Russell Kinnel Funds Quotations

Despite those amazing returns, by and large all those funds really did was lose money for a lot of people. One of the main points of owning a mutual fund is to be able to access high-quality professional management. But you are throwing that away when you buy funds like these with some manager who just happened to get lucky.

Putnam is in the early stages of a restructuring effort aimed at providing better, more reliable performance. It may be years before Putnam funds have a lot of appeal. Stock-picking skill and experience aren't changed overnight. Even if Haldeman and (head of research Josh) Brooks succeed, it will be years before their changes can markedly improve investment results.

A tax-managed fund is simply a fund who's goal it is to maximize after-tax returns, whereas most funds are focused on pretax returns, ... I think the one thing that probably all of them have is the idea of selling losers to offset gains. If you've just realized profits on one stock you'll sell a few dogs.

The big funds are very well managed and very well diversified. They might fall as hard as the S&P, but there aren't a lot of big disasters there.

A key challenge for investors is picking funds whose asset bases haven't become too fat to be handled effectively.