Having said that, Top Performers does tend to be dominated by small and micro-cap companies, as these shares have the in-built advantage of low starting points from which to measure their upwards momentum. Larger, often blue-chip companies, find it more difficult to sustain high IRRs, as their base of comparison is proportionately higher.

Only four of last year's Top Performers - African Dawn, Howden, Basil Read and ISA - managed to stay in this year's Top Ten.

African Dawn managed to retain its number one position, a feat rarely achieved in Top Performers. Though the share price managed to stay at around the R5 level for most of 2008, it fell precipitously from September onwards as the global credit crunch intensified. At the time of writing, it was trading around 150c.

Small-cap stocks such as African Dawn have fared worse than most in the shakeout on the JSE, as investors have adopted a "flight to quality", preferring the sanctuary of cash, near-cash or blue-chip stocks.

This resulted in the secular uptrend of the share price, which started in 2003, being broken. Nevertheless, its five-year IRR is still a very respectable 119%.

It's interesting to contrast the performance of African Dawn with that of Capitec, another recent Top Performer winner and one which operates in a not-too-dissimilar niche of the financial services sector as African Dawn. Both lend to the lower end of the market and see themselves as being positioned somewhere between micro-lenders and traditional banks.

Capitec was ranked eighth last year but dropped to number 38, its five-year IRR more than halving from 109% to 46%. Capitec's share price fell from R43 to R26 between February and July 2008, but has since recovered to the R40 level.

Howden Africa came in at number two, from number seven last year. And even though its five-year IRR has slowed, it's still very respectable at 92%. This is an exceptionally solid company, benefiting from the huge commitment to the long overdue infrastructural spend in SA. Its speciality is supplying fans, heat exchangers, blowers and compressors to a wide range of industries.

Old established construction company Basil Read only just missed the number two position, having moved up from number five last year. It has performed exceptionally well, especially considering the poor shape it was in less than a decade ago. It's one of the smaller construction companies among the established operators, but this doesn't explain its poor share price performance in the past year or so. It's trading at less than half of its value compared with early 2008. All of the construction companies' share prices have taken a knock in the past year. But the earnings picture from the construction companies belies this and Basil Read is no exception.

However, a setback in the share price of such a magnitude is likely to negatively affect Basil Read's performance in next year's Top Companies.

The best performance by far in this year's Top Performers is undoubtedly that of Southern Electricity Company (Selco), which rocketed up from last year's position 217 to this year's number four. This is the archetypal "penny stock", with a market capitalisation of just more than R9m. It also hardly trades; its average monthly volume is less than 35 000 shares.

Considering that its profit history is at best pedestrian, it appears that Selco's impressive IRR performance is due mainly to the share's illiquidity.

Selco is a subsidiary of the Resource Management Integration Group (REMIG), which has its head office in SA. As a successful African utility service provider, Selco specialises in the electricity distribution, management, metering, billing and revenue field. Its core business consists of the operation, maintenance and management of electricity networks on behalf of local authorities with current concessions in Namibia and Uganda. In some instances Selco also provides other services, such as water, sewerage and sanitation.

Highveld Steel & Vanadium had a good year in 2008 as far as earnings were concerned, predicated on the back of strong demand for its products in the first half of the year. However, as the year progressed and global growth cooled off, the demand for steel also slackened considerably.

Nevertheless, Highveld shot up from 23 to five and, in the process, even managed to improve its IRR from 78,4% to 82,3%. But the decline in its share price has been precipitous, which if sustained will surely affect its five-year IRR in next year's Top Performers. It's currently trading at only around a third of its share price of June last year.

York Timber comes in at number six from last year's 14. This company's ownership and direction has been drastically transformed in recent years. No longer run by the late Solly Tucker, who retired in 2005, the group is the largest forestry products company in the country.

But the share price has taken a beating in recent months, following a number of events including a slackening in demand for residential building and a devastating forest fire last year. But a combination of improved demand for low-cost housing coupled with a large reduction in timber stocks across the industry should result in firmer prices in future.

Cadiz Holdings has risen rapidly in Top Performers and is now in the number 10 spot. But the global financial meltdown has wreaked havoc on companies like Cadiz - those that are involved in fund management and derivatives - so it may be difficult to retain the number 10 spot next year.

Grindrod, a previous winner as the overall Top Company on at least one occasion, has also done well in Top Performers. This year it slipped slightly, just out of the Top 20.

One to watch next year may be WBHO. This construction company has an enviable earnings record and has proved to be remarkably adaptable at switching its operations. The current infrastructural spending boom should ensure its order book stays healthy for many years. It moved up from 34 to 31 this year, but a continuation of solid earnings growth this year should translate into future share price improvement.

Sentula Mining, formerly Scharrig Mining, spun out of the Top 10 decisively as a result of a really horrible convergence of circumstances. The share had been gradually creeping up the league and last year was ranked number four. This year, it is number 35. Early in 2008, the company's coal mines and other mining activities experienced abnormally heavy rainfall, which curtailed activities. But the biggest blow came later in the year when all sorts of financial irregularities were discovered following a forensic audit. At one point, the shares were suspended at the company's request, but were later reinstated on the JSE.

It's a truly inglorious chapter in this company's otherwise unblemished record. From its peak of more than R25 in late 2007 to its recent trough in March 2009, the Sentula share price has fallen by more than 90%. It is hoped the worst is now over, but it may take some time before investor confidence is restored.