January 2020 IssueLong scroll reading

“We’re here because you’re looking for the best of the best of the best, sir!”

By David Snowball

When I first started writing regularly about funds and investing, it was as an analyst for FundAlarm, a site whose publisher proclaimed

Our view of the mutual fund industry is slightly off-center. We help you decide when it’s time to sell a fund, instead of when it’s time to buy. The mutual fund industry is full of broken promises, arrogance, greed, hypocrisy — the list goes on. We try to shine a light in the darker corners, and poke holes in balloons that could use some poking.

In honoring that heritage, we routinely publish a roll call of the wretched, funds that have distinguished themselves by their inability to rise even to the level of honorable mediocrity.

The flip side of that equate are the funds that have achieved outstanding returns without sacrificing protection in falling markets. We’ll identify those funds by using the inverse of the roll call of the wretched methodology:

instead of starting with Three Alarm funds (those that have trailed at least 80% of the peers over the past 1, 3 and 5 year periods), we start with Honor Roll funds (those that have beaten at least 80% of the peers over the past 1, 3 and 5 year periods).

we’ll still use four different measures of downside risk –downside deviation, down month deviation, bear month deviation –

Using the tools at MFO Premium, we’ve identified the 10 best equity-oriented funds of the past decade based on each of three different downside measures.

Lowest 10-year downside deviation

Downside deviation can be thought of “day-to-day downside.” It measures only downward variation; specifically, it measures a fund’s return below the risk-free rate of return, which is the 90-day T-Bill rate (aka cash). Downside deviation doesn’t worry about how the stock market is doing, it just identifies funds which – in any market – return less than money in a savings account would.

  Lipper category Downside deviation 10-year annual returns Worst drawdown vs peer group
Benchmarks          
Vanguard Total Stock Market VTSMX Multi core 7.9 13.3 -17.7 1.6%
Vanguard Balanced Index VBINX Growth allocation 4.4 9.5 -9.0 1.0
           
Akre Focus AKREX Multi-Cap Growth 5.6 17.1 -8.6 3.5
First Trust Value Line Dividend Index FVD Multi-Cap Value 5.7 13.4 -11 2.6
Vanguard Dividend Growth VDIGX Equity Income 6.2 12.9 -11.2 2
WisdomTree US LargeCap Dividend DLN Large-Cap Value 6.6 12.4 -11.3 1.4
FAM Dividend Focus FAMEX Equity Income 6.7 13.8 -14.4 2.8
Madison Investors MINVX Multi-Cap Core 6.7 12.7 -15 1
Parnassus Core Equity PRBLX Equity Income 6.8 12.9 -14.8 2
Vanguard Dividend Appreciation Index ETF VIG Equity Income 6.8 12.5 -14.2 1.6
Hartford Core Equity HAIAX Large-Cap Core 7 14 -16.2 1.7
Nuveen Santa Barbara Dividend Growth NSBRX Equity Income 7.1 12.4 -13.9 1.5

Lowest 10-year down market deviation

Down market deviation can be thought of as “the downside in any sort of declining market.” Pure downside deviation includes only fund returns less than zero. Basically, DMDEV indicates the typical annualized percentage decline based only on a fund’s performance during negative market months. So, if the market drops by even 0.1% in a month, we report how each fund did and then project it over 12 months.

  Lipper category Down market deviation 10-year annual returns Worst drawdown vs peer group
Benchmarks          
Vanguard Total Stock Market VTSMX Multi core 7.8 13.3% -17.7 +1.6
Vanguard Balanced Index VBINX Growth allocation 4.3 9.5 -9.0 1.0
           
Akre Focus Multi-Cap Growth 5.5 17.1 -8.6 3.5
First Trust Value Line Dividend Index Multi-Cap Value 5.6 13.4 -11 2.6
Vanguard Dividend Growth Equity Income 6.1 12.9 -11.2 2
WisdomTree US LargeCap Dividend Large-Cap Value 6.5 12.4 -11.3 1.4
FAM Dividend Focus Equity Income 6.6 13.8 -14.4 2.8
Madison Investors Multi-Cap Core 6.6 12.7 -15 1
Parnassus Core Equity Equity Income 6.7 12.9 -14.8 2
Vanguard Dividend Appreciation Index ETF Equity Income 6.8 12.5 -14.2 1.6
Hartford Core Equity Large-Cap Core 6.9 14 -16.2 1.7
Nuveen Santa Barbara Dividend Growth Equity Income 7 12.4 -13.9 1.5

Lowest 10-year bear market deviation

Bear market deviation can be thought of as “the downside in a seriously declining market.” Basically, bear market deviation indicates the typical annualized percentage decline based only on a fund’s performance during bear market months. For equity-oriented funds, a bear market month is one in which the market declined by 3% or more in 30 days.

