Active Management Interest Rises

Franklin Templeton’s March asset tally showed investors are still putting fresh money into active strategies even as markets turned against them. (franklinresources.com) Franklin Resources said preliminary assets under management were $1.68 trillion on March 31, 2026, down from $1.74 trillion at the end of February because markets fell. It still reported $5 billion of long-term net inflows in March, or $6 billion excluding $1 billion of outflows at Western Asset Management. (franklinresources.com) A month earlier, Franklin had reported $1.74 trillion in February assets under management, up from $1.71 trillion in January, with about $10 billion of long-term net inflows. Excluding Western Asset Management, February long-term net inflows were about $11 billion. (franklinresources.com) Active management means paying a portfolio manager to pick securities instead of simply tracking an index. Morningstar said just 21% of active funds both survived and beat their average indexed peer over the decade through 2025, which helps explain why any turn in flows draws attention. (morningstar.com) Big firms are also telling clients that broad market indexes have become more concentrated and harder to treat as neutral bets. BlackRock’s 2026 outlook said a few “mega forces” are driving markets and warned that allocations made in the name of diversification can amount to large active bets. (blackrock.com) That message has shown up in portfolio guidance as well. BlackRock said in its second-quarter 2026 equity outlook that the market had become “ultra-concentrated” and described positioning as crowded among momentum-chasing investors, while saying signs of a broader market expansion were emerging. (blackrock.com) The product push is moving beyond stock-picking funds into strategies that require more manager discretion. Franklin Templeton said on March 12 that it expanded its Retirement Advantage target-date lineup with Retirement Advantage Plus funds that add private markets exposure for retirement savers. (franklintempleton.com) Firms are also still spending on distribution, the sales network that gets products in front of advisers and wealth clients. Franklin Templeton launched an “Intelligence Hub” distribution platform with Microsoft on January 29, 2026, and said the system was built to deliver more personalized client engagement at scale. (franklintempleton.com) Hiring has followed the same pattern in private markets and wealth channels. Franklin Templeton said in January that it hired Kayode Adedoyin to strengthen its Europe, Middle East and Africa private-markets wealth team, and in February it said its Franklin Lexington private-equity secondaries strategy had topped $3.5 billion in assets within its first year. (franklintempleton.com, franklintempleton.com) The shift is not a clean break with passive investing, and the long record still favors low-cost index funds in many categories. But March’s Franklin numbers, combined with firms’ push into selective, less index-like products, show asset managers are betting that more clients want judgment again. (morningstar.com, franklinresources.com, blackrock.com)