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https://www.wsj.com/articles/for-tech-funds-2019-has-been-hard-to-beat-11567994881
What would you call it if you gave a party and just about everybody came?
Maybe, the Tech Rally of 2019.
After a tough 2018 when riskier or “high beta” stocks got nailed in the fourth quarter, tech has had a revival this year that is startling in both its magnitude and its breadth. The average tech-stock fund tracked by Morningstar was up 22% for the year at the middle of last week, compared with a 16% climb in the S&P 500. Only seven tech funds in Morningstar’s database were trailing the broad market, but the mean actively managed tech fund was still 5.6 percentage points behind the surge in the S&P 500 Information Tech subindex.
Which tech stocks would you be interested in investing in? Join the conversation below.
All sorts of different tech-investing strategies are working. What follows is a look at the portfolios of some of the top performers.
The top five contributors to the fund’s gain, Mr. Turner says, have all been payments-related stocks such as Visa, Mastercard, PayPal and First Data Corp. The fund added to its positions in Visa and Mastercard in the second quarter. After Worldpay and First Data were acquired the fund added to its positions in the acquirers, Fidelity National Information Services and Fiserv.
Passively managed tech funds have seen even bigger returns than their actively managed brethren.
“The next 12 months will largely be about the disconnect between tech and the rest of the market,” says Mr. Nadig, who argues that so far tech has been less exposed to trade tensions than other stocks. “This can’t last forever, and with the additional tariffs coming on, I think we’re set up for a rough patch. That’s part of why we see so much volatility in the sector.”
“We have an ‘overweight’ ranking on tech and are wondering about the same thing,” Mr. Stovall says. “The chart shows tech remaining strong versus the S&P 500, but the strength has waned over the past year.”
Mr. Mullaney is a writer in Maplewood, N.J. He can be reached at [email protected].