Employee-owned companies' share prices were up 3.2%, performing worse than the FTSE All Share companies' share prices, which were up 5.4% in the quarter.
The EOI, compiled by the firm's equity incentives team, monitors the share price performance of listed companies, comparing the performance of FTSE All-Share companies with companies that are more than 10%-owned by employees.
In the last quarter of 2009, employee-owned companies also underperformed. However, in the long term the picture is very different, with the EOI demonstrating that employee- owned companies outperform FTSE All-Share companies over time.
The EOI started in 1992 and shows that over 17 years, employee-owned companies have outperformed FTSE All-Share companies each year by on average 10%. Over successive three-year periods they have outperformed by 41% and over successive five-year periods by 78%.
Graeme Nuttall, head of the equity incentives team at Field Fisher Waterhouse, said: "The first quarter of this year saw employee-owned companies performing less well than the FTSE All-Share. If, however, we look at performance over longer periods of time we see that despite variations in relative performance from quarter to quarter, the EOI demonstrates that in the long term employee-owned companies do better, proving to be more resilient than FTSE All-Share companies."
