FYI: The standard limit on investments will rise from $18,500 to $19,000 in 2019 in the Thrift Savings Plan for federal employees along with similar retirement savings plans such as 401(k)s, the Internal Revenue Service announced Thursday.
A separate limit on “catch-up contributions” allowed for those ages 50 and older, meanwhile, will remain $6,000.
Almost all federal employees have a TSP account, because one is established automatically for everyone hired into the Federal Employees Retirement System, which applies to those hired since 1983.
Of the nearly 2.6 million — including U.S. Postal Service workers — under that retirement program, nearly 180,000, about 7 percent, hit the investment maximum in 2017 of $18,000, TSP figures show. Of those, 122,000 were 50 or older, and of that group, nearly 79,000 invested the additional maximum $6,000.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2018/11/02/tsp-investment-limit-increase/?utm_term=.2ad242d7c75b

Hi @AndyJ
Thank you for the reference (St. Louis Fed.), and @David_Snowball for the Leuthold "info" and posting same.
The "liquidity" .................an area I attempt to ascertain and distinguish from other items within the financial world.
We investors live within a financial world; were aside from a boatload of money sloshing about in places known and unknown to us; must also have a full faith in the system that the quality of money between/among parties does not fall apart and become a problem of liquidity. My "investors" reference is not just related to the folks here; but must also include most of the big kids, too. They are subject to having their investment pants pulled down, too.
The full faith in the system is very critical, IMHO; and as we have witnessed in the past, can develop flaws and cracks from real reasons which then may begin a massive lost of faith that monetary functions can be maintained in some form of civil fashion and not cause great stress to the system.
Indebtedness is global; but relative to this country, as you noted; the debt piles are so large from a corporate measure, and the debt pile continues down into the public sector.
One example, the auto companies, in their advertising; do everything possible to pull in the "sub-prime" customer. Hey, folks; we can help you afford that $55k truck you're wanting. Okay, this will end well, eh? Too many in our society have no mental discipline for a budget and the spending involved with same. A recent report indicates the following for the regular folks:
---average American credit card debt = $6,375, average household = $17,000 and average annual credit card interest = $1,300.
None of this bodes well at some point down the road.
I continue to watch the bond side of money for cracks in the system, as I feel this could be the problem area that places cracks into the equity side.
Sadly, I/we are running out of time at this household; as we've been at this investment party for 40 years. We got "lucky" leaving the party early in 2008 while there were still chairs available before the music stopped. I'm not so sure we can be "lucky" twice in such a short time frame.
The rough part will be leaving a passion and breaking a habit; as well as deciding where to park the money in a hands off mode.
Lastly, @AndyJ ; have you anything else in particular that you watch for cracks and stress in the world of bonds and debt? Any reference links would be most appreciated. Thank you.
Take care,
Catch

Hey Crash, ignore the subtext and focus on Mike's suggestion. Anytime you wonder about a fund's performance vs. the market, first order of biz is to look at individual holdings. Also, sector concentrations can sometimes help suss out the differences.
On holdings, M* shows the top 25 on the Portfolio/Holdings pages (the top 100 if you pay the premium). The Equity View tab shows YTD gains/losses of each one, and the Equity Prices tab shows that day's results. Here's PRWCX.

FYI: Maybe investors should question the dogma of “stocks for the long run.” History shows that a portfolio of bonds has outperformed stocks surprisingly often and for shockingly long periods.
That’s the intriguing argument in a new research paper by Edward McQuarrie, a retired business professor at Santa Clara University. Investors have long taken it as an article of faith that stocks have always beaten bonds—and always will—if you can just hang on long enough. Prof. McQuarrie’s research is a healthy reminder that this belief is wrong. His findings also show the limits and dangers of extrapolating from the past.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.wsj.com/articles/sometimes-its-bonds-for-the-long-run-1541176880?mod=searchresults&page=1&pos=1
Annual Returns on Stock, T.Bonds and T.Bills: 1928 - Current:
http://pages.stern.nyu.edu/~adamodar/New_Home_Page/datafile/histretSP.html

FYI: While stock and bond market volatility has buffeted most investors in 2018, some shrewd global macro managers are posting stellar numbers this year. For instance, Jeffrey Talpins’ $17.5 billion Element Capital Fund has soared 25% through the first three quarters. Said Haidar’s $428 million Haidar Jupiter Fund is up nearly 25% in that time. And Nigol Koulajian’s $1.5 billion AlphaQuest Original program has gained 17%. All of these managers already hold strong long-term track records.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.barrons.com/articles/global-macro-fund-returns-1541042960?mod=djem_b_Weekly barrons_daily_newsletter

what is more important is to know when he moved the $150MM. Before the fall or after. By the time we know it will be too late, I guess.

