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Is Fidelity Select Insurance (FSPCX) a Strong Mutual Fund Pick Right Now?

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If you have been looking for Sector - Finance fund category, a potential starting could be Fidelity Select Insurance (FSPCX - Free Report) . FSPCX carries a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank of 3 (Hold), which is based on nine forecasting factors like size, cost, and past performance.

Objective

FSPCX is one of many Sector - Finance funds to choose from. Sector - Finance mutual funds provide investors with a diversified and stabilized investment approach focused on the financial space, which is a notoriously large, complex, and heavily-regulated industry. These funds include everything from insurance companies and exchanges to banks and investment giants; interest rates can impact the players of this space as well.

History of Fund/Manager

Fidelity is based in Boston, MA, and is the manager of FSPCX. Fidelity Select Insurance made its debut in December of 1985, and since then, FSPCX has accumulated about $205.65 million in assets, per the most up-to-date date available. Peter Deutsch is the fund's current manager and has held that role since June of 2013.

Performance

Obviously, what investors are looking for in these funds is strong performance relative to their peers. FSPCX has a 5-year annualized total return of 12.86% and is in the top third among its category peers. Investors who prefer analyzing shorter time frames should look at its 3-year annualized total return of 11.77%, 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. Over the past three years, FSPCX's standard deviation comes in at 21.44%, compared to the category average of 26.99%. The fund's standard deviation over the past 5 years is 17.49% compared to the category average of 22.4%. This makes the fund less volatile than its peers over the past half-decade.

Risk Factors

With a 5-year beta of 0.98, the fund is likely to be as volatile as the market average. 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. FSPCX's 5-year performance has produced a negative alpha of -3.16, which means managers in this portfolio find it difficult to pick 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, FSPCX is a no load fund. It has an expense ratio of 0.84% compared to the category average of 1.55%. From a cost perspective, FSPCX is actually cheaper than its peers.

This fund requires a minimum initial investment of $0, while there is no minimum for each subsequent investment.

Bottom Line

Overall, Fidelity Select Insurance ( FSPCX ) has a neutral Zacks Mutual Fund rank, and in conjunction with its comparatively strong performance, average downside risk, and lower fees, this fund looks like a somewhat average choice for investors right now.

For additional information on the Sector - Finance area of the mutual fund world, make sure to check out www.zacks.com/funds/mutual-funds. There, you can see more about the ranking process, and dive even deeper into FSPCX too 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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