Four Funds That Did the Nearly Impossible

As the price of petroleum and the stock market collapsed in October, it would seem almost beyond belief that the only closed-end equity funds to gain were energy plays.

Intelligent investment strategies involving energy infrastructure, production and delivery, with a heavy focus on natural gas, helped propel each of the quartet of funds in the accompanying table to positive returns last month. They were the only closed-end equity vehicles with performance numbers prepended by plus signs.

Like virtually all "long-side" stock funds, each of the four is lower for the year to date, albeit by distinctly lesser magnitudes than the S&P 500. ...