We don’t need to dwell on Buxton’s track record (annualised return on his UK Alpha Plus fund of 13.7 percent over 10 years), but combined with Mark Lyttleton's departure from BlackRock - his own star rather faded of late - I am drawn to ponder the funds industry’s views of, and hunger for, stellar talent.

It is attractive, and reassuring even, to believe that the people running our money are blessed with some innate skill for playing the markets, but I recently had to re-consider my own views on natural talent when talking to Matthew Syed, now a journalist and author, but previously England’s number 1 table tennis player for a decade. A competitor at two Olympic Games and winner of three Commonwealth Gold medals, Syed has some experience of being praised for his apparent natural ability.

He contends that some of our most cherished notions about natural talent are misplaced. Instead he argues persuasively that practice, opportunity and belief are far more important than genetics in determining success.
In a nutshell, Syed asserts that “when you look at the science rather than our own implicit biases, you arrive at the conclusion that champions are not born, they are made.”

Rather than going through these arguments in full, which Syed does best himself in his book ‘Bounce’, I will focus on a few aspects that have direct relevance for the funds industry and the cult of the star manager.

FEEDBACK

Exposure to the right opportunities is obviously vital for an Olympic athlete or a top fund manager to succeed, but Syed’s most consistent theme is a simple one: practice.

Not hard work for building character, or for some other honourable good, but because purposeful practice is far more influential in determining an individual’s success than a reliance on genes. “Those who believe in talent tend to lose motivation. Why work hard if it is all about having the right genes?”

Commodities guru Jim Rogers’ recent comments on his own experience are interesting here. “To the extent that I had any success, it was from homework,” he said. “I was willing and able to work harder than other people, but I was also willing and able to think differently from other people.”

Of course Syed’s emphasis on practice over talent does not mean that he believes effort alone guarantees success. The right mentor – perhaps the right investment manager – to learn from is vital. Intertwined with hard work is the often discomforting task of learning from feedback.

This has the potential to be a huge issue for star managers if the culture in their company is not conducive to giving (or receiving) constructive feedback, or to “think differently from other people,” in Rogers’ words. Not having your ideas challenged by colleagues, or believing your own billboard ads, is surely a slippery slope for a star fund manager.

As Syed puts it, “For those who are already ahead of the pack, it is vital they are pushed. If they stay within their comfort zone, they will not learn.”

The perils of lacking feedback, of not continuing to learn, can be seen in a striking example that Syed offers of research by Jeffrey Butterworth in 1960. This examined the ability of doctors to make diagnoses using heart sounds and murmurs over time. He found that while accuracy increases with experience as a person progresses from student to certified cardiologist, he also found that accuracy actually diminishes over time for doctors in general practice.

The explanation for this apparently surprising finding? GPs encounter cardiac cases relatively infrequently, and they have relatively limited feedback on which to base their judgments and diagnoses. How to improve? Well, after short, targeted practice, “their diagnostic accuracy soared,” says Syed.

This suggests a parallel with fund managers diagnosing, and dealing with, financial crises - even rarer than heart complaints, but also with devastating consequences. In turn it would be interesting to delve into the planning fund managers undertake for dealing with future crises of different shapes and sizes.

There is some evidence that fund managers have already learned to use their experience effectively. Analysing mutual funds registered for sale in the UK in preparation for this year’s Lipper Fund Awards, we compared winning funds against their peers and found that the average tenure of the winning fund managers is longer than the rest. From this initial examination the evidence was pretty consistent, suggesting that the fund management community may actually be a good example of practice in action – and of seeing experience make its mark.

BELIEF

Building success over the long term brings us to another aspect to consider, and something someone like Jim Rogers has in abundance: belief. Any individual has to be motivated enough by their profession to persevere with the hard work needed to succeed.

There are many extraordinary examples of the scale of hard work undertaken from an early age. Mozart had clocked up 3,500 hours of music practice before his sixth birthday, according to Michael Howe (‘Genius Explained’, 1999), while Geoff Colvin (‘Talent is Overrated’, 2008) estimates that Japanese ice skater Shizuka Arakawa fell over 20,000 times while practising her skating (starting at the age of five), but ultimately won an Olympic gold medal in 2006.

As Syed puts it, “When you appreciate that it has taken many thousands of baby steps by world-class performers to get to the top, their skills do not seem quite so mystical after all.”

