Talk to most fund managers and they are likely to tell you that they are stockpickers. What matters, they say, is not so much what is going on at a country level, or even a sector level, but how individual companies are faring.

In other words you can have dynamic, profitable companies that are thriving within ailing countries or depressed sectors. Provided you have a good stockpicker as a fund manager, he or she should be able to deliver the goods.

Does this argument hold water? Well up to a point. There’s no doubt some fund managers can buck the trend and perform much better than the region or sector in which they invest. A classic recent example is that of Philip Gibbs, who has worked wonders with his Jupiter Financial Opportunities Fund. In the past year, which has been a truly dreadful one for financial stocks, Mr Gibbs’ fund has returned more than 30 per cent.

However while financials’ spell of underperformance was dramatic, it was also comparatively short. It is much more difficult to buck a longer-term trend. Take technology funds as an example. Ten years ago they were the darlings of the investment industry and they soared upwards on a wave of enthusiasm for chip designers, mobile phone operators and internet entrepreneurs.

But how many tech funds have made money in the past ten years? The answer is: none. The four survivors from the late 1990s have, on average, lost investors more than 40 per cent of their original stake. No amount of clever stockpicking has been able to overcome the handicap of being in a sector which has just imploded.

What’s more it is not just sectors, but whole regions that have sometimes proved so moribund that they have defeated the best efforts of even the most talented fund managers. Take Japan as an example. How many of the 35 Japanese funds with a ten-year track record do you think have made money for investors over that timespan? The answer is: just one (take a bow Schroder Tokyo), and even that one only managed to make a £7 profit on an original investment of £1,000. The individuals who now have £500 million invested in the fund would have been better off putting their money into a deposit account.

Contrast this grim result with the experience of investors in the Asia Pacific region excluding Japan. The 41 funds with a ten-year track record produced an average return of more than 150 per cent. The best performer (First State Asia Pacific) managed to quadruple investors’ money and a further half dozen trebled it. Even the very worst performer produced a near 50 per cent return.

The conclusion from this trawl through fund statistics is that it is possible for outstanding funds to perform well in an unfavourable climate, but it is much easier to make money by going with the flow and identifying the most successful sectors.

Times Recommends

• How to sell your home in a downturn
• How to boost your spending power
• Unemployment benefits explained