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| Lazard US Systematic Small Cap Equity Portfolio | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Lazard US Systematic Small Cap Equity Portfolio | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Investment Objective | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The Portfolio seeks long-term capital appreciation. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Fees and Expenses | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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This table describes the fees and expenses that you may pay if you buy, hold and sell shares of the Portfolio, a series of The Lazard Funds, Inc. (the “Fund”). You may pay other fees, such as brokerage commissions and other fees to financial intermediaries, which are not reflected in the table and the Example below. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Annual Portfolio Operating Expenses (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Example | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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This Example is intended to help you compare the cost of investing in the Portfolio with the cost of investing in other mutual funds. The Example assumes that you invest $10,000 in the Portfolio for the time periods indicated and then hold or redeem all of your shares at the end of those periods. The Example also assumes that your investment has a 5% return each year and that the Portfolio’s operating expenses remain the same, giving effect to the expense limitation agreement described above. Although your actual costs may be higher or lower, based on these assumptions your costs would be: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Portfolio Turnover | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The Portfolio pays transaction costs, such as commissions, when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes when Portfolio shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in annual portfolio operating expenses or in the Example, affect the Portfolio’s performance. During the most recent fiscal year, the Portfolio’s portfolio turnover rate was 110% of the average value of its portfolio. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Principal Investment Strategies | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The Portfolio invests primarily in equity securities, principally common stocks, of small capitalization US companies. The Investment Manager considers “small cap companies” to be those companies that, at the time of initial purchase by the Portfolio, have market capitalizations within the range of companies included in the Russell 2000 Index (ranging from approximately $16.6 million to $59.1 billion as of March 31, 2024). The Portfolio typically invests in 300 to 500 companies. Under normal circumstances, the Portfolio invests at least 80% of its assets in equity securities of small cap US companies. Equity securities also may include depositary receipts, including American Depositary Receipts (“ADRs”), Global Depositary Receipts and European Depositary Receipts. The Portfolio may invest up to 20% of its assets in other securities which need not be equity securities of small cap US companies, including investments in larger US companies and in non-US companies, including securities of emerging markets companies traded on a US exchange. The Investment Manager will manage the Portfolio using its proprietary investment strategy that creates and applies what the Investment Manager refers to as “Insights” and employs its “Insight-driven” process to identify investments with fundamental traits the Investment Manager believes are undervalued by the market. The Investment Manager’s strategy combines fundamental and quantitative techniques into a fully systematic process—that is, the Investment Manager converts subjective criteria used to evaluate potential investments into quantitative formulas based on, among other things, market observations and testing of resulting hypotheses. The Investment Manager considers an “Insight” to be a fundamental opportunity that the Investment Manager believes can be quantified, validated and implemented systematically by the Investment Manager: · a fundamental opportunity is a recurring market inefficiency where the Investment Manager believes that investors are not fully incorporating the impact of a company’s changing operating fundamentals and/or attractive valuations; · the Investment Manager converts its market observation into quantified conditions utilizing proprietary process knowledge and techniques; · a potential Insight is validated through extensive proprietary testing that includes historical data, minimum targeted return objectives and persistence hurdles; · through each Insight, a number of securities are identified; and · the securities selection process is implemented systematically into automated daily operations. The Investment Manager selects investments for the Portfolio by applying its securities selection process to an investable universe of all publicly-traded equity securities, with a focus on small cap companies. However, Insights, which may change over time, may be related to the broad market or specific to a particular sector or industry. In addition, the selection process described above is not sequential, and certain criteria may be given more importance than others. Target position sizes are determined at the time of investment based on one or more Insights and subsequently monitored on an ongoing basis. To improve tax efficiency, the Portfolio may limit investments that have undesirable tax characteristics and may employ other tax-management techniques, such as adjusting the timing of trades, by relying in part on fundamental research and analytical judgements of the Investment Manager. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Principal Investment Risks | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Performance Bar Chart and Table | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The accompanying bar chart and table provide some indication of the risks of investing in Lazard US Systematic Small Cap Equity Portfolio by showing the Portfolio’s year-by-year performance and its average annual performance compared to that of a broad measure of market performance. The bar chart shows how the performance of the Portfolio’s Institutional Shares has varied from year to year. Updated performance information is available at www.lazardassetmanagement.com or by calling (800) 823-6300. The Portfolio’s past performance (before and after taxes) is not necessarily an indication of how the Portfolio will perform in the future. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Year-by-Year Total Returns for Institutional Shares As of 12/31 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Average Annual Total Returns (for the periods ended December 31, 2023) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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After-tax returns are shown only for Institutional Shares. After-tax returns of the Portfolio’s other share classes will vary. After-tax returns are calculated using the historical highest individual marginal income tax rates and do not reflect the impact of state and local taxes. Actual after-tax returns depend on the investor’s tax situation and may differ from those shown. The after-tax returns shown are not relevant to investors who hold their shares through tax-deferred arrangements such as 401(k) plans or individual retirement accounts. Effective as of May 1, 2024, the Russell 3000 Index replaced the Russell 2000 Index as the Portfolio’s broad-based securities market index. The Russell 3000 Index was selected in connection with certain regulatory requirements to provide a broad measure of market performance. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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