This highlights the need for perseverance, underpinned by a real belief in what one is practising and trying to achieve. As the statistics above illustrate, the sheer volume of work involved in reaching the highest levels of performance is difficult for outsiders to comprehend.

But this also hints at a classic conundrum for the fund management industry. Mutual funds are designed as long-term investments, but investors often buy and sell them far quicker if they do not think returns have been good enough over shorter periods. “Baby steps” can be too small or too slow for many investors.

To a certain extent this simply underlines some of the pressures that asset managers have to deal with. But taking this aspect together with the others from Syed, one finds a well-rounded case for fund businesses to build structures which give opportunities to those willing to work hard, provide constructive feedback throughout the organisation, and create a company culture that really motivates people.

Before ending, the number cruncher in me cannot help but ask Syed about those who practised hard but failed. Is there a survivorship bias in the statistical evidence?

“I am glad to say that I found no evidence of this," he says. "With deliberate and purposeful practice, we are all transformed with dramatic implications.”

Encouragement then even for those less-than-starry fund managers currently languishing at the bottom of the league tables.

((This is the third in an occasional series of interviews offering alternative insights for the fund management industry, which have also looked at betting on horses and charitable donations. ))

First up we had three of our largest unions teaming up behind a set of governance guidelines which they will wave noisily in the air at AGMs, but more significantly, Tuesday morning saw the first steps towards building the kind of collaborative architecture for investors envisioned by the Kay Review.

As first steps go, it's fairly tentative (as was the first, first step). In a sparse announcement, the Association of British Insurers, the National Association of Pension Funds and Investment Management Association said they will set up a working group to report back on how collective engagement "might be enhanced to make a positive difference.” It is a response to Economist John Kay's government-backed report from last July, which argued funds could improve returns to savers by presenting a united front to company boards.

We've looked before at how difficult this will be given the diversity of outlook and motivation among investors. Significantly, Tuesday's statement makes explicit reference to drawing in "overseas investors" who at the last count were heading towards ownership of half the UK stock market, though quite how that might work is hard to see. IMA chief executive Daniel Godfrey told Reuters he has already spent some time sounding out some of those foreign share owners, and encountered a "range of views and a range of enthusiasms." The next step, he says, is to work out whether there's a way to navigate past the obstacles.

The members of the working group tasked with this will be named by the end of next month and will be expected to deliver an answer in the autumn. The hope will be that they can avoid some of the issues which have hampered the ABI, NAPF and IMA's last effort to join forces.

The IIC (Institutional Investor Committee) was -- or in theory 'is' (it is still there in an odd kind of zombie state) -- an initiative to corral institutional investors into a meaningful whole in the wake of the financial crisis. Its example will act as a warning to the working group trying to come up with an alternative.

The IIC's first action seemed oddly to sidestep the flaws most visible during the crisis, setting up a committee to investigate rights issue fees which arrived at the not unexpected conclusion that they were... drumroll.... too high! Since then it has pretty much disappeared from the radar, knocking out ho-hum press releases at the rate of three a year and singularly failing to latch on to that new vigour among investors which inspired starry headlines during last year's so-called 'shareholder spring'.

The latest word is that IIC will continue to exist, even though its stated remit chimes harmoniously with this latest project, and with the conclusions of the Kay Review. It is probably fair to note that it has 'focused' on broad policy issues rather than on the nuts and bolts of browbeating chief executives or gathering forces to vote down a pay deal, but it also cannot be accused of leading the agenda on issues where is has got involved.

In short, it seems to lack ambition as much it lacks firepower, and this new initiative will have to make sure it falls at neither hurdle. Godfrey tells us he is "determined we should do something where we are able to follow through"; his blog post today hints at a nimble structure which is nevertheless able to do the "heavy lifting" in individual cases. Perhaps the crucial moment will come if it does succeed in gathering some support from among the giant sovereign funds and U.S. investment houses as well as investors whose outlook is more short-term. Progress convincing these players to join the game will mean there is half a chance that we might see a new Big Beast to shake-up British boardrooms.

Worldwide mutual fund flows numbers for February showed an overall move into equity funds of more than $22 billion, and a net flow to bond funds of about half that. Over 3 months it's a similar story, with a net inflow to equities of about $84 billion while bond funds sit close behind at about $75 billion. Little wonder then that there is some evidence at least of movements out of money market funds.

