As many investors continue to flee equities in search of a safe haven, some have flocked to hard assets like gold. Mutual funds with heavy exposure to gold have benefited.

On Friday, gold prices stretched to new highs, with gold delivery for August settling at $1,258.30 an ounce after reaching as high as $1,263.70. The price jump is fueling speculation over how long gold will continue to shine and how well the commodity might serve the funds that hold it for the rest of the year.

Fred Dickson, chief market strategist at the Davidson Companies, says the rule of thumb for how much an investor should allocate to gold is twice the year-over-year change in the consumer price index, a commonly used inflation gauge. Total CPI was up 2% year-over-year in May. Dickson adds a little wiggle room and recommends a gold allocation of 5% to 6%. (He also considers other factors like the investor s age and a current inflation forecast.)

Dickson says he has used the inflation rule for the last 30 years. It s dynamic and generally reflects the biggest reason to own gold as an insurance policy against asset erosion due to inflation, he says.

In recent years, gold has been used as a dollar replacement, he says, so some critics argue that his inflation rule weights gold too lightly. However, with the metal now trading near its all-time high price and other asset hedges like common stocks trading well off their recent highs, the rule of thumb seems appropriate, he says. As inflation expands, if it does, investors should boost their allocation to gold or other hard assets, he says. If we see deflation, investors will focus on bonds, not hard assets such as gold for potential return.

In this week s fund screen, SmartMoney looked at funds that offer investors exposure to gold, mostly through equities. Morningstar cautions that although such funds can help diversify portfolios rooted in stocks, they come with a lot of volatility, making them suitable only for those more-aggressive investors who can ride out some very large bumps in the road.

We searched for funds in Morningstar s equity precious metals category that had better-than-average performance track records over the trailing three- and five-year time periods for their peer group and that were outperforming their category year to date. We also required that the funds keep their annual expenses nominal. The funds are up between 17% and 20% year to date, compared with an average of 16% for their category.

Four funds made the list. The results included one class of Evergreen s Precious Metals (EKWAX) fund, which Evergreen says normally invests at least 80% of its assets in investments related to precious metals, including equity securities, debt securities and stocks of subsidiaries of the fund. Its top holding, Randgold Resources (GOLD), is up 73% from its 52- week low. The fund also owns Newcrest mining, Goldcorp (GG), Barrick Gold (ABX) and Kinross Gold (KGC).

The Oppenheimer Gold & Special Minerals (OPGSX) fund also made the list. Morningstar analysts say it has benefited from gains in large companies like Goldcorp and smaller miners like Centamin Egypt (Red Back Mining) and Red Back Mining (), the fund s largest holding.

The Criteria: The funds on the table have a minimum investment of $1,000 or less. They are open to new money and charge an annual expense ratio under 1.5%. In addition, their performance track records were above average for their category over the trailing three- and five-year time periods and year to date. They're also (dramatically, in this case) ahead of the S&P 500 so far this year. As usual, we did not include load funds.