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To: Jay Rommel who wrote (80017)	10/8/1999 2:26:00 PM
From: GST	Respond to of 164684

Jay: an article on fund performance: gold and Japan net plays dominated last month. I have decided not to fight the tape -- going long again. I bailed on IBM after a half-day hold earlier in the week. I am going back in now. Good luck: see below Monday October 4, 5:33 pm Eastern Time Japan, gold mining top stock fund performers -Lipper By Cal Mankowski NEW YORK, Oct 4 (Reuters) - Mutual funds investing in Japanese stocks and in gold mining companies dominated Liper Inc.'s list of top performers in the third quarter of 1999. With a return of 40.1 percent, the $17.7 million Warburg Pincus Institutional Japan Growth Fund ranked tops among thousands of funds tracked by Lipper. The Warburg Pincus funds, part of Credit Suisse Group's asset management business, had three funds among the top 25 in Lipper's quarterly tabulation. The $664 million Warburg Pincus Japan Small Company Fund returned 37.10 percent to rank third and the $377 million Warburg Pincus Japan Growth Fund was in sixth place with a 34.8 percent return in the quarter. Funds investing in Japan accounted for 10 of the 25 best performers in the third quarter and there were nine gold Funds among the top 25. The American Century Global Gold fund was tops among the gold funds with a 28.9 percent return. The $20 million Gabelli Gold Fund returned 25.1 percent, placing it sixth among the gold funds. The fund's biggest holdings are Placer Dome Inc. (Toronto:PDG.TO - news) and Newmont Mining Corp. (NYSE:NEM - news) Caesar Bryan, manager of the Gabeli Gold Fund, said in a telephone interview that not only are European central banks restricting the sale of gold but they will also not engage in further lending of gold beyond what is already on the books. The moves together should have a significant impact on the market, he said. ''It's sending a message to hedge funds and others who made so much money shorting gold that the game was not a one-way bet,'' he said. Announcement of the central banks' action sent the gold price and stocks of gold mining companies soaring last week. Bryan said it is now time to see how the demand side of the gold equation responds to tighter supplies, but he believes demand will remain firm. If so, the outlook for the companies is good, Bryan said. Todd Jacobson, manager of both the Japan Small Company Fund and the Japan Growth Fund for Warburg Pincus, said stocks such as NTT Mobile Communications Network Inc. (NTT DoCoMo), and Funai Electric Co. Ltd. have contributed to the strong performance. The former company is one of the world's largest cellular telephone companies and the latter is a leader in equipment for printers. Funds investing in Japan as a group have been strong all year and Warburg Pincus Japan Small Company Fund is up 181 percent year-to-date while the Growth Fund is up 145 percent. Jacobson said restructuring moves announced by Japanese companies early in the year are now being implemented. At the same time Japan's economic backdrop improved with, among other things, cuts in both personal and corporate tax rates. Meanwhile, Japan has awakened to the fact that the United States has the lead in Internet business. ''The Internet has arrived in Japan, '' he said. ''A bunch of companies have been looking at business models in the U.S., taking equity stakes in some of those companies, and bringing those models back into Japan,'' he said. As for the high-flying yen, Jacobson said it reflects both an improving economy and renewed investor interest. ''The concern would be if it (the yen) appreciates too quickly,'' he said. ''But the yen at 105 (per dollar) is not a problem at all.'' The Driehaus Asia Pacific Growth Fund returned 29.5 percent in the quarter, finishing in 11th place. Roughly half of the fund is invested in Japanese stocks. William Andersen, senior vice president at Driehaus Capital Management Inc., said fund manager Eric Ritter has had a big weighting in the Japanese over-the-counter market which is up about 200 percent so far this year. ''We think the Japanese economy is being transformed,'' Andersen said, adding that new laws are helping smaller companies compete against larger, more established players. Lipper's final calculation for nearly 6,700 stock funds as a group showed a decline of 3.34 percent for the third quarter, the first such decline since the third quarter of 1998. Lipper is a Reuters company.