In fact, maybe HSBC called it about right last week. In a note, their cross-asset strategists reckoned a pick-up in economic growth might support a 'minor' cyclical rotation into equities from bonds, but a longer-term structural shift between the two asset classes as part of a 'Great Rotation' was less likely.

You can play around with the full interactive graphic by clicking on the image below. If you have any problems, the link is here: http://r.reuters.com/ryk34t

There are a few caveats to note: these data don't include private institutional mandates and are an extrapolation from publicly-available performance and assets-under-management figures. Also, for ease of use, it's all in dollars; do your own maths as you go.

There are some other useful nuggets to pull from the data, not least the total failure to sustain the surge in U.S. equity inflows that hit the headlines in January. The three month numbers to end-Feb show net outflows to funds in Lipper's U.S. equity category at more than $18 billion, while Global emerging markets funds boast the top net inflow, at close to $30 billion.

Looking at bond funds in February alone, the stand out stat looks like a move away from corporates. Euro-denominated corporate debt funds showed the largest net outflow for the month at $1.7 billion (it's 1.4 billion in euros), but GBP corporates and global corporates are also in the top 10.

COMPETITION TIME: One last intriguing thing to note: Only four of Lipper's equity sectors show a negative return over the three months to end-Feb. If you can guess all of them before opening up the interactive graphic, award yourself £10, redeemable at all branches of Jessops.

So far the impact of the financial crisis has not hit the wealthy as hard as many protesters would like. Even French millionaires have a found an escape from the modern-day guillotine that is a 75 percent tax rate, in the shape of Russian president Vladimir Putin.

But what about the level of charges that high net worth individuals have to pay for investing in hedge funds? Even though there has been some downward pressure on the annual management fees charged, the most common model remains “2 and 20” -- 2 percent of the fund’s assets and 20 percent of its performance every year.

In real terms, for a 50 million pound hedge fund that returned 8 percent this could mean an annual fee of 1.8 million pound. The equivalent mutual fund in the UK would typically charge less than half this amount. Perhaps this should be a reason to consider switching to a different fund manager. But European investors have traditionally been more persuaded by the argument that you have to “pay more to get more” than by the notion that a fund manager should minimize costs in order to maximise returns. (Having said this, institutional investors are clearly more savvy when it comes to fees; it helps that they have the clout, through the volume of investable assets, to negotiate).

Yet perhaps the winds of change are blowing. Cantab Capital Partners has launched its Core Macro Fund with a “1/2 and 10” fee structure. The management fee of 0.5 percent (which does not cover back office costs - hedge funds do not typically quote total expense ratios) applies to those investing at least $50 million. Those investing less money will pay more, but still enjoy the 10 percent performance fee. It is hard to argue with Cantab Capital Partners’s assertion that this is “exceptionally low cost” for institutional investors, not least when considering that the fund has daily liquidity and there are neither redemption penalties nor gating clauses. But for performance fee savvy investors, the fact that there is no hurdle rate cannot be ignored. And for those looking for signs of a revolution, Cantab’s other funds have not changed their fees to move in line with the new fund.

There are others that have grappled with the issue of fairness in performance fees, either through the way the fund itself is structured, as with Optcapital, or Aquamarine Capital’s variation on the level of the performance fee. The Aquamarine Fund charges either “1 and 20” or “0 and 25” depending on the share class, with the performance fees subject to 4 percent and 6 percent hurdle rates respectively.

Products with a “no win, no fee” structure are not unique to the hedge fund arena, with mutual funds from the likes of Vinculum entering the fray last year and Bedlam manning the barricades ten years earlier. The Bullhound technology fund also tried this back in 2000 and subsequently closed. Of course mutual funds are also open to the ‘hoi polloi’ who, as we all know, are already revolting, not least in Greece.

PERFORMANCE FEES

There are some signs that millionaires are taking steps to move away from hedge funds. Reuters recently reported that Deutsche Bank's Alternative Investment Survey showed that family offices and high net worth investors now account for just 4 percent of industry assets, down from 18 percent in 2002.
Having said this, this looks to be a move in search of higher returns, rather than away from higher fees.

In the UK, the blow being struck against high performance fees has come from a more surprising quarter. Here Independent Financial Advisers (IFAs) are those with both the clout and, it seems, the inclination to discourage use of such fees among mutual funds. Their use is most common among funds seeking absolute returns in all market conditions. Many of their strategies mimic traditional hedge fund strategies, and many of them have mimicked hedge fund fees too.

