Sector report: Europe's shining stars

The past few years have proved turbulent for European equities, but no more so than in the last year. The mild strength in European equities seen in the first half of 2011 was then eclipsed by an eventful summer, to many investors' surprise. So far, 2012 has been no better. After a promising start to the year where continental European equities rose more than 9% in the first quarter (as measured by the MSCI Europe ex UK Index), these lost much of their gains in the second quarter, tumbling nearly 8%. A clear pattern was that nearly any kind of risk cost fund managers and their investo...