The Fund invests primarily in common stocks of small capitalization companies that demonstrate a consistent pattern of earnings and dividend growth. Crawford Investment Counsel, Inc. (the “Adviser”), manages the Fund by investing primarily in companies with market capitalizations of $5 billion or less at the time of purchase. The Adviser believes investing long-term in companies with sound management, strong balance sheets, and the ability to produce consistent earnings and dividends is a low risk means of building wealth. The Adviser utilizes a bottom-up, value-oriented approach to stock selection, focusing on company fundamentals, in an effort to identify stocks of companies where the market prices do not reflect their true values. The Adviser’s equity investment team works together to identify appropriate stocks. The Fund’s portfolio managers are responsible for selecting stocks for the Fund’s portfolio and implementing its investment strategy.

The Adviser’s goal is to identify high quality, small capitalization companies that have strong balance sheets and predictable earnings that are undervalued and have above-average total return potential. Traditional fundamental analysis is conducted, collectively and individually, on existing holdings as well as potential buy candidates. After the fundamental analysis has been completed, the Adviser selects a portfolio of companies that the Adviser believes are undervalued and present an attractive trade-off between risk and return. The Adviser seeks to buy high quality securities at attractive valuations and to identify a catalyst that is expected to produce attractive returns.

The Adviser believes that, by focusing on small capitalization companies with consistently increasing earnings and stable-to-rising dividends from one year to the next, the Fund’s portfolio companies will tend to be less volatile than the Russell 2000® Index (the “Index”). The Adviser also believes that the consistency and stability of the Fund’s portfolio companies cause the companies to have less earnings variability than other companies, which also leads to less stock price volatility than companies of similar size, because investors can be more confident in the expected results from these companies.

The Fund may invest its assets in securities of U.S. companies and foreign companies. The Fund will not invest more than 5% of its assets in any one issuer. Certain economic sectors may be overweighted compared to others because the Adviser seeks the best investment opportunities regardless of sector. The Fund will not invest more than 25% of its net assets in any one economic sector included in the Index or two times the weighting of that sector in the Index, whichever is greater. The Adviser generally purchases securities only for the long-term.

Under normal circumstances, the Fund will invest at least 80% of its assets in securities of small cap companies that pay or are expected to pay regular dividends. The Adviser considers small cap companies to be companies that, at the time of investment, have market capitalizations within the range of market capitalization of the companies appearing in the Index. As of December 31, 2023, the market capitalization of the companies appearing in the Index ranged from approximately $10 million to $15 billion. The Fund may invest its assets in securities of U.S. companies and foreign companies, directly or indirectly through American Depositary Receipts (“ADRs”) or other types of depositary receipts.

The Fund may sell a security when the Adviser believes that the company’s fundamentals have deteriorated, if the company decreases its dividends, or if the stock has become overvalued in the opinion of the Adviser. The Fund also may sell a security when the Adviser believes that a better investment opportunity is present.