At least three former Playboy magazine playmates have proved to be savvy investors, based on the results of a contest by tradingmarkets.com. In January, each of the 10 participants was given the task of putting together a virtual portfolio of five stocks to match their skills with the performance of the S&P500 and mutual fund managers. The magazine reported that overall the ladies performed well against the indices, beating them on average by 3.31%. But that’s a little misleading.

According to tradingmarkets.com’s daily tally as of May 15, only three of the playing former playmates outdid the S&P and one other was barely in positive ground. Skewing the figures most were the amazing returns by Amy Sue Cooper, a nursing student who was once Playboy’s “Cyber Girl of The Year.” As of May 15, her portfolio racked up returns of 64.16%. A distant second was Deanna Brooks (Miss May 1998) at 20.82% and Courtney Culkin (Miss April 2005) at 14.30%. Kara Monaco (Miss June 2005) inched up 0.21%, and the rest were well in negative ground. Cooper credited her success to understanding what companies did and the news of the industries. Her investment in Pacific Ethanol, for example, skyrocketed 214% through May 1.