We still like some Ivy funds

Article Excerpt

In the past, investors bought mutual funds within the “fund families” promoted by fund sellers for a couple of main reasons. Mutual funds within a particular fund family often shared some key investment characteristic, such as a conservative or aggressive investment approach, or a stress on value as opposed to growth. That let investors switch between funds within the family at little or no charge. This way, they could rebalance their portfolios and still maintain a common investment philosophy. But it also encouraged frequent trading. That can cause investors to miss out on some of their biggest gains. However, as a result of corporate mergers and takeovers in the mutual-fund industry and more aggressive marketing, a fund’s membership in a fund family now has little bearing on its approach or its appeal as an investment. Below, for instance, we analyze five funds from the Ivy Group. (Note that Ivy is part of Mackenzie Financial, which, in turn, is part of IGM Financial. The contact…