Their words of advice for fund investors are simply to a longer view of the market, don't get sector-happy and overweight your mutual fund portfolio with one-sector stock funds, and, make sure that you create a diversified portfolio of funds to modify risk.

"My forecast is for slush: moderate economic growth, slightly higher prices, improving corporate profits and an accommodating interest rate structure," says Herrmann, at Waddel & Reed, in Shawnee Mission, Kansas. "Considering the recent climate, this is not a bad scenario."

Herrmann says if inflation where to pop, interest rates would rise as well which would put pressure on bond and stock prices. If deflation came along, he said both corporate profits and stock prices could go down. "Slush, " he says, " Puts us in a position where interest rates have room to go down and corporate profits could improve. Both trends would aid financial asset prices."

Swanson thinks that high-grade corporate bonds look attractive in the current economic environment, and, that they are at their cheapest levels this century. "These companies are not only survivors but drivers of the U.S. economy, " says this Boston-based pro.

Ed Baldini, a member of the MFS Value Equity Team, is optimistic about the market next year.

He says that value investing tends to outperform growth during two distinct periods of a market cycle---during periods of market volatility and in early stages of economic recovery. On the other hand, Baldini says that value stocks tend to underperform growth stocks in the later stagers of economic growth periods as earnings growth begins to moderate.

"Despite the record relative returns of value over the last year and a half, " says Baldini, " We believe that the value sector can still provide attractive returns relative to the general market."