Resource Funds Soared in May - Investing: Canada

Resource funds were the big winners in May in the wake of rising oil and gold prices. Taking a look at the Top 25 funds for the month as listed at The Vancouver Sun website, we find 20 of them are resource or energy funds. The balance are a sprinkling of specialty funds, some of which have a heavy component of energy and mining stocks. Below is a table of the Top Ten.

Rank	Fund	Type	1 Month	3 Month	1 Year
1	Dominion Equity Resource Fund Inc.	Resource	24.67%	41.07%	44.36%
2	Green Line Energy Fund	Resource	17.63%	35.40%	35.98%
3	Lion Natural Resources Fund	Resource	14.72%	18.38%	12.04%
4	Special Opportunities Fund	Specialty	14.70%	15.25%	74.06%
5	Royal Energy Fund	Resource	14.59%	36.27%	35.41%
6	AGF Managed Futures Value Fund	Specialty	14.45%	18.97%	44.71%
7	Middlefield Growth Fund Limited	Resource	13.68%	40.00%	14.11%
8	Multiple Opportunities Fund	Specialty	13.57%	9.06%	25.74%
9	Clarica Alpine Canadian Resources Fund A	Resource	13.52%	23.58%	-
10	Clarica Alpine Canadian Resources Fund	Resource	13.49%	23.57%	16.50%

Of the three specialty funds in the Top Ten, Special Opportunities and Multiple Opportunities are restricted to B.C. residents and have significant exposure to the resource sector. The AGF Managed Futures Fund specializes in commodity futures and includes copper, silver and gold futures in its top ten holdings.

May saw a sharp drop in the number of Power Performers (from 76 to 50) reflecting the market weakness that continued through much of the month. We note that while most of the Power Performers and Super Power Performers in April had negative one-month returns, most had positive three-month returns. But for May, most had negative three-month returns as well, six of them taking a 25% or greater loss for the period.

What's amazing is that a few weathered the market meltdown with positive three-month gains. The most sterling example was the Resolute Growth Fund which has positive numbers across the board including a 19.74% three-month return and a 10.91% one-month return. Below is a table of the few Performers and Power Performers with gains for the three-month period ending May 31, 2000.

Fund	1 Month	3 Month	1 Year	3 Years	5 Years
Resolute Growth	10.91	19.74	84.22	24.65	24.50
C.I. Signature Global Small Companies	-6.12	14.88	87.45	28.75	22.32
C.I. American	1.92	12.67	29.86	21.86	20.96
C.I. American Sector Shares	1.85	12.41	28.70	20.81	20.01
Vistafund 1 American Stock	0.00	9.72	43.49	35.11	27.93
Vistafund 2 American Stock	-0.07	9.50	42.36	34.07	26.95
MD U.S. Equity	-3.70	6.70	22.95	31.68	30.98
Ethical North American Equity	-4.03	3.65	22.36	31.33	30.72
Montrusco Bolton U.S. Equity 'A' (US$)	-3.76	3.17	33.73	24.54	25.86
Spectrum United American Equity	-2.40	2.85	22.13	20.41	23.15
Manulife Cabot Canadian Equity	-2.49	0.18	50.92	21.25	21.36

Resolute Growth has an unusually top heavy position in Cangene Corporation, a bio-technology company, as well as a couple of oil related stocks in its top holdings. The C.I. American funds have a solid core of old economy stocks as well as a mix of new economy stalwarts such as Microsoft and Cisco.

I've started updating my Database of Key Mutual Fund Links as I hadn't looked at them in quite a while and some links had gone stale. Among other things, PalTRAK was taken over and absorbed in Morningstar Canada. The old links still work, but I'm changing the link names to Morningstar. Some companies have changed the layout of their websites with resulting dead links and even Globefund has changed some of its references resulting in error pages. The latter reflect mutual fund company mergers among other things. I've updated 10 of the 62 fund pages so far and hope to have them all completed in a week or two.

If there is a fund company I haven't included in the database so far that you would like to see added, drop me line and I'll add it right away.

GlobeFund - Canada's premier mutual fund site. Part of the Thomson Financial media group.
The Fund Library - Another superb resource for Canadian mutual fund investors.
The Fund Counsel - Economists Levi Folk and Richard Webb run this excellent site.
Morningstar Canada - Formerly Portfolio Analytics, this is another superb Canadian mutual fund resource.
U.S. Mutual Funds - About.com Guide Marlene Dziegeleski steers you through the world of US mutual funds.

	Related Articles

	Power Performers Super Power Performers Power Performers Index Mutual Fund Net Links Database of Key Links

	Join A Discussion

	Canadian Mutual Funds