Q2) Use MacKenzie as a point of departure to discuss how the interplay between academics and practitioners played out in the development of the index fund in the 1960's and 70'S

In the past 50 years, financial theory has evolved in a highly dynamic way. The interplay between theory and practise has been astounding. Our understanding of investor behaviour and the operation of financial markets has been aided by academic study. Additionally, financial innovation has been sparked by academic research, creating new financial markets and instruments. The portfolio theory, capital asset pricing theory, interest rate structure theory, capital structure theory, agency theory, efficient markets theory, and option pricing theory have been particularly significant fields of financial research over the past five decades. It is argued that academic and applied research has significantly influenced policy discourse as part of this evolutionary process, both through its conceptual contribution to the framing of the debate and through methodological advancements in data collection methods, analysis and modelling techniques, and appraisal methods. A type of passive fund management is "indexing." A fund manager develops a portfolio whose holdings mimic the securities of a specific index rather than actively stock selecting and market timing, that is, deciding which assets to invest in and planning when to buy and sell them. The theory is that by closely matching the index's profile—the stock market overall or a significant portion of it—the fund will match its performance. For almost all of the financial markets in existence, there is an index and an index fund. The most well-liked index funds in the US follow the S&P 500. Since the 1970s, index funds have existed. They have soared in value in the 2010s thanks to a combination of factors including the popularity of passive investing, the allure of low fees, and a protracted bull market. Investors put more than $400 billion into index funds in 2021, across all asset classes, according to Morningstar Research. Actively managed funds lost $188 billion within the same time period. The initial fund, established by Vanguard chairman John Bogle in 1976, is still among the top because to its overall long-term success and affordable price. The performance and composition of the Vanguard 500 Index Fund have closely mirrored those of the S&P 500. While academic engagement in terms of organisational structure stands for collaboration, commercialization, or "technology transfer," may happen through academic entrepreneurship, which is the establishment of a company with the goal of commercially exploiting a patented invention or, in some cases, a body of unpatented expertise. An invention that has been patented or otherwise protected can also be licenced out in exchange for a certain amount of royalties. The filing of a patent is the first step in both procedures, demonstrating an academic's propensity for some form of exploitation. With the benefit of hindsight, we can now identify significant mistakes the fund industry made during the Wonder Years of the 1960s that led to the Woeful Years of the 1970s. The industry can still be making the same mistakes now, according to several contemporary tendencies that define the successful fund company that we have grown accustomed to taking for granted. Some in the mutual fund business are contributing to the development of short-sighted investors by overemphasising performance. About thirty years ago, the industry committed this error, for which it paid a heavy price. The industry's goal is to draw lessons from the past and halt the spread of the new performance cult.