The most renowned fixed income fund manager, Bill Gross, who runs Pimco's $240bn Total Return fund, might consider himself lucky he made what was possibly his worst investment mistake only last year - that is, later on in his career, rather than early on.

Everybody makes mistakes. But making a bad mistake in their first three years spells the end for most fund managers, who might have turned out to be good if only investors had taken a chance on them. The trouble is that investors usually won't take a chance on managers if they've made an early mistake.