The folks at the Leuthold Group have an almost-daily subscriber newsletter that discusses their most recent research and, occasionally, how they're positioning their fund portfolios.
Today's note might have been titled, "we've seen this picture before."

Today’s backdrop from an economic, liquidity, and technical perspective is very reminiscent of all three of those prior tops (1990, 2000, 2007) in ways that are too numerous to cover here. But one that’s especially worrisome is the blowout in spreads on low- grade corporate bonds. The yield gap between Moody’s BAA corporates and the 10-year Treasury yield is up about 50 basis points since the January stock market high, poking above the 2% level that preceded several U.S. recessions. Note the market tops of 2000 and 2007 featured similar patterns of credit deterioration just as the stock market was issuing the “all-clear” signal by breaking above its pre-correction highs. Credit patterns did not show similar deterioration leading into the 1990 bull market top; even the “bond guys” sometimes get it wrong. But we are not inclined to bet against their message here.Stay defensive.

They reported earlier this week that their flagship Leuthold Core Fund (LCORX) had moved to its portfolio to the most defensive positioning permitted by prospectus. I suspect their ongoing concern about the market's health is reflected in the fund's changing beta values. Over the past three years, beta has been about .60 but over the past 10 and 15 year periods they've allowed it to live above 1.00.
David

>> don't give me the standard bullshit line about how I should not be concerned about a single day's performance. PRWCX is my biggest holding. The rest of the Market zoomed up on Nov 1st. PRWCX was FLAT.
>> Um... WTF? I understand the fund is heavier into (defensive) utilities lately. I understand that a bit less than 25% of the portfolio is in bonds. I understand that the fund does write some shorts against its holdings. Fair Market Pricing? ORK? It simply sucks to see the fund lying FLAT on a day like today.
I don't imagine that anyone here can divine its inner workings much better than you, but a disinterested adviser, or even friend, might suggest that if a flat day with the market up bends you so sorely, maybe you should get into something else?

If there is any solace for your 1 day disappointment with this fund, maybe this will help. From Oct. 1st to Oct. 29th, the S&P 500 dropped 9.9%. PRWCX dropped about 1/2 of that, 5.5%. No BS!!! Shouldn't that matter more?

Um.... @MikeM: yes. It DOES matter more. Thanks for so rudely dismissing what I asked about.

Long ago when I was interested in this sort of behavior,
I found it helped to look at the movement in the top 10-20 positions of the portfolio.

If there is any solace for your 1 day disappointment with this fund, maybe this will help. From Oct. 1st to Oct. 29th, the S&P 500 dropped 9.9%. PRWCX dropped about 1/2 of that, 5.5%. No BS!!!
Shouldn't that matter more?

You are both infinitely wise.

If there is any solace for your 1 day disappointment with this fund, maybe this will help. From Oct. 1st to Oct. 29th, the S&P 500 dropped 9.9%. PRWCX dropped about 1/2 of that, 5.5%. No BS!!! Shouldn't that matter more?

Hi Crash, The fund has morphed over the years into pretty much a “go anywhere” fund. Pretty darn hard to “read” its daily behavior for that reason. I knew they played with derivatives. Wasn’t aware (as you claim) it shorts stocks - but it wouldn’t surprise me. One thought - Gold (and materials) had an uncharacteristically big day Thursday. So if the fund is shorting any of that stuff, it would have gotten dinged. Even if substantially “underweight” materials (but not shorting) it would have lagged some of the broader indexes. TRP has been bearish on the commodities / materials sectors for several years.
Compared to many other conservative equity / balanced funds, PRWCX is still having a respectable year. DODBX is positive but lags it. OAKBX and RPGAX are actually in the red.
PRWCX - Lipper Breakdown (From Reuters)
http://www.funds.reuters.wallst.com/US/funds/holdings.asp?YYY622_6sBkEkBoRVEDVUmnzYdySBuZTH3KwZb8EX/lL+8rQLfc70v/pOneMtJCmBtqvYsy
TOP 10 HOLDINGS % of Assets (Change vs 1Q Ago)
1 Keurig Dr Pepper Inc ORD
KDP
4.2%
(+11.0%)
2 T Rowe Price Government Money Fund
PRRXX.O
4.1%
3 Marsh & McLennan Companies Inc ORD
MMC
3.2%
(+2.1%)
4 Microsoft Corp ORD
MSFT.O
3.0%
(-1.5%)
5 Fiserv Inc ORD
FISV.O
2.9%
(-0.4%)
6 Becton Dickinson and Co ORD
BDX
2.9%
(-4.5%)
7 Danaher Corp ORD
DHR
2.7%
(-0.9%)
8 PerkinElmer Inc ORD
PKI
2.7%
(-5.5%)
9 Visa Inc ORD
V
2.5%
(+1.4%)
10 Fidelity National Information Services Inc ORD
FIS
2.4%
(+0.7%)
@Crash - Try drinking more Keurig Coffee & Dr Pepper. It might boost your return. :)

