Eponymous Hedge Funds

Abstract

Using a relatively common phenomenon of eponymy in the hedge fund industry where funds are named after their founder-managers, we examine if eponymy is associated with skilled managers signaling their ability. Our results suggest that eponymous fund managers are neither necessarily skilled nor outperform their non-eponymous peers. In contrast, eponymous funds take higher risk which lead them to have lower Sharpe ratios and information ratios, hence worse risk-adjusted performance. Moreover, we do not find any evidence of an increase in reputational costs and benefits associated with eponymy. Fund investors neither reward nor punish eponymous managers for good and bad performance, respectively, relative to their non-eponymous peers. Overall, these results fail to support a signaling-based explanation of eponymy and highlight the need for exploring other rationales behind the eponymy decision of hedge fund managers.