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Are You Invested In These 3 Mutual Fund Misfires? - February 11, 2020

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You may need to start looking for a new financial advisor if your current one has put any of these high-fee, low-return "Mutual Fund Misfires of the Market" into your portfolio.

High fees coupled with poor results: It's a straightforward equation for an awful mutual fund. Some are more regrettable than others - and some are bad to the point that they have got a "Strong Sell" from our Zacks Rank, the lowest positioning of the almost 19,000 mutual funds we rank every 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.

Federated International Bond C (FTIBX - Free Report) : Expense ratio: 0.93%. Management fee: 0.75%. After expenses, the 5 year return is 0%, meaning your fees are far higher than the fund's returns.

Vanguard Precious Metals & Mining (VGPMX - Free Report) : 0.38% expense ratio, 0.3% management fee. Sector - Precious Metal funds like VGPMX normally invest in stocks focused on the mining and production of precious metals such as gold, silver, platinum, and palladium. This fund has an annual returns of -0.23% over the last five years. Another fund guilty of having investors pay more in fees than returns.

Loomis Sayles Limited Term G&A A (NEFLX - Free Report) - 0.8% expense ratio, 0.37% management fee. NEFLX is a Government Bond - Short fund, and these funds hold securities issued by the U.S. federal government. This category focuses on the short end of the curve, and are seen as extremely low risk securities from a default perspective. NEFLX has generated annual returns of 0.74% over the last five years. Ouch!

3 Top Ranked Mutual Funds

Now that we've covered our "worst offender" list, let's take a look at some of Zacks' highest ranked mutual funds with some of the lowest fees you may want to consider.

MFS Research R4 (MFRJX - Free Report) : Expense ratio: 0.55%. Management fee: 0.43%. MFRJX is a Large Cap Growth mutual fund, and these funds invest in many large U.S. firms that are projected to grow at a faster rate than their large-cap peers. This fund has achieved five-year annual returns of an astounding 11.73%.

MassMutual Select Mid Cap Growth R5 (MGRFX - Free Report) has an expense ratio of 0.81% and management fee of 0.69%. MGRFX is a Mid Cap Growth mutual fund. These mutual funds choose companies with a stock market valuation between $2 billion and $10 billion. Thanks to yearly returns of 12.87% over the last five years, MGRFX is an effectively diversified fund with a long reputation of solidly positive performance.

Victory Sycamore Small Company Opportunity Y (VSOYX - Free Report) is an attractive fund with a five-year annualized return of 10.82% and an expense ratio of just 1.09%. VSOYX is a Small Cap Value mutual fund option, which typically invest in companies with market caps under $2 billion.

Bottom Line

We hope that your investment advisor (if you use one) has you invested in one or all of the top-ranked mutual funds we've reviewed. But if that is not the case, and your advisor has you invested in any of the funds on our "worst offender" list, it might be time to have a conversation or reconsider this vitally important relationship.

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