Utility Stock Performance

The Wall Street Journal:

The most-energized mutual funds this year include a category sometimes associated with the most conservative investors: utility-sector funds.

These mutual funds have delivered high-wattage performance, especially those that bulked up on shares of telecommunications and power merchants that benefit from high electricity prices. But with these stocks' valuations getting richer and the broader market increasingly favoring "growth" stocks -- those of companies with quickly expanding earnings -- it isn't clear how long these funds can continue to generate strong returns.