Many Berkshire investors are just as happy to treat it like a value-oriented mutual fund.

Janus added a value-oriented fund this year and two sector funds, one focused on technology and one on health stocks, at the end of 1998.

Their idea was to treat Berkshire like a value-oriented mutual fund and use it, along with utility stocks, as a counterweight to their technology stocks.

Among value-oriented funds, those that focus on large stocks advanced 1.3 percent while small-company funds surged 3 percent.

One noticeable standout among the biggest 401(k) funds is Fidelity Equity-Income, a value-oriented fund that is up 19.3 percent in the last year.

Among value-oriented funds, the percentage of assets in technology stocks was in the low teens.

The immediate effect will be to lower the ratings of some value-oriented funds, because value funds have tended to outperform growth-oriented funds over the last two years.

Among midcap value-oriented funds, the figure is greater than 13 percent.

But a handful of value-oriented funds are doing much better than their more traditional peers.

FROM these findings, investors can conclude that value-oriented funds make sense only for relatively short-term bets that value stocks will outperform growth stocks.