The fund is performing better now, he said, "but I can't tell people we've solved the problem" of poor performance.

Do its mutual funds perform well, and are there enough of them?

Most such funds perform well when long-term interest rates fall rapidly.

But the original funds did not perform well, and the group began evolving two or three years ago.

The better the fund performs on its own, the less the city must contribute.

But under his management, he said, the fund had performed well through early December 2000.

For years, the data confirmed the theory that small funds perform better than large ones.

"I don't want to hide from that fact, but the overall fund has still performed very well."

One fund performed better than the newsletter, the other three worse.

Three funds performed best over the last quarter, year and five years.