[Comment replaced - Snowball] "I am concerned about a single day's performance." PRWCX is my biggest holding. The rest of the Market zoomed up on Nov 1st. PRWCX was FLAT.
Um... WTF? I understand the fund is heavier into (defensive) utilities lately. I understand that a bit less than 25% of the portfolio is in bonds. I understand that the fund does write some shorts against its holdings. Fair Market Pricing? ORK? It simply sucks to see the fund lying FLAT on a day like today.

You've got the right idea, but the dividends don't make any difference.
Whether for RMD or for any other reason, one always wants to buy low and sell high. So if, say, you want to pull $4K out of an account, you'd rather do it when that account is worth $100K (4% drawdown) rather than when the value has dropped to $80K (5% drawdown).
Of course that's the theory. The reality is no one knows when the account will hit the high point for the year. (Though since investments tend to rise more than fall, later in the year seems to work out better on average.)
The dividends don't matter because they don't affect the value of the account. Whether you've got 10,000 shares at $10/share, or 12,500 shares at $8/share (after a distribtion of 2500 shares), the total value is the same. Either way, the RMD is in dollars, not shares.
QCDs are a nice way to take part of an RMD without paying taxes on the withdrawal. Especially now that it's gotten much harder to itemize deductions. It's great you're thinking about this - both for your taxes and for whoever gets the contributions.

Thanks -- I was going to check my local library tomorrow. I appreciate the info!

You may be able to access it free anywhere via the internet through your local library as I do. Here are the numbers if you are not able. All in millions. PRGTX AUM
2008-92
09-255
10-381
11-500
12-697
13-984
14-1626
15-2718
16-3153
17-5910
18YTD-4202

You may be able to access it free anywhere via the internet through your local library as I do. Here are the numbers if you are not able. All in millions. PRGTX AUM
2008-92
09-255
10-381
11-500
12-697
13-984
14-1626
15-2718
16-3153
17-5910
18YTD-4202

Thanks fundly. I let my M*Premium lapse last year given the ongoing issues there, but I know where I can find that data now. Thanks!

In Morningstar premium which I get free from our local library, in the fund page you are looking at, click on the Performance tab and the last 5-10 yrs of AUM will be listed low on the page. This will not show up in the free site. Hope this helps.

In Morningstar premium which I get free from our local library, in the fund page you are looking at, click on the Performance tab and the last 5-10 yrs of AUM will be listed low on the page. This will not show up in the free site. Hope this helps.

FYI: Outside investors may not be the only ones who have pulled money from Bill Gross’s bond fund.
The manager and his family’s personal stake in the Janus Henderson Global Unconstrained Bond Fund fell to about $566 million at the end of last month from $775 million a year earlier, a regulatory filing Monday shows. When accounting for the fund’s 6.3 percent loss, that suggests Gross may have withdrawn or transferred about $150 million of shares.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-29/gross-may-be-pulling-cash-from-his-unconstrained-fund-at-janus

FYI: Being too far ahead of your time is indistinguishable from being wrong.”
That’s what Howard Marks, chairman and co-founder of Oaktree Capital Group LLC, wrote in a memo to clients about 11 years ago. Around that same time in late 2007, banking analyst Meredith Whitney made a prescient negative call on Citigroup Inc. that exacerbated a market sell-off and, she said, prompted death threats. Perhaps emboldened by that experience, she made another headline-grabbing prediction in a December 2010 broadcast of CBS Corp.’s “60 Minutes” program: There would be “50 to 100 sizable defaults” in the U.S. municipal market in the coming year, totaling “hundreds of billions of dollars.”
Regards,
Ted
https://www.fa-mag.com/news/meredith-whitney-was-flat-out-wrong-about-municipal-bonds-41662.html?print
Meredith Whitney 60 Minutes Interview 12/19/2010: