February 22, 2012

Top 12 Small Cap Stock Mutual Funds 2012

Small cap stock mutual funds have been outperformed other US stock mutual funds for the past 3 years. Some of the best small cap stock mutual funds are: Oceanstone Fund, Intrepid Small Cap, Brown Capital Management Small Company Inv, etc.

Best Small Cap Mutual Funds 2012
Intro

Small cap stock mutual funds could be the correct choice for higher risk tolerance investors. During the bull market, these small cap mutual funds can generate higher return which leads to better performance for their overall portfolio. Smaller companies also can reinvest their profits from their sales back into their business. This reassures shareholders of great performance and higher profit potential from such companies. To achieve a well-diversified portfolio, small cap stock mutual funds are an excellent choice for investment.

Note: Small Cap stock funds are part of domestic stock mutual fund. There are three type of small cap funds such as small growth funds, small value funds, and small blend funds.

Best Small Cap Mutual Funds

These funds are rated based on its past 5-year performance. Most of these small cap mutual funds are also rated among the best in their class. Please check details about its performance, expense ratio, sales load, top sectors, initial investment requirement, risk, top holdings, etc.

Top 12 Best Performing Small Cap Stock Mutual Funds 2012 are:
  1. Oceanstone Fund (OSFDX)
  2. Intrepid Small Cap (ICMAX)
  3. Brown Capital Management Small Company Investor (BCSIX)
  4. SouthernSun Small Cap Investor (SSSFX)
  5. Janus Triton A (JGMAX)
  6. Fidelity Small Cap Discovery (FSCRX)
  7. Needham Aggressive Growth (NEAGX)
  8. Lord Abbett Developing Growth A (LAGWX)
  9. Transamerica Systematic Small/Medium Cap Value A (IIVAX)
  10. Dreyfus Opportunistic Small Cap (DSCVX)
  11. T. Rowe Price New Horizons (PRNHX)
Updated on 2/20/2012

1. Oceanstone Fund (OSFDX)

The Oceanstone Fund objective is to achieve capital appreciation. This small cap mutual fund invests only in undervalued common stocks on the New York Stock Exchange, American Stock Exchange, and NASDAQ. It may invest in American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) of foreign issuers. It invests in small, medium, and large capitalization stocks and may engage in active and frequent trading of its portfolio securities.

This small cap mutual fund has YTD return of 10.40%. The annual expense ratio is 1.80% compared to the average in the Small Value category which is 1.45%.

James J. Wang is the fund manager since its inception in 2006. He is the President, Director and shareholder of Oceanstone Capital Management. The minimum initial investment in this small value fund is $2.000. There is no management fee and no sales charge.

Intrepid Small Cap fund
2.  Intrepid Small Cap (ICMAX)

The investment objective of Intrepid Small Cap fund is to seek long-term capital growth. This stock mutual fund uses its assets to purchase undervalued small capitalization companies stocks. It uses the Russell 2000 Index, the S&P Small Cap Index or the Dow Jones Wilshire US Small Cap Index as its benchmark.

Morningstar has given this fund a 5-star rating. Since its inception, this fund has always given positive return except on year 2008. The annual expense ratio of this fund is 1.40%. The annual holdings turnover as of February 13, 2012 is 88.00%. The 5-year annualized return of this fund is 12.18%.

The top 5 stocks in its holdings as of December 2011 are Bio-Rad Laboratories Inc (3.1%), CSG Systems International Inc (3.0%), Teleflex Inc (2.5%), Computer Sciences Corp (2.4%) and ManTech International Corp (2.4%).

3. Brown Capital Management Small Company Investor (BCSIX)

The Brown Capital Management Small Company fund invests >80% of its assets in the equity securities of small companies with total operating revenues of $250 million or less. This equity mutual fund typically invests in common stocks, but may invest in preferred stocks, convertible bonds, and warrants.

The total net assets of this small growth mutual fund are $1.40 billion. The annual expense ratio is 1.19%. The fund is currently managed by Robert E. Hall, Kempton M. Ingersol, Keith A. Lee and Amy Y. Zhang.

To open a brokerage account, investor needs initial investment of $5.000. There are 61 brokerages that sell this fund. This fund has 4-stars rating from Morningstar. The Morningstar analysts have rated this fund with Gold rating.

4. SouthernSun Small Cap Investor (SSSFX)

SouthernSun Small Cap Inv fund
The SouthernSun Small Cap fund is seeking to provide long-term appreciation of capital. This top small cap stock fund utilizes majority of its assets (>80%) to buy small cap securities. It uses the Russell 2000 Index as it guideline. This small cap mutual fund invests in 20-40 companies with niche dominant, attractively-valued with financial flexibility and uniquely-fitted management teams.

The CUSIP of this SouthernSun fund is 66537T19. The fund was incepted on October 2003. The 12b1 fee is 0.25%. The 3-year beta is 1.55. This fund has 3-year annualized return of 37.19% and 5-year annualized return of 9.37%.

The top industry weightings of this fund are Industrials/ Machinery (24.72%), Consumer Discretionary (16.34%), Consumer Staples (12.59%), Industrials/ Construction & Engineering (9.52%) and Materials (7.42%).

5. Janus Triton A (JGMAX)

The Janus Triton fund invests mainly in high growth small- and medium-sized companies common stocks. The companies typically have a market capitalization of less than $10 billion. This best small cap mutual fund may invest in foreign equity, emerging market equity, and debt securities.

Top Performer US Domestic Stock Mutual Funds of 2011

This small growth mutual fund has annual expense ratio of 1.01%. The average in the Small Growth category is 1.48%. This fund has total net assets of $2.59 billion.

