CAN investing in unit trusts make you rich - really rich? Many would doubt it. Unit trusts can appear a pretty pedestrian way of accumulating capital.
How could a stranger - the fund manager - do such a good job of investing on your behalf that you find yourself inspecting Rolls Royces, Peak apartments and luxury yachts with a view to purchase.
That sort of wealth, of course, tends to come from success in property speculation or other big business, not careful investment. Most would believe that the only funds that could provide really massive returns would be the funds operated by investment heroes such as George Soros of Quantum Fund and Warren Buffet of Berkshire Hathaway - which is actually a quoted company, although it operates like a fund.
Yet, television viewers will be familiar with the trio of chums, which back in their youth received a lump sum. Two had a good time, the third boring bloke invested it in mutual funds. Now, greyer and wiser, two of them sit fishing on the quay, while the investor sweeps by in his yacht.
Fanciful? Not really. A search through Standard & Poor's Micropal long-term fund tables throw up two or three dozen fund management groups that have turned every $100 invested 20 years ago into $1,000 or more today.
There are more than 30 among the funds authorised for sale in Hong Kong by the Securities and Futures Commission. The list is one of the best advertisements for diversified holdings that the industry could have. The top performer is Schroders' UK Smaller Companies fund - which has returned 1,997 per cent over the past two decades. Other members of the 1,500 plus club include Threadneedle Funds' UK Income fund (1,953 per cent), Templeton's World Fund (1,641 per cent), HSBC's GIF Asian Equity (1,566 per cent), and, incredibly considering the disaster that had been Japan's stock market until recently, Schroders' Japan fund, which is still showing a 20-year return of 1,543 per cent.
Moving beyond the range of the SFC-authorised funds can bring investors into some pretty heady country as far as simple returns are concerned.