Tuesday 7 June 2011

Fluctuations And Stability In Top Mutual Funds

By Sarah Cole


For the last 5 decades, stock market equities have been just about the best investment possible, with yearly returns that are much higher than comparably accessible financial instruments. On good years the returns can exceed 25% although on average it has hovered near 10% Other types of financial instruments such as bonds and CDs do not come close. However, before opening up an account it is nevertheless important to understand how to assess mutual fund returns and find out about the top 100 mutual funds.

The first typical way to assess top mutual funds is to look at the historical rate of return. Because the broader stock market is highly liquid and available to all investors, it serves as the benchmark against which all other funds are measured. Therefore, it is important that a mutual fund performs well relative to the stock market as a whole.

The second typical way of assessing top mutual funds is to examine the volatility. Some funds may have high returns some years, but are extremely volatile. The factor known as beta is a measure of relative volatility, again compared to the broader stock market. A beta of greater than 1 means the mutual fund is more volatile than the stock market.

Mutual funds have fluctuating returns. It is important to contrast them with investments that have stable returns as in the following.

Individuals who are curious about stable yields but higher yield than a savings account might ponder over the money market account. Such accounts are kept in mostly very short term securities. At what institutions might an investor start a money market account ? It so happens that the little branch of a nation-wide bank has the power to offer these accounts. In addition, one may open an account on the web through online banks. Those who are concerned about the trustworthiness of internet-only banks should be comforted as long as the banking institution is licensed, deposits are insured by the FDIC in case of a disastrous collapse.

A government-related fund that is very stable is the GNMA mutual fund, especially when compared to the sister Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The trio manage to real estate consumers and benefit from the gains. Most interested people will recall in recent years Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae got severely damaged in the property crash of late 2000s. Not all mutual funds can call itself a Ginnie Mae fund. Only those that invest than 80% fraction of money in GNMA securities are so entitled.

The final, stable investment we consider is the bond. The daily activities of a government, for example keeping a police force active on the city level, or the city college system functioning on the county level, depends upon loaned money. This loan cannot be done through a regular bank, but must involve the sale of bonds that are promises of payment. People put their money into bonds for what up till now has been a highly reliable promise of yield and absence of risk.




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