Top 10 Fund Categories By 15 Year Performance

Chai Wan, Hong Kong, April 9, 2015 (Newswire.com) - For most of the past 15 years, there’s been no place like home for investors. Notwithstanding the importance of diversification geographically as well as by sector and asset class, most of us would have been much better rewarded by simply forgetting about the rest of the world and plowing all our savings into domestic offerings.

The statistics for the 15-year period ended Dec. 31, 2014 reveal a striking difference between returns globally for the preceding decades.

There was a huge underinvestment in resources during the 1990s

Eric Bushell, CIO

Canadian companies overall averaged an annual compound return of 6.2% from January 2000 through December 2014, while U.S. companies overall averaged 1.3%, and European companies overall averaged 0.7%. Canadian fixed income funds overall yielded an average annual compound return of 4.3% for the 15 years through December 2014, while global fixed income funds averaged just 2.6%. Balanced funds of all types had a similar skew, if to a somewhat lesser extent.

The disparity also applies to individual funds. Of the 10 top-performing funds (see accompanying table), four are Canadian small-/mid-cap equity funds, two are Canadian dividend and income equity funds, and the remaining four – which at first glance seem to have a broader focus – turn out to be heavily Canadian-weighted. The portfolio of the RBC Global Precious Metals Fund, for example, contains 86% Canadian equities, while the Front Street Special Opportunities Fund’s portfolio is 92% Canadian content.

Several factors are behind this dichotomy, but the two biggest are the enormous Asia-driven natural resource boom and the soaring Canadian dollar.

"There was a huge underinvestment in resources during the 1990s," says Eric Bushell, chief investment officer at Signature Global Asset Management (a division of CI Investments Inc.) in Toronto. “Then in the 2000s, China started growing at an impressive rate, and that led to a boom in resources of all kinds.

"That’s the basis of what has happened in the past 15 years — underinvestment and then a surge in demand," Mr. Bushell says. "The starting point of the current 15-year cycle was 1999, when there was the Asian crisis and collapse in growth. Commodities were really weak, and the market went from that low level to a boom".

Fund Access has been poised to position clients into one of the best performing economies, and indeed with equities, which have now returned as the best performing class.

Which is why Fund Access is pleased, to be able to offer to a select few clients an opportunity to increase the portfolio returns by being placed in to once again the highest returning section the I.P.O (Initial Public Offering).

This has always outperformed the major indices historically but it has gone quiet, with the recent success of Ali Baba and Go Daddy, the market has seen these become the best performers, due to a number of reasons most clients never get a chance to get into these they have to wait in the wings and buy at the higher end of the cycle.

Provided an exit strategy is in place there will be no better place to put your money at work than the I.P.O's 

With the markets finally recovering from the eight year slump expect to see some very impressive returns this year and in particular the Technology sector stands streets ahead of the rest of the pack.

Here at Fund Access we hand pick companies poised for strong growth in 2015, and look forward to a very successful year ahead.

James King.