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Is Fidelity Mid-Cap Stock Fund (FMCSX) a Strong Mutual Fund Pick Right Now?

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If you have been looking for Global - Equity funds, a place to start could be Fidelity Mid-Cap Stock Fund (FMCSX - Free Report) . FMCSX bears a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank of 1 (Strong Buy), which is based on nine forecasting factors like size, cost, and past performance.

Objective

FMCSX is classified in the Global - Equity segment by Zacks, an area full of possibilities. Even though Global - Equity mutual funds invest in bigger markets like the U.S., Europe, and Japan, these kinds of funds aren't limited by geography. Rather, they offer an investment strategy that utilizes the global economy to provide stable returns.

History of Fund/Manager

Fidelity is based in Boston, MA, and is the manager of FMCSX. The Fidelity Mid-Cap Stock Fund made its debut in March of 1994 and FMCSX has managed to accumulate roughly $4.76 billion in assets, as of the most recently available information. John D. Roth is the fund's current manager and has held that role since February of 2011.

Performance

Investors naturally seek funds with strong performance. This fund has delivered a 5-year annualized total return of 5.78%, 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 8.46%, 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. FMCSX's standard deviation over the past three years is 11.06% compared to the category average of 10.33%. Over the past 5 years, the standard deviation of the fund is 10.93% compared to the category average of 10.27%. This makes the fund more volatile than its peers over the past half-decade.

Risk Factors

It's always important to be aware of the downsides to any future investment, so one should not discount the risks that come with this segment. In the most recent bear market, FMCSX lost 56.14% and underperformed comparable funds by 3.57%. This makes the fund a possibly worse choice than its peers during a sliding market environment.

Nevertheless, with a 5-year beta of 0.91, the fund is likely to be less volatile than the market average. Because alpha represents a portfolio's performance on a risk-adjusted basis relative to a benchmark, which is the S&P 500 in this case, one should pay attention to this metric as well. FMCSX has generated a negative alpha over the past five years of -1.82, demonstrating that managers in this portfolio find it difficult to pick securities that generate better-than-benchmark returns.

Expenses

As competition heats up in the mutual fund market, costs become increasingly important. Compared to its otherwise identical counterpart, a low-cost product will be an outperformer, all other things being equal. Thus, taking a closer look at cost-related metrics is vital for investors. In terms of fees, FMCSX is a no load fund. It has an expense ratio of 0.61% compared to the category average of 1.16%. So, FMCSX is actually cheaper than its peers from a cost perspective.

Investors need to be aware that with this product, the minimum initial investment is $2,500; each subsequent investment has no minimum amount.

Bottom Line

Overall, Fidelity Mid-Cap Stock Fund ( FMCSX ) has a high Zacks Mutual Fund rank, and in conjunction with its comparatively strong performance, average downside risk, and lower fees, this fund looks like a good potential choice for investors right now.

For additional information on this product, or to compare it to other mutual funds in the Global - Equity, make sure to go to www.zacks.com/funds/mutual-funds for additional information. If you want to check out our stock reports as well, make sure to go to Zacks.com to see all of the great tools we have to offer, including our time-tested Zacks Rank.


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