IFAs, most notably Hargreaves Lansdown, have been publicly sceptical of performance fee structures and it looks as though asset managers in the UK have responded. Since the fee structure was first allowed for open-ended funds in 2004, the number of funds being launched with the fee rose to a peak in 2006, but has since declined to the point where only two funds with this structure were launched last year.

Lest we lose sight of the millionaires, it is worth casting an eye to Switzerland, where the Swiss Federal Supreme Court has apparently taken up the mantle of the 1789 Assemblée Nationale and stated that retrocessions, or trail commission, received by banks for asset management services belong to the client.

Although the full implications of this move are still being considered, Ernst & Young have helpfully carried out a survey where respondents generally believe that the Court’s move will improve transparency in the industry, but still the price of bank services (including private banks) are not expected to fall.  The experience in Switzerland so far sounds a lot like that in the UK with the Retail Distribution Review (RDR), which was originally aimed squarely at the man in the street. Perhaps millionaires and the downtrodden retail investor do indeed have common cause.

What that means is foreign investors buying Russian domestic rouble bonds will be able to process them through Belgian clearing house Euroclear, which transfers securities from the seller's securities account to the securities account of the buyer, while transferring cash from the account of the buyer to the account of the seller. Euroclear's links with correspondent banks in more than 40 countries means buying Russian bonds suddenly becomes easier.And safer too in theory because the title to the security receives asset protection under Belgian law. That should bring a massive torrent of cash into the OFZs, as Russian rouble government bonds are known.

In a wide-ranging note entitled "License to Clear" sent yesterday, Barclays reckons previous predictions of some $20 billion in inflows from overseas to OFZ could be understated -- it now estimates that $25 to $40 billion could flow into Russian OFZs during 2013-2o14. Around $9 billion already came last year ahead of the actual move, Barclays analysts say, but more conservative asset managers will have waited for the Euroclear signal before actually committing cash.

Foreigners'  increased interest will have several consequences.  Their share of Russian local bond markets, currently only 14 percent, should go up. The inflows are also likely to significantly drive down yields, cutting borrowing costs for the sovereign, and ultimately corporates. Already, falling OFZ yields have been driving local bank investment out of that market and into corporate bonds (Barclays estimates their share of the OFZ market has dropped more than 15 percentage points since early-2011).  And the increased foreign inflows should act as a catalyst for rouble appreciation.

Each of these points in a bit more detail:

a) Foreigners' share of the Russian bond market is among the lowest of major emerging markets.  Compare that to Hungary, where non-residents own over 40 percent, or South Africa and Mexico, where foreigners' share of local paper is over 30 percent.

b) Foreign buying last year compressed Russian yields sharply, eventually pushing down 10-year yields by 130 basis points over the year as foreigners moved further along an increasingly flattening curve.  But Russian 10-year yields around 6.5 percent will remain attractive to foreigners, comparing favourably with most other emerging markets.  And at home, falling government bond yields will benefit the economy as a whole as local banks change their focus. Barclays write:

(Falling yield) provides cushion to the (finance ministry) which plans to borrow 1.2 trillion roubles internally, versus 0.9 trillion last year. This also accommodates the reallocation of Russian banks’ portfolios  from OFZ into retail lending and corporate and municipal bonds  driven by higher returns.

c) Barclays advises clients to buy 10-year OFZs in anticipation of further gains, and suggests doing this on an unhedged basis to take advantage of potential rouble appreciation.  While the rouble has outperformed other emerging currencies in the past year, Barclays expects the outperformance to continue.

January was a month of record issuance for corporates, yielding $51 billion or more than double last January's levels and after sales of $329 billion in the whole of 2012. (Some of this buoyancy is down to Asian firms rushing to get their fundraising done before the Chinese New Year starts this weekend). What's more, despite all the new issuance, spreads on JPMorgan's CEMBI corporate bond index tightened 21 basis points over Treasuries.

JPM say in a note today that assets benchmarked to the CEMBI have crossed $50.6 billion, having risen 60 percent year-over-year.  Interest in corporates is strong also among investors who don't usually focus on this sector, the bank says, citing the results of its monthly client survey. One such example is asset manager Schroders. Skeptical a couple of years ago about the risk-reward trade-off in emerging debt, Schroders said last month it was seeing more opportunities in emerging corporates, noting:

Stronger economic growth in developed markets and because of surging new issue volumes which permit investment in a greater variety of companies and countries.

