MutualFundWire.com: Odd Lots, July 16, 1999

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Friday, July 16, 1999

Odd Lots, July 16, 1999

Stansky gives AOL and Time Warner the boot
From The New York Post
Robert Stansky, the manager of Fidelity Investment's flagship Magellan fund, dropped America Online and Time Warner shares from his top ten holdings last quarter. Telecommunications stocks Lucent and AT&T where added in replacement. The top two holdings of the fund, General Electric and Microsoft, remained unchanged. Fidelity observers say they are impressed at how Stansky can buy and sell stocks for the giant fund without tipping off the entire market.

Fidelity Shareholders recast proxy votes
From TheStreet.com
Shareholders of four Fidelity funds are being asked to recast proxy votes on whether to retain PricewaterhouseCoopers as their auditor. The new vote comes after PwC revealed that a manager in its Boston office held shares in the Fidelity Puritan fund, a fact that wasn't disclosed in proxy materials sent in May to shareholders. The SEC requires that a professional at a public accounting firm who provides any service to a client can't own a significant amount of stock in the client's company. The funds that will be casting their ballots again are Fidelity's: Puritan, Balanced, Global Balanced and Low-Priced Stock.

Taking the middle road
From The Wall Street Journal
With large-cap stock prices at sky high levels, fund managers are reluctant to plow more money into large-cap funds, but nervous about small stocks despite a strong second-quarter showing. Exploring the middle ground of the investment world: "midcap" funds, seems to be the logical thing to do. Research firm Ibbotson Associates recently found that midcap stocks are much less prone to sharp swings in returns than their diminutive cousins. The portfolios of medium-size companies provide many of the benefits of small-stock funds, but less volatility. They offer a lot of the growth potential of small-cap investing, but, more along the lines of large-cap stocks, medium-size companies tend to be seasoned and the stocks have trading liquidity.

TV icons used to market retirement planning
From The Los Angeles Times
The actor who played Timmy in the long-running "Lassie" TV series along with two other childhood stars are joining forces with SunAmerica Inc. to promote its retirement-planning services. The trio will join the talk show circuit, chronicling how bad financial planning led them to squander their Hollywood fortunes. At the end of the spiels, talk show hosts will be encouraged to mention a toll-free telephone number that consumers can call to order a free SunAmerica brochure. SunAmerica is betting that the familiar faces of yore will appeal to baby boomers tackling retirement planning.

Funds in the Press:

Smart Money highlights the International Assets Advisory (IAA) which has created a Global Internet Trust, representing the extreme sport of investing.
The Worldly Investor takes a closer look at Marcel Houtzager, portfolio manager of the Acorn Foreign Forty Fund in Chicago.
The Individual Investor debates old-style utilities funds--such as Vanguard Utilities Income--that focus on power companies, or the new breed--represented by American Century Utilities--with bigger and riskier stakes in telephone and wireless companies.