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Is Fidelity Select Gold Portfolio (FSAGX) a Strong Mutual Fund Pick Right Now?

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Any investors hoping to find a Sector - Precious Metal fund could think about starting with Fidelity Select Gold Portfolio (FSAGX - Free Report) . FSAGX holds a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank of 2 (Buy), which is based on nine forecasting factors like size, cost, and past performance.

Objective

The world of Sector - Precious Metal funds is an area filled with options, such as FSAGX. Usually, Sector - Precious Metal mutual funds invest in stocks with a focus on the mining and production of precious metals like gold, silver, platinum, and palladium. Here, stocks often trade as leveraged bets of the underlying commodity, meaning they're tied to the metal's prices and can be volatile.

History of Fund/Manager

Fidelity is responsible for FSAGX, and the company is based out of Boston, MA. Fidelity Select Gold Portfolio made its debut in December of 1985, and since then, FSAGX has accumulated about $1.87 billion in assets, per the most up-to-date date available. Steven Calhoun is the fund's current manager and has held that role since September of 2018.

Performance

Of course, investors look for strong performance in funds. This fund carries a 5-year annualized total return of 17.87%, and it sits in the top third among its category peers. But if you are looking for a shorter time frame, it is also worth looking at its 3-year annualized total return of 16.48%, which places it in the top third during this time-frame.

When looking at a fund's performance, it is also important to note the standard deviation of the returns. The lower the standard deviation, the less volatility the fund experiences. The standard deviation of FSAGX over the past three years is 32.92% compared to the category average of 18.15%. The fund's standard deviation over the past 5 years is 35.44% compared to the category average of 17.17%. This makes the fund more volatile than its peers over the past half-decade.

Risk Factors

Investors should note that the fund has a 5-year beta of 0.7, which means it is hypothetically less volatile than the market at large. Another factor to consider is alpha, as it reflects a portfolio's performance on a risk-adjusted basis relative to a benchmark-in this case, the S&P 500. FSAGX's 5-year performance has produced a positive alpha of 14.29, which means managers in this portfolio are skilled in picking securities that generate better-than-benchmark returns.

Expenses

Costs are increasingly important for mutual fund investing, and particularly as competition heats up in this market. And all things being equal, a lower cost product will outperform its otherwise identical counterpart, so taking a closer look at these metrics is key for investors. In terms of fees, FSAGX is a no load fund. It has an expense ratio of 0.76% compared to the category average of 1.44%. So, FSAGX is actually cheaper than its peers from a cost perspective.

Investors should also note that the minimum initial investment for the product is $0 and that each subsequent investment has no minimum amount.

Bottom Line

Overall, Fidelity Select Gold Portfolio ( FSAGX ) has a high Zacks Mutual Fund rank, and in conjunction with its comparatively strong performance, worse downside risk, and lower fees, Fidelity Select Gold Portfolio ( FSAGX ) looks like a good potential choice for investors right now.

Your research on the Sector - Precious Metal segment doesn't have to stop here. You can check out all the great mutual fund tools we have to offer by going to www.zacks.com/funds/mutual-funds to see the additional features we offer as well for additional information. For analysis of the rest of your portfolio, make sure to visit Zacks.com for our full suite of tools which will help you investigate all of your stocks and funds in one place.


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