We've noted before that there have been some big winners in the on-going credit crunch. One of them appears to be the Franklin Templeton Mutual Financial Services fund. Manager Chuck Lahr had the foresight to rotate out of U.S. financial services stock and into European financial stocks, which have generally performed well, or at least not as bad during the crunch. Bottom line: The fund has returned an average 13.7 percent annually over the past three years. That compares with 8 percent for his peer funds, according to Fortune. You could argue that he left some bucks on the table by rotating out in 2004, but that's merely a quibble. The big issue now is whether valuations in the U.S. have declined to the point where they are relatively more attractive.   

For more:
- here's an interview in Fortune