Vanguard Finds Picking Active Managers is Hard – Duh?!

Vanguard fired Mellon Capital Management.  Vanguard had previously hired Mellon to manage the Vanguard Growth and Income Fund(VQNPX).  VQNPX is a large cap blend mutual fund whose stated goal is to beat the S&P 500 Index.  Mellon didn’t get the job done so Vanguard has hired two new managers to try to beat the S&P 500 Index. 

The fact that Vanguard even attempts to have actively managed funds perplexes me since the Vanguard Group was built on the theory that active managers won’t beat index funds over the long-term.  The performance of VQNPX below once again proves this:

VQNPX                      S&P 500

3-year             -0.6%                          +1.2%

5-year             -2.6%                          -1.2%

10-year           +2.2%                         +2.8%

I love Vanguard, but this makes no sense to me. Personally, I think the VQNPX investors would have been better served if Vanguard had merged the fund into the Vanguard 500 Index Fund (VFINX) – but time will tell.