The Daily Screen: The Best Telecommunications Funds

Let's just say communications stocks and funds are getting their bells rung this year.

These funds, which tend to blur the line between tech and telecom, rode networking and wireless stocks to a 70.1% return on average last year when Wall Street saw unlimited growth for those shops. But this year valuation fears and some growth jitters for bellwethers such as Nokia(NOK Quote), down 17% this year, and Nortel Networks(NT Quote), down 21% since Jan. 1, have whacked these funds. Their long-term returns still smoke the S&P 500's, but their average 18.7% loss since Jan. 1 is the worst among all U.S. stock fund categories.

Poor Communications The sector's had a tough time this year.
	Avg. communications fund	S&P 500
YTD return	-18.7%	-5.3%
1-year return	3.4	7.6
5-year return	24.6	20.9
10-year return	24.3	19
Source: Morningstar. Annualized performance figures through Oct. 31.

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