  Lipper category Bear market deviation 10-year annual returns Worst drawdown vs peer group
Benchmarks          
Vanguard Total Stock Market Index VTSMX Multi core 7.4 13.3 -17.7 1.6
Vanguard Balanced Index VBINX Growth allocation 3.9 9.5 -9.0 1.0
           
Akre Focus Multi-Cap Growth 4.9 17.1 -8.6 3.5
First Trust Value Line Dividend Index Multi-Cap Value 5.1 13.4 -11 2.6
Vanguard Dividend Growth Equity Income 5.8 12.9 -11.2 2
FAM Dividend Focus Equity Income 5.8 13.8 -14.4 2.8
WisdomTree US LargeCap Dividend Large-Cap Value 6.1 12.4 -11.3 1.4
Madison Investors Multi-Cap Core 6.2 12.7 -15 1
Fidelity Select Wireless Portfolio Telecom 6.2 12 -16.1 2.9
Parnassus Core Equity Equity Income 6.3 12.9 -14.8 2
Vanguard Dividend Appreciation Index ETF Equity Income 6.3 12.5 -14.2 1.6
Neuberger Berman Real Estate Real Estate 6.4 13.2 -17.9 1.2
Nuveen Santa Barbara Dividend Growth I Equity Income 6.5 12.4 -13.9 1.5
Johnson Equity Income Equity Income 6.5 12.1 -14.9 1.2
Virtus Duff & Phelps Global Real Estate Securities Global Real Estate 6.5 11.4 -18.6 2.6

Let’s step back and assess what we’ve done and what we’ve discovered. What we did was:

Step One: identify funds with top tier returns over the last 1, 3 and 5 years – the FundAlarm Honor Roll

Step Two: from among those funds, identify the ones that has subjected their investors to the smallest routine trips and falls (downside deviation), the smallest trips and falls in months where the market was tripping and falling (down market deviation) and the smallest trips and falls in months where the market was falling hard (bear market deviation).

What we found was that the same funds appeared over and over. Apparently, the discipline that limits small, day-to-day trips also points toward funds that protect in far more serious declines. Here, then, is a very short list of very good funds. Each appeared on all three lists. Funds in blue are designated as MFO Great Owl funds, funds that have delivered top quintile risk-adjusted returns, based on Martin Ratio, in its category for evaluation periods of 3, 5, 10, and 20 years.

Akre Focus AKREX

FAM Dividend Focus FAMEX

First Trust Value Line Dividend Index FVD

Madison Investors MINVX

Nuveen Santa Barbara Dividend Growth NSBRX

Parnassus Core Equity PRBLX

Vanguard Dividend Appreciation Index ETF VIG

Vanguard Dividend Growth VDIGX

WisdomTree US LargeCap Dividend DLN

Bottom line: as we’ve found before, dividends matter and quality matters, most especially to investors who are less obsessed about shooting for the stars and more concerned about sustainable gains in good times and manageable losses in bad ones. We commend our profiles of Akre Focus and FAM Dividend Focus (formerly FAM Equity Income) to you, but admit the Parnassus Core Equity has an amazing array of attractions from its long-term ESG focus, stable team, huge insider ownership, and first-rate risk-return profile.

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About David Snowball

David Snowball, PhD (Massachusetts). Cofounder, lead writer. David is a Professor of Communication Studies at Augustana College, Rock Island, Illinois, a nationally-recognized college of the liberal arts and sciences, founded in 1860. For a quarter century, David competed in academic debate and coached college debate teams to over 1500 individual victories and 50 tournament championships. When he retired from that research-intensive endeavor, his interest turned to researching fund investing and fund communication strategies. He served as the closing moderator of Brill’s Mutual Funds Interactive (a Forbes “Best of the Web” site), was the Senior Fund Analyst at FundAlarm and author of over 120 fund profiles. David lives in Davenport, Iowa, and spends an amazing amount of time ferrying his son, Will, to baseball tryouts, baseball lessons, baseball practices, baseball games … and social gatherings with young ladies who seem unnervingly interested in him.