Money 70: Best mutual funds and ETFs

(Money Magazine) -- It's tough to stay calm these days. Though the market has rebounded from its Great Recession lows, fears about the eurozone debt crisis and the struggling U.S. economy remain front-and-center on a lot of people's minds.

Amid such instability it sure would be nice to be able to rely on a steady, long-term investing strategy. That's the basic premise behind the MONEY 70, our recommended list of mutual and exchange-traded funds. Not surprisingly, the list is chock-full of index funds, which by nature never veer off course.

For actively managed funds, you want to park your dough with a professional at the helm who is capable of holding firm in the face of market volatility, and a fund family that keeps fees low and rewards its managers for earning solid long-term returns. "Most active managers trade too often and rack up costs in the process," notes NYU Stern finance professor Robert Whitelaw.

The average tenure of a Money 70 fund manager is 10.7 years, versus 5.5 years for the industry. And the average expense ratio for our actively managed stock funds is just 0.7%, versus 1.2% for the industry.

Having a dependable strategy doesn't guarantee stability in returns, of course. In fact, when a fund doggedly follows a certain stock-picking methodology -- say, it buys undervalued small firms -- it generally lags when investors are flocking to other types of stocks.

So while long-term performance counts, we don't kick funds off the list for a rotten year. In the long run, you'll do better sticking with funds that stick to their knitting. Eighty percent of the MONEY 70's actively managed funds beat their category average over the past five years.