Picking the right fund is only part of the challenge for investors; timing those decisions can be just as difficult. Funds that attract strong inflows after a good run can struggle to repeat that performance, while those sold after a period of weakness can rebound sharply, leaving investors on the sidelines.
Trustnet’s analysis of the most bought and sold active funds of 2024 shows how some popular funds went on to deliver, but others lagged, while several strategies that investors abandoned staged strong recoveries in 2025.
The findings highlight the risk of being swayed by recent performance and the potential cost of losing patience without a clear long-term strategy.
IA Global
The most purchased active global fund in 2024 was Royal London Global Equity Diversified, which had risen 12.5% by the end of 2025. This was a second-quartile result in the IA Global peer group, although it still narrowly underperformed the MSCI World (up 12.8%), just like it did in August, at the time of our last review.
Investors who put money into the Vanguard LifeStrategy 100% Equity fund in 2024 (an actively managed allocation of a passive portfolio) would have been rewarded with a first-quartile return of 16% last year. This performance contribute to it reaching £11bn in assets under management, up from £8.5bn in February.
On the sell side, Morgan Stanley Global Brands had £200m withdrawn in 2024 and it continued to underperform last year, sliding 6.2%. Meanwhile, investors continued to sell the giant Fundsmith Equity, which rose by just 0.8% in 2025 – a slight recovery compared to August, but still in the bottom quartile.
Investors also may have sold some funds too early. For example, people who pulled money from Jupiter Global Value Equity (£380m outflows) and Fidelity Global Special Situations (£357m outflows) would have missed out on a 22.2% and 19.1% surge, respectively.
IA UK All Companies
UK equities posted a strong rally last year, with the FTSE All Share up 24% and the average UK All Companies fund up around 15.4%, as investors began to take more notice of the UK market.
This contributed to strong performance from many of the most bought and sold funds of 2024, with the three most purchased active funds (HL Multi Manager UK Growth, Invesco UK Opportunities and Artemis UK Select) all outperforming the sector.
Artemis UK Select, managed by FE fundinfo Alpha Manager Ed Legget and Ambrose Faulks, was the big winner of the shortlist with a 28.3% total return, the eighth-best performance in the peer group.
Liontrust Special Situations and Lindsell Train UK Equity, which shed more than £1bn in 2024, failed to turn around performance in 2025. The Liontrust strategy fell by 3.8%, while Lindsell Train fell by 7.2%, the only funds on the UK shortlist to make a loss.
But investors did not always get it right. For example, they shunned Invesco UK Equity High Income (£272m outflows in 2024), but it posted a 26.7% total return, one of the best results in the sector.
Managed by Ciaran Mallon and James Goldstone, the portfolio targets a yield higher than the FTSE All-Share, favouring undervalued companies with strong cashflow generation and fundamentals.
IA North America
Shifting focus to the North American sector, investors had a much worse record, with many of their favoured funds underperforming while some they shunned rallied.
Three of 2024’s most popular active funds (Premier Miton US Opportunities, abrdn American Equity and MGTS AFH DA North American Equity) underperformed the IA North America sector, up 7%.
While Aberdeen and MGTS were in the black, Premier Miton was down 11.7%, one of the worst-performing American funds last year.
However, one of the active funds favoured by investors, BNY US Equity Income, rewarded investors with a 11.3% total return. Led by John Bailer, the fund targets stocks with high dividends and durable dividend growth, which leads it to favour value stocks over higher growth companies.
By contrast, every active fund that investors shied away from in 2024 posted a positive return last year. One example is CT American, which faced outflows of £700m in 2024, but delivered a total return of 11.5%, the best result on the shortlist.
IA Europe Excluding UK
European equities had a strong 2025, with enthusiasm over German infrastructure investment and strong performance from defence stocks helping the MSCI Europe index to rise 26.1%.
In such a strong year for European equities, investors had success with some of their 2024 picks. Three active funds made the most bought list in 2024: Liontrust European Dynamic, Quilter Investors Europe Ex UK Equity and Quilter Investors Europe Ex UK Equity Income, all of which outperformed the IA Europe ex UK sector average of 22.5%.
Quilter Investors Europe ex UK Equity Income led the short list with a 36.5% total return, while its stablemate was up 25.4%. Meanwhile, Liontrust European Dynamic surged 29.3%.
Some of the funds investors opted to avoid in 2024 underperformed last year. For example, Baillie Gifford European, Premier Miton European Opportunities, CT European Select and M&G European Sustain Paris Aligned were all in the bottom quartile of the sector.
Investors still made some missteps with their picks in this sector.
For example, Invesco European Equity (UK) lost £724m in outflows in 2024 after one of the worst performances in the sector. By contrast, it was already rallying in the August study and ended the year up 30.8%, a first-quartile return.