If there is ever a financial research piece that active managers would love to banish to the deep depths of hell, it would be the SPIVA Scorecard.

SPIVA stands for S&P Indices Versus Active and the SPIVA Scorecard is a research paper published by S&P DJI that compares the performance of actively managed funds against their appropriate benchmarks. The results are not exactly rainbows and sunshine for the active fund houses. Pretty much a train wreck.

The ultimate objective of an active fund is to outperform its benchmark aka generating alpha.

Key takeaways from end-2018 SPIVA report 

For the uninitiated, note that lagged means underperformed. 

United States

Equity Over a 15-year horizon, 88.97% of domestic funds lagged the associated benchmark 91.62% of large-cap funds lagged the associated benchmark 92.71% of mid-cap funds lagged the associated benchmark 96.73% of small-cap funds lagged the associated benchmark One shining spot Over one year ending...