The average domestic stock fund, for example, was up 18.4 percent last year.

For the year, the average general domestic stock fund rose 11.9 percent.

Still, so far even domestic mutual funds are out of the question.

For the entire second quarter, the average domestic stock fund lost 2.8 percent.

Over the 12 months through September, the average domestic stock fund rose by 16.5 percent.

The study also looked at domestic funds but found the performance gap to be far smaller.

That's less than half the loss suffered by the average domestic stock fund in the same period.

In July, however, investors have continued to put most of their money into domestic stock funds.

Among general domestic stock funds, the gain for the quarter was 2.4 percent.

The average domestic stock fund returned a decent 4.4 percent.