The continued market selloff is creating rumors that Janus is selling stocks to meet funds shareholder redemptions, reports Dow Jones. The paper also reports that Janus is denying that the firm is selling stocks to meet redemptions.

"That is absolutely not the case," the news service quotes a Janus spokesperson as saying.

The rumors come as the major stock indices have fallen each of the past three days. Both the Nasdaq and the S&P 500 indices have reached five-year lows during the sell-off.

That Janus is the center of rumors is not surprising. The firm is known for holding just a few stocks in many of its funds.

Janus lost 48 percent or $105 billion of its $219 billion of fund assets under management from the March 2000 peak of the bull market though the end of May, 2002, according to Financial Research Corp. That decline in assets pushed Janus to the 13th largest fund complex from its spot as number five.

Also mauled by the bear is Putnam Investments. The Boston fund firm has sign its fund asset base shrink by 34 percent to $174 billion from $264 billion 26 months ago. 

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