Jack Laporte of T. Rowe Price Associates Inc.; Dan Fuss of Loomis Sayles & Co. Inc.; and Jack Mussey of Colonial Newport Tiger have been named managers of the year by Morningstar Inc., Chicago.
This is the first time since the firm began giving the honors in 1987 that more than one top mutual fund portfolio manager has been honored.
Mr. Laporte runs T. Rowe Price New Horizons, a small-cap fund that chalked up a 55% return in 1995 with less in technology stocks than many other growth funds. Mr. Fuss runs Loomis Sayles Bond, which lost just 4% during the bond market debacle of 1994 and followed it up with a stocklike 28% in 1995.
Few funds resemble the value-oriented fund, which rotates among sectors and often holds "busted" convertibles.
Mr. Mussey of Newport Tiger, the first fund to specialize in Asia excluding Japan, managed to advance 16% in 1995, a year most emerging markets managers would like to forget.
Morningstar said Tiger "may be the best near-term choice among this year's winners," because its securities haven't seen the same rise in valuations as the others.
