Friday, January 11, 2013


In late December we noticed some technology funds creeping up into the mid teen rankings and speculated as to whether they are diamonds in the rough about to make it into Quant’s elite ranks.  Today those elite ranks see 3 technology funds in the top 10.
               
Slightly trailing the market year to date, the iShares Goldman Sachs Technology Index Fund (IGM) is still buyable and has only seen higher ranks since it reached 17th place in that December 28th post, it’s at 6th place today. As was the case a few weeks ago, Fundamentals are still responsible for the strong rank driven by high cash flow and yield scores.  It had an 82.5 Fundamental Score then and it’s at 82 today.  The behavioral side is not as strong with low 60s in the technical and sentiment categories.  The iShares Dow Jones U.S. Technology Index Fund (IYW) wasn't mentioned in that December 28th post but it has risen to 8th place today.  A very high 90.2 Fundamental Score gets it there but the flip side of a cheap fund is that it hasn't been performing well.  We don’t write about too many funds with a Technical Score as low as 27.9 but that has helped it garner a very decent 77 Sentiment Score so maybe this one is due to outperform.  Rounding out our list of three today is the iShares PHLX SOX Semiconductor Sector Index Fund (SOXX) which also didn’t make our December 28th post but is in 10th place today.  Here we see a better balance of scores with a decent 78.2 on the Fundamental side matched by a good 67.2 on the Behavoiral side.  It has been scoring well since early November and its performance since then has justified its high score.

The upper ranks are still dominated by US large cap but we are seeing several small cap funds creeping back up in the rankings.  Some of our familiar foreign funds are also getting near the higher ranks again so maybe we’ll have reason to highlight them in coming posts.  We are keeping our eyes on them and will back next week to keep you apprised.  Until then thanks for reading and have a nice weekend.

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