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3 Mutual Fund Misfires To Avoid In Your Retirement Portfolio - December 30, 2019

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If your advisor has you invested in any of these "Mutual Fund Misfires of the Market" with high fees and low returns, you need to rethink your advisor.

How can you tell a good mutual fund from a bad one? It's pretty basic: If the fund has high fees and performs poorly, it's not good. Of course, there's a range - but when a mutual fund earns a Zacks Rank of #5 (Strong Sell) that means it's among the worst of roughly 19,000 funds we rate each day.

First, let's break down some of the funds currently part of our "Mutual Fund Misfires of the Market." If you happen to have put your money into any of these misfires, we'll help assess some of our best Zacks Ranked mutual funds.

3 Mutual Fund Misfires

Now, let's take a look at three market misfires.

Virtus Equity Trend C : 2.3% expense ratio and 1% management fee. VAPCX is part of the Large Cap Blend section, and these mutual funds most often invest in firms with a market capitalization of $10 billion or more. By investing in bigger companies, these funds offer more stability, and are often well-suited for investors with a "buy and hold" mindset. With a five year after-costs return of 1%, you're for the most part paying more in charges than returns.

Templeton Frontier Markets C : 2.71% expense ratio, 1.4%. FFRMX is a part of the Non US - Equity fund category, many of which will focus across all cap levels, and will typically allocate their investments between emerging and developed markets. This fund has yearly returns of -8.4% over the most recent five years. Another fund liable of having investors pay more in charges than what they receive in return.

Western Asset Short Duration High Income C (LWHIX - Free Report) - 1.71% expense ratio, 0.55% management fee. This fund has yielded yearly returns of 1.52% in the course of the last five years. Too bad!

3 Top Ranked Mutual Funds

There you have it: some prime examples of truly bad mutual funds. In contrast, here are a few funds that have achieved high Zacks Ranks and have low fees.

Columbia Seligman Communications and Information R4 (SCIOX - Free Report) is a fund that has an expense ratio of 0.99%, and a management fee of 0.87%. SCIOX is a Sector - Tech mutual fund, allowing investors to own a stake in a notoriously volatile sector with a much more diversified approach. With yearly returns of 17.5% over the last five years, this fund clearly wins.

Dreyfus/Boston Small/Mid-Cap Growth Y (DBMYX - Free Report) : Expense ratio: 0.63%. Management fee: 0.6%. DBMYX is a Mid Cap Growth mutual fund. These mutual funds choose companies with a stock market valuation between $2 billion and $10 billion. DBMYX has managed to produce a robust 11.71% over the last five years.

MainStay Large Cap Growth R6 (MLRSX - Free Report) is an attractive fund with a five-year annualized return of 13.07% and an expense ratio of just 0.64%. MLRSX is a Large Cap Growth option; these mutual funds purchase stakes in numerous large U.S. companies that are expected to develop and grow at a faster rate than other large-cap stocks.

Bottom Line

So, there you have it - if your advisor has you invested in any of our "Mutual Fund Misfires of the Market," there is a good probability that they are either asleep at the wheel, incompetent, or (most likely) lining their pockets with high fee commissions at your financial expense.

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