The Berwyn Income Fund, advised by Chartwell Investment Partners in Berwyn, is leading the way in active fund management with its steady and consistent approach to building its portfolio, writes Sarah Max for Barron’s.

Co-managed by George Cipolloni and Mark Saylor, the fund has earned its clients an average return of 6.8 percent over the last decade, which is better than 98 percent of its Morningstar peers. And the fund has achieved this with 25 percent less risk when measured using standard deviation.

“This is a fund that is built from the bottom up,” said Saylor.

Restricted to income-generating investments, it can have 30 percent of its assets in dividend-paying stocks with the rest of the funds invested in fixed income and cash. To find stocks, the pair is constantly analyzing dividend-paying stocks, investment-grade bonds, high-yield bonds, and other assets.

They are also very careful not to get too excited about an investment opportunity when searching for discounted securities.

“We’ve avoided many areas of excess exuberance over the years by attempting to act rationally at market peaks,” said Cipolloni. “The fund fell just 10 percent in 2008, half the average drop of similar funds, and still managed to return 30 percent in 2009.”

Read more about the fund’s performance in Barron’s here.