There could be headwinds however. One could be a rise in Treasury yields that would make higher-risk assets less attractive. Corporate bonds are less well cushioned than in the past and many see valuations as looking a tad rich after last year's 150 bps  spread compression on the CEMBI. Certainly, hardly anyone expects the kind of double-digit yields that came through in 2012.

But many reckon the risks from U.S. Treasuries will be far greater for U.S. high yield and emerging sovereign debt. According to Mike Conelius,  who runs an EM bond fund at T.Rowe Price:

(EM corporate) yields generally exceed those of corporate bonds in the United States, and companies in many cases are conservatively leveraged and managed with large cash reserves and little debt on their balance sheets. Yet they have a greater tailwind for growth, and the asset class is benefiting from investors’ search for yield.

Fans of the sector will point out that the CEMBI  yield on average is still 320 basis points over Treasuries, while the EMBI Global sovereign bond index trades around 275 bps  -- in these yield-scarce days that 45 bps represents no mean pick-up.

The answer? Cattle, bicycles, radios, founder of Zimbabwean telecoms company Econet Wireless Strive Masiyiwa told an Economist conference on Africa this afternoon. Masiyiwa said he researched ownership of these status items to assess the five-year demand for mobile phones in Botswana when he successfully bid for a mobile phone contract from Botswana's government.

His forecasts, more optimistic than the other bidding operators', still turned out to undershoot by hundreds of thousands, Masiyiwa said, adding that official data from organisations such as the World Bank also tend to underestimate Africa's growth potential.

 We need to have the confidence to review some of this (official) data ourselves, particularly when it doesn’t make much sense.

Nick Blazquez, President for Africa for drinks company Diageo, told Reuters that Africans were drinking everything from  cheap keg beer to Johnnie Walker King George V whisky at $400 a bottle.

"We are seeing premiumisation at all price points," Blazquez said, as consumers move from illicit concoctions to the well-known brands at one end of the market, and are trying the top-brand spirits at the other end.

Blazquez said 10 countries in Africa accounted for 80 percent of the profitable market in both beer and spirits and Diageo has a presence in most of them.

So where is there room for growth? Blazquez said Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo were countries where "we would like to get more participation".

Just to cool the enthusiasm a little, it's worth remembering that this comes after a torrid 2012.

Our graphic detailing Lipper's latest estimated net flows in and out of various fund sectors shows combined outflows from U.S. equity funds and U.S. small cap funds reached a total of more than $150 billion last year. The fourth quarter alone contributed more than $50 billion of that.

To make the point more forcefully, those 12-month net outflows from the two sectors are far in excess of the rest of the top 25 worst-hit fund sectors combined. 

So there's a fair deal of ground to catch up, and just as it makes recent inflows seem less gargantuan, that yawning gap can also be seen as succour to the bull case for equities in the U.S. and beyond (a bull case which now includes -- oxymoron ahoy -- permabears among its adherents).

You can view the full interactive graphic by clicking on the image below.

Of course, the glut of withdrawals from U.S. equity was a much touted trend; there are some less well-known nuggets among the Lipper data.

Notably, U.S. income funds took in a good chunk of the cash flooding out of their domestic peers, posting the fourth largest net inflow over the year. And just behind them, Swedish equity funds nudged into the top five, rewarded for a growth story that sharply contrasted with those of its euro zone neighbours.

There was clearly some hunting for returns further down the market scale too, with four regional small and midcap fund sectors making it into the top 25 for the year. And looking at the fourth quarter alone,  European small and midcap funds  pulled in a healthy $890 million, while another $440 million made its way to Asia Pacific smaller companies funds. There be stock pickers here; maybe the trampling of active management by the ETF behemoths isn't quite a one-way street just yet.

COMPETITION TIME*: A quick look at the performance numbers for 2012 shows that only four equity fund sectors put in a negative return over the 12 months... Reward yourself with a pat on the back and a firm handshake if you can name all of them before checking.

I've concentrated on the equity story here. You can play around with the interactive graphic to look more deeply at bond fund sector flows and performance.

For any questions on the data, you can contact me on Twitter at @reutersJoelD or via Reuters messenger.

*No actual prize available

That appetite for the sector is strong was proven by a September Eurobond from Zambia that was 15 times subscribed. Demand shows no sign of flagging despite a default in frontier peer Belize and shenanigans over the payment of Ivory Coast's missed coupons from last year. Reasons are easy to find. First, the yield. The average yield on the NEXGEM is roughly 6.5 percent compared with  just under 5 percent on the EMBIG.

