Fidelity soloist Danoff carries $100 bln weight

By Tim McLaughlin

BOSTON (Reuters) - Fidelity Investments' Will Danoff again is managing over $100 billion in assets by himself, raising concerns among investors that the manager of the Contrafund - a staple in millions of U.S. retirement accounts - may struggle to maintain his stellar performance record.

Running big sums of money alone has tripped up plenty of portfolio managers. Solo managers torpedoed by burnout, asset bloat and poor performance include some of Danoff's Fidelity colleagues like Bob Stansky and Harry Lange and fallen stars elsewhere like Legg Mason's Bill Miller.

The key question investors are asking is whether the strategies that led to Danoff's impressive success over the past 22 years will continue to serve him as the fund grows ever larger. Contrafund has beaten 97 percent of similar funds over the past decade, according to Morningstar, and doubled the return of the Standard & Poor's 500.

"I always worry about the size of the fund, as investors did with Magellan for many years and how we do now with the Pimco Total Return," said Dave Caruso, founding chairman and managing director of Coastal Capital Group LLC in Danvers, Massachusetts.

Still, Danoff remains one of the firm's top picks among managers who invest in large companies, Caruso said. Danoff can draw on Fidelity's vast research and trading heft to aid his investing, Caruso noted. "What it comes down to is that I still trust his judgment," Caruso said.

Danoff has deftly piloted the fund through both of the past decade's bear markets. He invested heavily in Apple