Compulsive Gamblers

In defined contribution schemes, participants take responsibility for their investment strategy. After an initial decision, most people do little or nothing until they approach retirement, whereas some participants are active: in some cases they are sophisticated investors, in others, compulsive gamblers. We analyse compulsive traders in a UK multi-employer master trust over the period 2002-2012. We focus on those who switched assets within asset classes and between related products in the context of market volatility and identify who is prone to this behaviour, referring to socio-economic characteristics. Implications are drawn for the design of pension products and institutions.

This paper is co-authored with Maurizio Fiaschetti from the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment and Peter Tufano from the Said Business School at the University of Oxford.