These Mutual Funds Are the Real Turkeys

The Thanksgiving holiday always marks a time on the calendar when we start to take a look at the mutual funds that had a good year and those that didn't do as well. Of course, in 2008 we are anticipating most funds will probably fall into that latter group. However, we have a feeling there may be some pleasant surprises, too.

First, though, we want to get rid of the bad news by highlighting some of the industry's worst performers. We affectionately call this the Turkeys screen, and it doesn't refer to funds based on the country. Rather, these funds sit squarely in the bottom of their individual categories over the trailing one-, three-, five- and 10-year time periods. In other words, these funds are down in the dumps — and have been for quite a while.  (We'll follow up in December with our list of the best performers. Click here to email us funds you think we should consider.)

We started with a universe of 425 offerings. This screen has traditionally focused on equity funds so we nixed fixed-income and money-market offerings. Since we are screening solely on performance benchmarks we didn't exclude funds that charged a load, and we relaxed our annual expense ratio criteria, too. We were truly looking for the basement dwellers, regardless of how much they charged. One hundred and thirty-two funds made the final dubious cut. The 20 with the largest asset bases are listed below. You can click here to see the expanded list in an Excel spreadsheet.

Obviously, no investor likes to see his fund (or funds) on this list. If you do it means it's time to seriously re-evaluate your holdings. We can excuse a bad year or two, especially given the current economic climate. But if a fund is down for the better part of a decade, well, it's time to find out exactly why that is and whether your hard-earned cash could be making a better return elsewhere.

To make that decision you need to understand a thing or two about mutual fund returns. The numbers we focus on that are published by Lipper and Morningstar are averages. A good year or a bad one can skew a three-year average annual return in either direction. Similarly, two or three years can impact the five-year number. To really understand how a fund is doing it pays to look at individual years, especially those during a bull and bear market. You want to be able to understand how a particular fund manager does during the market's best and worst times. For example, it would be smart to know right now how a given fund did coming out of the last bear market. It might give you a clue as to how it will perform over the next year or 18 months.

You also don't want to dwell too much on the percent ranking of a particular fund (although we included it as one variable this week). There will always be a highflier that sits atop its respective category. But ultimately what you should be concerned with is whether your funds are beating a benchmark like the S&P 500 index. In a bull market a relatively conservative fund could be ranked low in its category while still beating the broad market. If you aren't worried about hitting it out of the park, that scenario won't bother you — even if the fund is in the bottom quintile of its group.

Funds can take a turn for the worse for several reasons. A particular fund may have endured a revolving door of managers, each of whom decided to put their respective fingerprints on the portfolio without much luck. Focus funds — with concentrated portfolios of 50 or fewer stocks — can also experience a downturn if one or two of its top picks don't pan out. Finally, a fund can experience a rough patch simply because its strategy or the stocks it focuses on are out of favor. That can boil down to a debate about growth vs. value stocks or which size companies are the best investments.

Of course, funds that make our list can easily fall off it if their predicament changes. On last year's Turkeys list we highlighted Putnam Fund for Growth & Income (PGRWX). At the time new managers at the fund were struggling to get it back on track. It still isn't a screaming buy. But its three-year performance record improved — the reason it moved off the list this year — and its parent company is trying hard to improve its entire lineup by instituting a sweeping reorganization plan.

One fund we would expect to follow a similar path is Ariel Focus (ARGFX). This fund is run by John Rogers, a well-respected manager known for doing deep research, buying at a discount, low turnover and a long-term investing horizon. He takes such a patient and disciplined value approach to stock picking that his company’s motto is rooted in the tortoise and hare story. During the last week, as we ran earlier versions of this screen, Ariel jumped on and fell off of it. So it's easy to see the impact of the day-to-day machinations of the stock market.

One of the reasons this fund is down is because Rogers has stuck to his guns. He sat out the energy boom that goosed the returns of many of his competitors in 2006 and 2007. Meanwhile, this concentrated portfolio has seen some of its top picks get hammered in the credit crisis. A top holding like Energizer (ENR), the battery maker, has watched its share price go from the $110 level to a recent $39.That said, we think Rogers' deep value style — and a portfolio of cheap stocks with strong cash flows — will come back into favor. We wouldn't expect to see his fund on the list next year.  

Of course, we don't have a crystal ball so we could easily be wrong. And that brings us to our conclusion for this week. Any fund that found a place on this week's list deserves serious consideration for being booted out of your portfolio. After all, the average expense ratio for the larger list is 1.98% or 30% higher than our usual cutoff. And the average performance during the last decade is an anemic -3.3% a year. Not exactly an early Christmas present. So as you shovel down that turkey and stuffing, you may want to may want to work it off by doing some homework and deciding if it's time to sell.

The Criteria

The funds on our list this week ranked in the bottom 15% of their respective equity categories over the trailing one-, three-, five- and 10-year time periods. We allowed load funds this week and we also waived our usual fee criteria. This list truly showcases some of the worst-performing funds in the industry.

Recipe

Fund Type = *
Annualized 3-Year Return (%) = Display Only
Rank in Classification (%) (3 year performance) >= 85
Annualized 5-Year Return (%) = Display Only
Rank in Classification (%) (5 year performance) >= 85
Annualized 10-Year Return (%) = Display Only
Rank in Classification (%) (5 year performance) >= 85
Annualized 1-Year Return (%) = Display Only
Rank in Classification (%) (5 year performance) >= 85
Minimum Initial Investment <= 5,000
Open to New Investors = Yes
Total Net Assets ($ millions) >= 50
Year-to-Date Return (%) = Display Only

* The screen only includes equity funds