Retirement & Financial Planning Report

If you are interested in investing outside the United States, how should you proceed? One way is to choose among hundreds of mutual funds. Mutual funds investing outside the United States may be divided into two categories: (1) International funds. These hold only foreign stocks. They offer a pure play on non-U.S. stocks. Top performers include American Century International Growth Fund (800/345-2021), which returned nearly 25% per year for the past five years and UMB Scout Worldwide Fund (800/996-2862), with a five-year average return over 20%. (2) Global funds. These may hold U.S. stocks as well. Thus, they’re more flexible than international funds. A leader here has been Janus Worldwide Fund (800/525-8983), with an annualized return of nearly 31% for the past five years.