Oppenheim thrives

Rehab Great Investment Race:October was a very positive month for the Rehab Great Investment Race, with the five participants racking up combined gains of more than 50 per cent and bringing the total raised so far to €79,026.

Leading the way yet again was Oppenheim, which not only held onto its position at the top of the leaderboard, but also managed to generate a monthly return of 17.8 per cent. Since the competition started Oppenheim has contributed more than €41,000 of the €79,026 raised.

The fund's top-class performance was again the result of significant trading, with its manager Stephen Hynes buying four stocks and selling five.

However, his main gains came from two stocks held over into October - Trina Solar and Renesola - both of which are involved in the manufacture of parts for solar panels. They produced gains of about 18 and 22 per cent respectively for the fund when sold during the month.

At the end of October, Hynes was left holding just one stock, Ultrashort QQQ Proshares, with the remainder in cash. He said this holding, an exchange traded fund which appreciates in value as the Nasdaq declines, is representative of his cautious stance on markets at the moment.

October was also a good month for Seamus Magner, heading up the race fund at Irish Life Investment Managers. The fund gained 13.1 per cent, good enough for second place in the monthly rankings and helping it climb to third place in the overall table, with a total gain of 14.1 per cent, or €14,053.

A flurry of trading helped Magner excel in October. After buying and selling 12 stocks he ended the month holding onto just Burren Energy, an oil and gas exploration group that has been the subject of recent takeover speculation.

During the month his best performers were Irish homebuilder McInerney, on which he made a 4.5 per cent return in one day; UK mortgage lender Bradford & Bingley, which he held onto during the Northern Rock debacle and sold out of just after it assured investors everything was okay; and Nobel Biocare, a Swiss medical supplies company whose shares rallied during a very well received post-results conference call.

Elsewhere, AIB Investment Managers slipped one place in the monthly ranking to third, but held onto second position in the overall table, with an 11.3 per cent gain for October. Since the start of the race the fund is up 22.6 per cent.

During the month Keith Johnstone, the fund's manager, sold out of two stocks, SAP and Electronic Arts, replacing them with Flir Systems, a manufacturer of thermal imaging equipment, and footwear group Crocs.

It proved a good decision as Flir gained 18 per cent in the month, matching the increase made by another of the fund's holding, Nintendo. Johnstone also held onto Rio Tinto and National Oilwell.

KBC Asset Management retreated back to fourth place in the monthly and overall rankings, with a 6 per cent gain on the month, bringing the total increase to 7.8 per cent.

Noel O'Halloran, the fund's manager, again made no trades, holding onto the five stocks he has held since the competition started.

Bottom-ranked Bank of Ireland Asset Management (BIAM) in October recorded its first monthly gain since the outset of the contest, adding 3.8 per cent to the value of what had become a rather depleted fund after losses in the previous two months.

BIAM's fund now stands at €93,573, up from €90,130 at the end of September, but remains the only one of the five participants to be down from the initial €100,000.

During the period, Pat Cunningham, the fund's manager, made no trades, holding onto shares in Australian medical diagnostics company Sonic Healthcare, which he bought in September, and sitting tight on the three other stocks he had at the start of the competition.

These are Vallourec, a French services company which makes metal pipes, steel giant Arcelor Mittal and Hong Kong property developer Sun Hung Kai Properties.

Cunningham said this week that he was happy with his holding and in particular its performance in October.