Since international exposure usually represents only a small part of investors’ assets, it is most often concentrated only in the style that has recently outperformed as advisors rarely have the capacity to offer more diversification. Recognizing that demand for style-specific non-US investing will grow, MFS has bundled together its five flagship international products to provide an easy and cost-effective access to truly global markets.

Investing in Asian Pacific stocks is a daunting task. With more than fifteen exchanges, currencies and economic cycles, investment managers need a specific focus and well-honed quantitative discipline. The ICON Asia-Pacific Region Fund invests in sectors and industries rather than companies to mitigate country and currency risks. The sectors and industries across the region may be a better way to exploit investment arbitrage than to build a country-specific fund.

Jeffrey Mortimer’s job isn’t stock picking. Instead, he picks managers, and more importantly, he picks how much capital is allocated to each manager. The goal is to achieve a broadly diversified international fund that can have a value tilt or a growth tilt depending on the macroeconomic environment. A key aspect of the fund’s strategy is the focus on future, not past performance, and that is achieved through a proprietary mean reversion model.

Investing in stocks and bonds has been accepted as a diversification strategy and now increasingly real estate has been regarded as a way to diversify investment portfolios. Investing in real estate companies requires understanding of management, hard assets and cash flows at the property and company levels. Joel Beam at Kensington Real Estate Securities Fund looks for high quality real estate and management teams that have demonstrated track records.

Sophia Collier, who has been at the helm of the Citizens Value Fund for the last three years, has an unusual background for portfolio management. As a successful entrepreneur, she brings not only the business perspective, but also the understanding that the world is a dynamic place and you need the open mindedness and the courage to adjust your views frequently. The fund is looking for the industry underdogs that, under the right circumstances, can benefit both from the earnings growth...

In a world where oil supply is tight, demand is rising, and OPEC plays a big role in pricing, it’s hardly surprising that investors are benefiting from the strong surge in energy prices. Tim Guinness, the manager of the Guinness Atkinson global energy fund, believes that the big picture makes this trend durable for the years to come. He manages a portfolio of 28 equally weighted stocks with strong discipline and a belief that the run up is not over yet.

Investing with many fund managers can be better than sticking with one manager. Every fund manager has tough periods and managers go in and out of favor. How about investing in a fund that puts managers with consistent records who are stable hands at investing together during volatile markets? This is what the Vantagepoint Aggressive Opportunities Fund does. The fund provides an opportunity to invest with some of the best growth stock investors around.

Growth stocks may bring great returns, but they usually come with more volatility and risks. With that in mind, AIM Capital Development Fund looks for sustainable growth at a reasonable price in the mid-cap space. The fund places a strong emphasis on cash flow reinvestment, balance sheet metrics, return on capital, and overall shareholder profitability.

The value search of the Fifth Third Multi-Cap Value Fund is not confined to a specific sector or market cap range. With a contrarian approach and a long-term outlook, the fund relies on an experienced research team to find those gems, ignored by Wall Street, that have stopped shining only temporarily.

The Fifth Third Disciplined Large-Cap Value Fund exploits the tendency of the market to price stocks based on an extrapolation of recent results. In fact, growth rates exhibit little persistence over time, so that buying out-of-favor, low expectation stocks with low P/E’s, low price to book ratios and above average yields is a winning strategy.