commission-free trading trend that took hold late last year may be behind the surge, analysts say.

The manager is still recovering from losses that started in 2015, when his main fund fell 20%, and deepened with a record 34% decline three years later.

The firm had a target of joining the "$1 trillion club." Instead, clients withdrew more than $157 billion from its 2017 merger to the end of last year.

The funds had posted gains over the past decade, but have suffered losses amid this year's coronavirus-driven volatility.

Almost all of the decline reflects performance-related losses rather than client withdrawals, according to a person familiar with the matter.