“Avoid popularity; it has many snares, and no real benefit”, said William Penn, one of the first US real estate barons. If only investors would heed his words; over the second half of 2010, some of the least popular funds managed to outperform their more favoured peers.

According to TrimTabs, a data firm, a number of US large-cap equity managers posted returns in the top quartile for the fourth quarter of 2010, after reporting outflows of more than $1bn for the previous quarter.