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AGF Asian Growth Class
How can we only give a $ rating to a fund that gained 44.7% in the year to June 30/07? It’s easy when we look at the broader picture. That “great” gain was actually sub-par for the category and this fund shows a below average record over all time frames. Yes, it has made money – just not as much as many of its competitors. This is a large-cap Asian fund which invests throughout the region, with the exception of Japan.
read moreAGF American Growth Class
Tony Genua took over this underperforming fund at the start of 2005 and it has shown some improvement since. Over the year to June 30/07 the fund showed a gain of 15.3%, about three percentage points ahead of the category average. This is highly encouraging, to say the least, and may finally signal a return to past glories. For a time in the 1990s, AGF American Growth was a powerhouse under the direction of Steve Rogers.
read moreAGF Aggressive Global Stock
This fund has a new managerial team with Lynette Schroeder and Meighan Harahan now running the show. However, both are with Driehaus Capital of Chicago, which has overseen this fund since the outset, so there is no change in the underlying aggressive style and the focus on small to mid-cap stocks. This approach results in huge NAV swings depending on the fortunes of the market. The fund gained 108% in 1999 and then proceeded to record big drops in 2000, 2001, and 2002.
read moreAGF Global Equity Class
This fund went through a long losing streak that lasted four years, from 1999 to 2002. However, only in the final year of that run was the loss serious, a setback of 17.2%. In each of the previous three years, the drop was less than 5%. Since the start of the bull market in late 2002, results have improved greatly and the fund is a consistent first or second quartile performer.
read moreAGF Canadian Growth Equity Class
AGF needs to update its website description of this fund. The positioning statement describes it as: “A growth Canadian equity fund identifying micro- to mid-cap companies poised for success.” Oh, really? Now check out the Top 10 holdings. Hmmm. We see names such as Petro-Canada, Teck Cominco, Canadian Oil Sands Trust, and Cameco. By what stretch of the imagination do these qualify as “micro- to mid-cap companies”? The fund is officially classified as Canadian Equity which makes a lot more sense in the context of the portfolio.
read moreAGF Canadian Stock Fund
This fund is the product of a number of mergers. It was originally the AGF Canadian Growth Fund, and the Canadian Equity Fund merged into it in 1998. Then in 2001, the Global Strategy Growth & Income Fund and the Global Strategy Canadian Companies Fund were folded into it as well. Consequently, manager Martin Hubbes has had to juggle a variety of portfolios along the way.
read moreAGF Canadian Resources Class
This fund was a long-time underachiever but it has looked much better in recent years. Although the 10-year numbers are only average for the Natural Resources category, returns from one to five years are well above the peer group norms. The average annual compound rate of return for the three years to June 30/07 was 35.4%, more than five percentage points better than the average for the category.
read moreimaxx U.S. Equity Value Fund
The team that runs this value-oriented fund is with the Bear Stearns investment house of New York so perhaps it follows logically that more than a third of the portfolio is in financial service stocks with Citigroup and Bank of America topping the list.
read moreimaxx U.S. Equity Growth Fund
Fund Company AEGON Fund Management Fund Type U.S. Equity Rating $$$ Style Growth Risk Level Medium Load Status Optional RRSP/RRIF Suitability Good TFSA Suitability Good Manager Gary Rolle since June 2002 MER 2.96% Code AFM 260 – Front End Units AFM 160 – DSC Units AFM 560 – Low Load Units Minimum Investment $1,000 Analysis: The goal of this fund is to produce capital gains over time by investing in companies with good growth potential. So it should come as no great surprise that biotech heavyweight Genentech tops...
read moreimaxx Global Equity Value Fund
The managers of this fund use a fundamental, bottom-up approach in selecting stocks so you’d think they’d be doing better. However, this fund has been an underperformer since its launch in mid-2002 – albeit, in fairness, the current team only assumed responsibility in July 2004. Although this is billed as a global fund, 75% of the assets are in U.S. companies which means that the rapid rise of the Canadian dollar has been a major factor in the poor results.
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