Chad A. Meade has managed this fund since 2006. He is the Executive Vice President of Janus Triton Fund. This fund can be purchased from 40 brokerages with the minimum initial purchase of $2.500. The brokerages are JP Morgan, Ameriprise Brokerage, Raymond James, etc.

6. Fidelity Small Cap Discovery (FSCRX)

The Fidelity Small Cap Discovery investment fund invests most of assets (>80%) in securities of companies with small market capitalization. These companies typically are similar to companies in the Russell 2000 Index or the S&P SmallCap 600 Index. It may invest in domestic and foreign issuers. The fund invests in either growth stocks or value stocks or both (blend).

Morningstar analysts rated this fund with Silver rating and it also has 5-stars rating from Morningstar. The fund total net assets are $2.28 billion. The YTD return of this fund is 6.09%. This small blend mutual fund has 1-year annualized return of 5.39%.

This small cap stock mutual fund has 1.04% annual expense ratio. Since 2006, this fund is managed by Charles L. Myers. As of December 2011, this fund has a total of 67 holdings. The top 10 holdings represent 27.55% of the total portfolio.

7. PIMCO Small Cap StocksPLUS TR A (PCKAX)

The PIMCO Small Cap StocksPLUS TR fund seeks total return which exceeds that of the Russell 2000 Index. It may invest in common stocks, options, futures, options on futures and swaps. This best performer mutual fund may invest all of its assets in a basket of Russell 2000 Index stocks. It also may invest in exchange traded funds based on the Russell 2000 Index.

This PIMCO fund has dividend yield of 4.03%. The annual holdings turnover rate as of February 13, 2012 is 571.00%. This fund has 4-stars rating from Morningstar.

The effective duration of this PCKAX fund is 5.32 years. The top sector allocation as of January 2012 is Mortgage, Emerging Markets, Government bond (Treasury), and Swaps & Liquid Rates.

8. Needham Aggressive Growth (NEAGX)

The Needham Aggressive Growth fund uses its assets to purchase equity securities of domestic companies. It may invest in companies of all sizes or market caps, but it will focus in small cap companies. The fund may focus on healthcare, technology, business and consumer services, media, communications, financial and energy company stocks.

John Barr is the current fund manager of this fund. He managed this fund since 2010. The annual expense ratio of this fund is quite high (2.05%). The 5-year annualized return of this fund is 7.38%.

The minimum initial investment is $2.000. The top holdings of this fund as of December 2011 are Akamai Technologies Inc, Entropic Communications Inc, PDF Solutions Inc, Seagate Technology PLC and Formfactor Inc.

9. Lord Abbett Developing Growth A (LAGWX)

Lord Abbet Developing Growth Portfolio
The Lord Abbett Developing Growth fund invests mainly in equity securities of US and foreign small companies. The total net assets of this Lord Abbett fund are $2.32 billion. It has 4-stars rating from Morningstar. The current fund manager is F. Thomas O’Halloran.

The top sector breakdown as of January 2012 is Information Technology (32.7%), Health Care (20.0%) and Industrials (14.5%).

10. Transamerica Systematic Small/Medium Cap Value A (IIVAX)

The initial purchase of this Transamerica Systematic Small/Medium Cap Value fund is $1.000. This amount is applicable for brokerage or IRA account. The annual expense ratio of this fund is 1.43%. The YTD return of this fund is 6.06%.

This best small cap mutual fund has recorded 7 years of positive return since its inception in 2001. The 3-year annualized return of this fund is 28.28% and 10-year annualized return of 10.92%.

11. Dreyfus Opportunistic Small Cap (DSCVX)

The Dreyfus Opportunistic Small Cap mutual fund seeks capital appreciation by investing in small cap companies stocks. This fund is managed by David A. Daglio. Morningstar gave this fund 3-star rating. The fund is available for purchase from 99 brokerages. The dividend schedule is paid annually. The benchmark of this fund is Russell 2000 Index.

12. T. Rowe Price New Horizons (PRNHX)

The T. Rowe Price New Horizons fund invests in a diversified group of small and emerging growth companies. This fund has 5-year annualized return of 7.04%. It has total net assets of $8.59 billion. The annual expense ratio is 0.81%. The current lead manager of this PRNHX fund is Henry Ellenbogen.

Disclosure: No Position

Other Top Performer Mutual Funds of 2012 article:
Fund Performance:

NoNameTicker1 Year Return %3 Year Return %5 Year Return %10 Year Return %Expense Ratio
1Oceanstone FundOSFDX7.18%78.86%41.21%-1.84%
2Intrepid Small CapICMAX5.02%21.81%12.18%-1.41%
3Brown Capital Mgmt Small Co InvBCSIX8.56%26.87%9.44%5.72%1.29%
4SouthernSun Small Cap InvestorSSSFX14.32%37.19%9.37%-1.35%
5Janus Triton AJGMAX6.85%30.91%7.94%-1.02%
6Fidelity Small Cap DiscoveryFSCRX5.39%32.55%7.77%8.20%1.08%
7PIMCO Small Cap StocksPLUS TR APCKAX3.95%34.00%7.46%-1.09%
8Needham Aggressive GrowthNEAGX-6.10%23.72%7.38%7.91%1.97%
9Lord Abbett Developing Growth ALAGWX2.27%29.06%7.25%7.17%1.09%
10Transamerica Systematic Sm/Md Cap Val AIIVAX0.61%28.28%7.18%10.92%1.47%
11Dreyfus Opportunistic Small CapDSCVX-6.66%29.83%7.12%7.92%1.16%
12T. Rowe Price New HorizonsPRNHX13.72%32.80%7.04%8.92%0.81%

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