FYI: Spring Break at Augustana College!
Regards,
Ted
https://www.mutualfundobserver.com/2019/03/march-1-2019/

Thanks @rforno,
You are correct. I had assumed the disclosure issue related to the fund Prospectus and applied to all investors who might buy the fund. A second reading made it clearer. It’s some type of hidden administration fee targeted at the 401 K participants. However, were the issue instead related to the actual funds and their fees as stated in the fund prospectuses, than I think the SEC would still have jurisdiction.
“The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission administers and enforces the federal laws that govern the sale and trading of stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and other securities. The U.S. Department of Labor’s Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) has oversight of 401(k), pension and retirement plans.”: https://www.sec.gov/complaint/401k.htm

Related. Think Ted post this article last yr
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.kiplinger.com/slideshow/investing/T052-S001-10-funds-beat-the-market-another-decade.html
Most mf have 1 2% annual fees will put large dink in long term returns - long term superior returns may not be possible

IIRC Labor Dept has jurisdiction over policies governing employee retirement plans like 401Ks...think of the controversial 'fiduciary duty' rule & fees from the Obama DOL that Wall Street *hated*.
By contrast SEC has jurisdiction over what goes in these accounts (ie, investment vehicles like mutual funds, etc)

Thanks @rforno and Old_Joe for adding some needed clarity. Another puzzle for me is why the Labor Department is investigating? I’ll assume it’s because of the workplace environment in which 401-K products are marketed. Still, it seems to me this is something the SEC would normally take the lead in.
One guess: (merits of case notwithstanding) - this might be more of “an axe to grind” (politically motivated) case. Like I said - a guess. But this admin. is not above such tactics. I’m thinking specifically of previous threats to raise US postal rates for Amazon. Also, more recent threats to investigate a potential government criminal witness’ father.

@Lewis: I don't think that Bill will ever ask you to play poker with him, or view his stamp collection. Where have you been ? I heard on the grapevine that Dow Jones ask you to stop giving your opinions on MFO. I guess the grapevine was wrong 1
Regards,
Ted

Fidelity announced a doubling of its NTF ETFs from 250 to 500 immediately after Schwab announced a doubling from 250 to 500.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-fidelityinvestments-etf/fidelity-schwab-expand-commission-free-etfs-to-over-500-idUSKCN1Q12BZ
As of today, per its press release, "Fidelity is [still] in the process of expanding its commission -free ETF platform for individual investors and advisors to include more than 500 ETFs". Its ETF page reports 357 ETFs are NTF, only Fidelity and some iShares.
The only thing that Fidelity did immediately was add some iShares. It's nowhere near the 500 that FA Mag said was coming by today.
Schwab has just posted its 501 NTF ETFs:
https://www.schwab.com/public/schwab/investing/investment_help/investment_research/etf_research/etfs.html?&path=/Prospect/Research/etfs/overview/oneSourceETFs.asp
Meanwhile, Vanguard Brokerage Services has been selling 1800 ETFs without a transaction fee for the past six months. That's supposed to be 90% of the 2000 ETFs on the market.
https://pressroom.vanguard.com/news/Press-Release-Vanguard-Launches-Commission-Free-ETFs-082118.html

A little housekeeping:
Skeet mentioned a number of Vanguard funds using investor class tickers. These are now closed to retail investors; look for the admiral class shares. For example, instead of VIGRX, use VIGAX.
@STB65 writes that PRIDX suggests that one can still get in if one can meet the min. I don't know how (with the usual exceptions of grandfathered 401k plans and the like). It is closed to new investors even going directly through TRP (as of April 2, 2018):
https://www3.troweprice.com/fb2/fbkweb/snapshot.do?ticker=PRIDX
(See also Shadow's post above.)
That is indeed a soft close (since existing investors can add money), but for new investors it might as well be a hard close.
I'm wondering about the statement that "VWIGX will always be open." It's not as though Vanguard doesn't close funds. See VDIGX. Unlike, say, the Primecap run funds, VDIGX is closed even to Flagship customers. Why couldn't VWIGX likewise be closed in the future?
It's true that Vanguard often adds more subadvisors to increase capacity of its funds rather than close them. By that thinking though, VWIGX should be even more likely to close, since Vanguard dropped the number of subadvisors for the fund from three to two in mid 2016.
Regarding using global funds to let managers put money where it can be used best: I like the idea of letting mangers do what I'm paying them to do, i.e. manage. But ISTM that global funds generally (a) have a big hometown bias (50%+ in US) and (b) keep their US/foreign ratios fairly steady. There may be exceptions of course, which means digging through older annual statements to see if they actually do move assets in and out of the US.
Where I think the "delegate to manager" may work better with foreign funds is in deciding which foreign countries to invest in. That is why I prefer broad based foreign funds. Also, a few of these funds more than dabble in EM, so there are some funds that can be used to truly span the globe. Notably, VWIGX has nearly 1/4 of assets in EM.

