Dividend Growth Trust Rising Div Gr A ICRDX Mutual Fund

Investing in high dividend mutual funds can be very rewarding. These mutual funds, also known as equity income mutual funds, provide regular income for investor and they are less volatile than other funds such as growth mutual funds. One of the best high dividend mutual funds is Dividend Growth Trust Rising Div Gr fund.

Dividend Growth Trust Rising Div Gr A (ICRDX)

The Dividend Growth Trust Rising Dividend Growth fund seeks long-term capital growth and current income. The US stock mutual fund utilizes most of its assets (>80%) to buy equity securities of dividend-paying domestic and foreign companies with market capitalization >$500 million. The companies have increased their dividend payments to stockholders for each of the past 10 years or more. This equity fund will focus its investments in a group of 25-50 companies. It may invest in MLPs, REIT, and other dividend paying entities. This equity mutual fund is non-diversified.

Fund Details

Dividend Growth Trust Rising Div Gr 

• Fund Inception Date: 03/17/2004
• Ticker Symbol: ICRDX
• CUSIP: 255378101
• Beta (3yr): 0.70
• Rank in category (YTD): 98%
• Category: Large Blend
• Distribution: 1.56%
• Capital Gains: 0%
• Expense Ratio: 1.65%  
• Net Assets: $ 182.82 million
• Number of Years Up: 5 years
• Number of Years Down: 2 years
• Annual Turnover Rate: 51.85%

Updated on 2/27/2012

The inception date of this fund is March 17, 2004. The lead manager of this fund since 2004 is Thomas W. L. Cameron. He is the Director and Founding Member of DGA (Dividend Growth Advisors). This best mutual fund is rated with 4-stars rating from Morningstar. The dividend yield of this large blend stock mutual fund is 1.56%. This dividend is distributed quarterly. The annual expense ratio of this fund (1.65%) is higher compared to the average in the Large Blend category (1.12%).

This mutual fund has a 5-year average return of 4.57%. The fund also has 5 years of positive return and 2 years of negative return since 2004. The best 1-year total return was in 2009 with 26.79% and the worst 1-year total return was in 2008 with -26.11%. Based on the load adjusted return, this top stock fund has returned 3.34% over the past 5-year. The performance of this fund for the past years is:

• Year 2010: 18.72%
• Year 2009: 26.79%
• Year 2008: -26.11%
• Year 2007: 8.90%

The minimum initial investment is $5,000 for brokerage account and $1,000 for retirement account. The other classes of this fund are Class C (ICRGX) and Class I (ICRIX). The maximum sales charge for ICRDX is 5.75%, while the sales charge for ICRGX and ICRIX is 0.00%. This fund is available for purchase from 30 brokerages such as Scottrade Load, JP Morgan, E Trade No Load Fee, Firstrade, Matrix Financial Solutions, Fidelity Retails Fund Network, E Trade Financial, etc.

Fund Composition

As of January 2012, the top 10 holdings out of 41 total holdings are Fastenal Co (64.5%), TEVA Pharmaceutical (29.2%), McDonald’s Corp (29.0%), Novo-Nordisk (22.7%), Norfolk Southern Corp (22.0%), Vodaphone Group (20.1%), Praxiar Inc (19.7%), International Business Machines (18.6%), Franklin Resources Inc (14.8%), and Roper Industries Inc (11.8%).  The top 5 sectors are Energy (21.2%), Industrials (17.6%), Discretionary (12.4%), Cash (11.0%) and Health Care (10.2%).

Investing in this mutual fund involve principal risks such as Stock Market Risk, Non-Diversification risk, Foreign Securities risk, Smaller Companies risk, MLPs & Real Estate Investment Trusts risk, Management risk.

Disclosure: No Position

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• Burnham A (BURHX) Mutual Fund