Do Financial Experts Make Better Investment Decisions?
We provide direct evidence on the effect of financial expertise on investment outcomes by analyzing private portfolios of mutual fund managers. We find no evidence that financial experts are making better investment decisions than their less financially astute peers: they do not outperform, do not diversify their risks better, and do not exhibit lower behavioral biases. Managers do much better in stocks they share with their mutual funds; however, only about 22% of them have any mutual fund-related positions. Some managers, particularly more experienced ones, seem to be aware of the limitations to their investment skills as they increase their holdings of mutual fund related stocks following bad performance of their portfolios. Our results demonstrate that day-to-day knowledge of financial markets does not improve investment decisions.