Mutual fund recommendations on fund flows and returns

Abstract

Using Thailand open-end mutual fund samples from 2017 to 2019, this study examines the impact of analysts’ recommendations on mutual fund flow and return. We decide to use the analysts’ recommendation from two big management companies in Thailand who publicly released their analysts’ recommendation in weekly periods, SCBAM and KAsset. We hypothesize and find the recommendations have a significantly positive impact on mutual fund flows and found no significant impact on return. Our study further examines the risk-adjusted return and observe no significant excess return is generated from recommended mutual funds.