Briefly Noted

Features
Peerless Performers: The Top Funds Over 5 Years
To be rated tops, a mutual fund must beat a benchmark, and the crucial benchmark is peer group performance over five years. Who are the current top performers, and how did they outperform their peers? A look at the top funds and how they managed to distinguish themselves.

First Cut
The First Cut: Declining Total Assets and Positive Earnings Surprises
A starting point for investors. This issue's focus is on stocks with the greatest annual decline in total assets, based on a recent research paper suggesting these stocks tend to outperform stocks with the largest increases in total assets.

Stock Strategies
The Role of Diversification in an Individual Stock Portfolio
A large number of holdings makes it impossible for investors to know their companies well. At the other extreme, holding just a handful of stocks can subject you to unnecessary risk and also impairs your ability to make rational decisions under pressure. Managing these emotional realities is one of the more subjective aspects of risk management through diversification.

Investor Professor
Great Expectations: Earnings Estimates and Their Impact on Stock Prices
How often have you seen a stock's price fall after the company announced increased earnings, or rise after it announced that earnings fell? Expectations play a key role in determining a stock's price. A look at how earnings estimates can impact price.

Hot Links
Mortgage and Refinancing Tips
Web sites that can help you understand the issues involved in home mortgages include free advice, tips and calculators.

AAII Model Portfolios
Market Weakness Hits Model Shadow Stock Portfolio
The market weakness continues, but it has stopped hitting small and value stocks more than the general market. The Model Shadow Stock Portfolio is now performing better than the overall market. An update on the portfolio and its holdings.

Offbeat Offerings
Offbeat Offerings: Closed-End Funds
An investor reference for products that are not your typical offering. This issue's focus is on closed-end funds.

Stock Screens
Ralph Wanger's Survival Guide to Investing in Small-Cap Stocks
Ralph Wanger's investing style of holding small companies with financial strength, entrepreneurial managers, and understandable businesses allowed him to generate enviable returns while managing the Acorn Fund between 1970 and 2003. A look at AAII's screen that follows the Ralph Wanger approach.

Departments
Briefly Noted
Current news items of interest to individual investors.

Departments
Letters to the Editor
Member questions and comments on recent AAII Journal articles.