Nice catch. It's not unusual to see VCs get shares of a private company at a discount, but I've never seen something like that done with seed money for a mutual fund. (That's not to say it's not done, but it's not something I've run across.)
I notice in the same SAI (dated March 29, 2018, supplemented Sept 21, 2018) that it has two controlling (> 25% share) owners: Interactive Brokers (56.92%) and Institutional Secured Credit LLC (29.66%).
Not unusual for brokerages to have a sizeable stake (though rarely this large) in a fund. But that's because they have legal title ("street name") to the shares that their customers own. In this case, Interactive Brokers doesn't sell STATX, so what's it doing owning over half the fund?
That 29.66% is (through a series of companies) completely owned by "Mr. Abarbanel who is the CEO of the fund and owns 100% of the Advisor." (This includes the 10,000 shares purchased at $10/share.)
In a little touch of irony, Institutional Secured Credit is located on Painted Mirage Road, at the same address as the fund and the fund advisor.

Best Ira maybe SEP- Ira if you have a small business or have 1099 incomes... I have one at Vanguard - it's great way to have tax sheltered acct to have for long term holdings because you save so much tax deferred to use for investing
Anyone have DEFINED BENEFITS plans added to their portfolio!?

@johnN you asked this two weeks ago and I stated that "if the object is to maximize allowable contributions, the individual 401(k) is usually superior."
https://mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/47567/roth-ira-and-sep-ira-and-defined-benefits-questions
I'll try to be clearer. What are you trying to do with a DB plan? Usually someone looks at these only with high income and after one has maxed out DC options. For most people with self-employment income, they get a higher max with a 401(k) plan than with a SEP-IRA.
The SEP-IRA limit is lower until you hit $280K in net income. Even then, it's still lower if you qualify for a catch up contribution, which you can't do with a SEP.
So if you're trying to increase the amount you can defer, have you looked into a 401(k) instead of a SEP? If you're trying to create a "traditional" pension plan (which is what a DB plan is), have you considered simply annuitizing (part of) your DC plan instead? That's simpler than doing all the annual mortality and funding calculations for a DB plan.
Here's a calculator from Fidelity that will show you what you can contribute to a SEP vs a 401k plan.
https://scs.fidelity.com/products/mobile/sepMobile.shtml
Here's Fidelity's worksheet (with 2017 limits) that shows you what's behind the calculations:
https://www.fidelity.com/bin-public/060_www_fidelity_com/documents/customer-service/401k-self-employed-owner-only-business.pdf
Another reason why a 401(k) plan is superior for some - unlike a SEP, it allows you to make Roth contributions. Vanguard finally added a Roth option to its individual 401(k). For many years, T. Rowe Price was the only one offering a no cost 401(k) with Roth option, which is why I used that. Fidelity's still doesn't have a Roth option.
https://investor.vanguard.com/small-business-retirement-plans/comparison

Thanks @rforno and Old_Joe for adding some needed clarity. Another puzzle for me is why the Labor Department is investigating? I’ll assume it’s because of the workplace environment in which 401-K products are marketed. Still, it seems to me this is something the SEC would normally take the lead in.
One guess: (merits of case notwithstanding) - this might be more of “an axe to grind” (politically motivated) case. Like I said - a guess. But this admin. is not above such tactics. I’m thinking specifically of previous threats to raise US postal rates for Amazon. Also, more recent threats to investigate a potential government criminal witness’ father-in-law.

