Mid Cap Company
Risk. Investments in mid cap companies may be riskier, less liquid, more volatile and more
vulnerable to economic, market and industry changes than investments in larger, more established
companies. The securities of smaller companies may trade less frequently and in smaller volumes
than securities of larger companies. As a result, changes in the price of securities issued by
such companies may be more sudden or erratic than the prices of other equity securities,
especially over the short term.
Growth Investing Risk. Because growth investing attempts to identify companies that the adviser believes will experience rapid earnings growth relative to value or other
types of stocks, growth stocks may trade at higher multiples of current earnings compared to
value or other stocks, leading to inflated prices and thus potentially greater declines in value.
Derivatives Risk. Derivatives, including futures contracts, may be riskier than other types of investments and may increase the
volatility of the Fund. Derivatives may be sensitive to changes in economic and market conditions
and may create leverage, which could result in losses that significantly exceed the Fund’s
original investment. The Fund may be more volatile than if the Fund had not been leveraged
because the leverage tends to exaggerate any effect on the value of the Fund’s portfolio
securities. Certain derivatives expose the Fund to counterparty risk, which is the risk that the
derivative counterparty will not fulfill its contractual obligations (and includes credit risk associated with the counterparty). Certain derivatives are synthetic instruments that attempt to replicate the
performance of certain reference assets. With regard to such derivatives, the Fund does not have
a claim on the reference assets and is subject to enhanced counterparty risk. Derivatives may not
perform as expected, so the Fund may not realize the intended benefits. When used for hedging,
the change in value of a derivative may not correlate as expected with the security or other risk
being hedged. In addition, given their complexity, derivatives expose the Fund to risks of mispricing or improper valuation. Derivatives also can expose the Fund to derivative liquidity risk, which includes risks involving
the liquidity demands that derivatives can create to make payments of margin, collateral, or
settlement payments to counterparties, legal risk, which includes the risk of loss resulting from insufficient or unenforceable contractual documentation, insufficient capacity or authority of the Fund’s
counterparty and operational risk, which includes documentation or settlement issues, system
failures, inadequate controls and human error.
Industry and Sector Focus Risk. At times, the Fund may increase the relative emphasis of its investments in a particular industry or sector. The prices of securities of
issuers in a particular industry or sector may be more susceptible to fluctuations due to changes
in economic or business conditions, government regulations, availability of basic resources or supplies, contagion risk within a particular industry or sector or to other industries or sectors, or other events that affect
that industry or sector more than securities of issuers in other industries and sectors. To the
extent that the Fund increases the relative emphasis of its investments in a particular industry or sector, the value of the Fund’s shares may fluctuate in response to events affecting that industry or sector.
Healthcare Sector Risk. Companies in the healthcare sector are subject to extensive government regulation and their profitability can be significantly affected by
restrictions on govern
ment reimbursement for medical expenses, rising costs of medical products and services, pricing pressure
(including price discounting), limited product lines and an increased emphasis on the delivery of
healthcare through outpatient services. Companies in the healthcare sector are heavily dependent on
obtaining and defending patents, which may be time consuming and costly, and the expiration of
patents may also adversely affect the profitability of these companies. Healthcare companies are
also subject to extensive litigation based on product liability and similar claims. In addition, their products can become obsolete due to industry innovation, changes in technologies or other market developments. Many new
products in the healthcare sector require significant research and development and may be subject
to regulatory approvals, all of which may be time consuming and costly with no guarantee that any
product will come to market.
Industrials Sector Risk. The industrials sector may be adversely affected by changes in the supply of and demand for products and services, product obsolescence, claims for
environmental damage or product liability and general economic conditions, among other
factors.
Technology Sector Risk. Market or economic factors impacting technology companies could have a major effect on the value of the Fund’s investments. The value of stocks of technology companies is particularly vulnerable to rapid
changes in technology product cycles, rapid product obsolescence and frequent new product
introduction, unpredictable changes in growth rates and competition for the services of qualified
personnel, and government regulation and competition, both domestically and internationally,
including competition from foreign competitors with lower production costs. Stocks of technology
companies, especially those of smaller, less-seasoned companies, tend to be more volatile than the overall market. Technology companies are heavily dependent on patent and intellectual property rights, the loss or
impairment of which may adversely affect profitability.
Transactions Risk. The Fund could experience a loss and its liquidity may be negatively impacted when selling securities to meet redemption requests. The risk of loss
increases if the redemption requests are unusually large or frequent or occur in times of overall
market turmoil or declining prices. Similarly, large purchases of Fund shares may adversely affect the Fund’s performance to the extent that the Fund is delayed in investing new cash and is required to maintain a larger
cash position than it ordinarily would.
Investments in the Fund are not deposits or obligations of, or guaranteed or endorsed by, any bank and are not insured or guaranteed by the
FDIC, the Federal Reserve Board or any other government agency.
You could lose money investing in the
Fund.
The Fund’s Past
Performance
This section provides some indication of the risks of
investing in the Fund. The bar chart shows how the performance of the Fund’s Class I Shares has varied from year to year for the past ten calendar years. The table shows the
average annual total returns over the past one year, five years and ten years. The table compares the Fund’s performance to the performance of the Russell 3000® Index and Russell Midcap® Growth Index. The