Second, this is where a lot of issuance is happening as big emerging markets such as Brazil and Mexico, once prolific dollar bond issuers, sell less and less on external markets in favour of domestic debt.  Frontier markets are filling the gap. JPM says Angola, Guatemala, Mongolia and Zambia joined the NEXGEM in 2012 as they made their debut on global capital markets. Bolivia is also set for inclusion soon, taking the number of NEXGEM members to 23 by end-2012.

NEXGEM's market value also jumped in this period by 36 percent to $33.3 billion. It now represents 5.9 percent of the EMBI Global, up from 5.3 percent a year back, JP says.

The future too looks bright.

JP Morgan predicts NEXGEM credits will return 9-10 percent total next year  (it forecasts 7-8 percent for the broader EMBIG).  And there will be new entrants. JP Morgan expects new issuance of $9.3 billion next year, more than double 2012 levels. Paraguay and Tanzania could enter the index in 2013 while Nigeria, Angola, Ghana and others are expected to issue more debt.

Investors must recall however that their indiscriminate rush for these high-yield credits is translating into -- falling yields. JP Morgan reckons NEXGEM spreads over U.S. Treasuries could fall by 75 to 100 basis points next year.  Analysts at the bank write:

This will allow NEXGEM issuers to retain their ability to issue at highly competitive spreads, as was recently illustrated by Bolivia, which despite its interventionist policies in late October, managed to price a debut global bond at under a 5% yield.

Investors will no doubt be weighing up the risk-reward of holding a credit such as Bolivia at that price.

This morning, FairPensions, a British charity which aims to promote responsible investment, has dug deeper into the behaviour of major institutional investors during that supposedly febrile period, and among the nuggets it has produced is the chart below of voting on contentious pay reports at annual meetings.

There are some questions which crop up straight away. What did BlackRock and Standard Life like so much about the Barclays pay deal that no other investor could spot; why did BlackRock think Martin Sorrell's potential 500% bonus was a goer; and given that, why did almost everyone think a maximum bonus award of 923% of BP CEO Bob Dudley's salary was just dandy?

(For the record, BlackRock tells us that it does not comment on voting decisions, and notes its Barclays vote was outsourced over a potential conflict of interest linked to its 2009 acquisition of BGI. Standard Life couldn't find the right people to comment directly, but a spokeswoman noted public statements that it had been pacified by concessions made by Barclays shortly before the AGM)

In truth, and as FairPensions acknowledges, investors were picking their fights during the UK AGM season, which helps to explain some of the oddities in the above graphic. But it's fair to ask whether such inconsistencies are helpful in drawing a line under excessive pay deals or promoting the idea of investor stewardship

One of FairPensions' key gripes is that the investors keep quiet on these and other questions (see the BlackRock response above). Some seek to explain their votes against, but barely any seek to justify their votes in favour of resolutions. Whenever you prod the 'shareholder spring' it seems to crumble a little, and the name looks a bit like an insult to the popular revolts which inspired the phrase.

Catherine Howarth, chief executive of FairPensions, thinks people may have over-egged how interested shareholders are in rocking the boat. She told us:

Our research is highlighting an under-discussed problem which is that institutional shareholders actually have no appetite to take on these battles on executive pay. The government’s approach – let’s empower shareholders to take these firms on - is very naïve in the absence of other measures that actually demand investors to be accountable and use these powers in an effective manner.

Fund managers -- a handful of activists aside -- have no appetite for heroics. They are clearly eager to avoid micro-managing the companies in which they invest, and are content to show publicly their frustrations with Boards only rarely. Expecting them to act as the guardians of ethical capitalism is wrongheaded.

The FairPensions report concludes:

There remains a lack of appetite in some quarters for increased responsibilities, with asset managers and investor trade bodies often resisting attempts to enhance their oversight role... It is therefore time to revisit the assumption that achieving effective shareholder oversight is a simple matter of giving  shareholders better tools to hold company management to account.

Their solution is to head further down the chain; to you and me. Empower individual savers to call asset managers to account, says FairPensions, and you complete the circle. I would worry fund firms and Boards might consider that a nice way of sidestepping their own responsibilities. As our meagre turnout to choose Britain's first elected police commissioners showed last week, you rely on the unwashed masses at your peril.