Empower Funds, Inc., located in Greenwood Village, CO, has been in business for over 30 years and has more than 40 mutual funds across active and passive strategies, target date and risk allocation, and guaranteed income options. Most funds are sub-advised by a leading investment manager, Empower Capital Management, LLC (ECM), with $125 billion in assets as of Sept. 30, 2023. All these attributes make Empower Funds a reliable investment choice.
We have chosen three Empower mutual funds — Empower Small Cap Value Inv MXLSX, Empower Mid Cap Value Inv MXMVX, and Empower Moderately Agg Prfl Inv MXBPX— that investors should buy now for the long term. These funds have a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank #1 (Strong Buy) or 2 (Buy), positive three-year and five-year annualized returns, minimum initial investments within $5000 and expense ratios considerably lower than the category average. So, these funds have given a comparatively stronger performance and carry a lower fee.
Empower Small Cap Value Inv fund invests in equity securities of small-cap companies. MXLSX advisors categorize small-cap companies based on their market capitalization, aligning with the range defined by the Russell 2000 Value Index during the initial acquisition.
Joseph R. Gatz has been the lead manager of MXLSX since Dec. 31, 2000. Most of the fund’s holdings were in companies like Moog Inc. (1.5%), Knife River Corp (1.1%) and Weatherford International plc (1%) as of Sept. 30, 2024.
MXLSX’s 3-year and 5-year annualized returns are 4.7% and 9.1%, respectively. Its net expense ratio is 1.09%. MXLSX has a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank #1.
To see how this fund performed compared to its category, and other 1 and 2 Ranked Mutual Funds, please click here.
Empower Mid Cap Value Inv invests in equity securities of mid-cap companies. MXMVX advisors classify mid-cap companies based on their market capitalization, adhering to the range specified by the Russell Midcap Growth Index at the time of the initial purchase.
Len Ioffe has been the lead manager of MXMVX since Oct. 24, 2011. Most of the fund’s holdings were in D.R. Horton, Inc. (1.5%), AMETEK, Inc. (1.3%) and Xcel Energy Inc. (1.3%) as of Sept. 30, 2024.
MXMVX’s 3-year and 5-year returns are 5.5% and 8.9%, respectively. MXMVX has a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank #1 and an annual expense ratio of 1.15%.
Empower Moderately Agg Prfl Inv fund invests in international funds, emerging markets funds, small-cap funds, mid-cap funds, large-cap funds and short-term bond funds.