SmartMoney just gave Pimco [profile] and Vanguard [profile] some more positive ink. On Sunday Russell Pearlman and Ian Salisbury offered a comparison of overall mutual fund returns at the ten biggest mutual fund families.

"There's a belief among fund families that they have to be everything to everybody," fundster consultant Geoff Bobroff told SmartMoney. "It's unrealistic."

Pimco came in first, with an overall 3.6 percent return despite Bill Gross' tough year at Pimco Total Return. Vanguard also finished in positive territory, with 1.5 percent. And Capital Group's American Funds [profile], despite many public debates about its performance, came in third among the big ten with -0.3 percent.

Despite the many ups and downs last year, the S&P 500 returned two percent and the Dow returned more than eight percent. SmartMoney notes that the different asset class mixes at the different mutual fund firms accounts for at least part of the discrepancies in performance.

2011 overall returns for the 10 biggest mutual fund firms: 1) Pimco, 3.6 percent;
2) Vanguard, 1.5;
3) American Funds, -0.3;
4) Franklin Templeton [profile], -1.1;
4) OppenheimerFunds [profile], -1.1;
6) T. Rowe Price [profile], -1.4;
7)Columbia [profile], -2.0;
8)John Hancock [profile], -3.4;
9)Fidelity [profile], -3.5; and
10)Dodge & Cox [profile], -5.7. 

Edited by: Neil Anderson, Managing Editor


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