Wasn't the idea of the tax on SS in fact to tax the "rich"? If I recall the argument, many well-off people with large retirement incomes were (as usual) using loopholes to avoid taxes. Wasn't it the idea that people with lower retirement incomes would not hit the tax threshold for SS but people with the larger incomes would?

@Old_Joe, I don't remember the argument, but what you say about the actual tax computation is true. With lower income, much less of SS income is taxed; 2018 was a low income year for me, and ~ 15% is taxable, versus the usual ~ 85%.
Haven't heard this argument in a while, but I recall that in the past, at least, it was suggested that SS should be means tested ... and it is, via the income tax.
P.S., off topic: do you still have the place in the Russian R. valley? Another flood year there, I'm reading.

FYI: Even after one of the most storied careers in financial markets, Bill Gross has a few surprises left.
For one, he’s been diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, the autism-spectrum disorder. Gross says he lived most of his life unaware of the condition and now believes it helps explain not only why he was such a successful investor for so long but also why he could, by his own admission, rub people the wrong way.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-01/taxes-deficits-and-asperger-s-the-bill-gross-you-didn-t-know

@johnN: Once again, look before you leap !
https://www.mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/47914/9-ways-to-buy-treasurys-with-etfs#latest

https://www.etf.com/sections/daily-hot-reads/hot-reads-9-ways-buy-treasurys-etfs?nopaging=1
https://money.usnews.com/investing/funds/slideshows/9-ways-to-buy-treasurys-with-etfs
ETFs make it easy to target Treasury bonds.
Interest rates are on a wild ride. Thanks to the vibrant economy, rates on the 10-year U.S. Treasury bond briefly topped 3.2 percent in late 2018, and mortgage rates hit their highest levels since 2011. But concerns over a trade war with China and the impact of the prolonged government shutdown took some of wind out of investors' sails and rates on the 10-year are at about 2.6 percent – a substantial drop, and a sign that the promise of higher rates may not be as certain as previously thought. Here are nine U.S. Treasury-focused exchange-traded funds that offer a variety of ways to invest in the evolving government bond sector.
Anyone have Treasury as their cash holdings instead of CDs?!!

Best Ira maybe SEP- Ira if you have a small business or have 1099 incomes... I have one at Vanguard - it's great way to have tax sheltered acct to have for long term holdings because you save so much tax deferred to use for investing
Anyone have DEFINED BENEFITS plans added to their portfolio!?

It's almost impossible to beat market over 10 20 yrs long... Even great MFs can't do it the odds are heavily stack against you that's why it maybe prudent to have good ETFs and good MF that had long reasonable term records... Just my 2 cents
Maybe Buffett was able to do few yrs previously but can't tell if trend would continues

"The fee is calculated as 0.15% of a mutual-fund company’s industrywide assets, not just on the dollar amount of assets held by Fidelity customers buying shares on the platform, the document says."
This is the kicker -- .15% of a hosted fund company's ENTIRE industrywide assets? So if they are offering XYZ's S&P 500 fund only, XYZ is paying Fido a fee that's based on not only the AUM of that fund but also the AUM of every other fund XYZ sells, even if it's not available on the Fido platform? And does that include retirement plans, SEP accounts, or other managed accounts? Wow .. that's chutzpah!
This sounds like an end-run around declaring a 12(b)-1 fee -- or a 12(b)-1 that's higher than the average for services that are supposed to be paid for from a stated 12(b)-1 fee. TL;DR Typical greed/sleaze move!!

huh, no mention of the 'value' auto-churn strategy for SP500 that, so far as I can see, outperforms at every interval for the last ~6.5y
iow a non-secret for beating the market, or #7
graph CAPE vs FXAIX since fall of 2012 and any sub-period thereafter

There was a unusual statement in a previous SAI that the fund manager was allowed to buy a good number of shares at $10. The NAV is pretty steady at 100.

Mona,
MAVRX skews more toward smaller cap and is very much value-oriented (trailing P/E = 9.7). MAPIX is all cap-ish, dividend oriented, not so much value oriented (trailing P/E = 14.6). At the moment MAVRX has 22% in cash, versus essentially none at MAPIX.
There are also geography and sector differences. Using the Matthews website is a good way to compare: Value and Dividend.