Thanks. man. I'm approx. 50/50 domestic/international. That includes EM and Frontier. MAPIX is the biggest chunk. Next biggest chunk is PRWCX at 18.77% of portf followed by PRESX at 14.85% and MAPOX at 9.02% of total. The others are much smaller. I like my selections, but the proportions here just happened, always playing catch-up, if you know what I mean.
MAPTX sounds good, too. But I'm already sitting on 13 different funds. Some of them, ostensibly the "hot" ones--- serve as feeders for more tame, core funds in the portfolio: PRWCX and MAPOX.
I will indeed move some money, but keep a big chunk in MAPIX. Thanks again. I've already decided that I want to keep this all in Matthews.

@Crash,
29.78% is a lot in my opinion. My shares of MAPIX= 9.02% of my portfolio. It is a good fund though and it is closed to new investors so I would not sell it all. If you decide to sell, just pare it back a bit. The bigger question is where to go with that money? MEASX I'm sure is a good fund but it has a high ER. Also, and this again is my opinion, it does not include Hong Kong, Singapore as well as Japan. Japan may not be the fastest growing economy but the other two are pretty important in this region. I am getting the impression you want to be in emerging markets or in Asia with your comments. EM funds in this region have been slow as of late. It depends on what your impression of the future is and how countries like India and other countries will grow with the economy. It will be a rough ride and if you don't like volatility then you have more to think on. I would keep my asset allocations on these funds a bit lower. Depending on your asset size, 5-10% might be a good start.
A simple way would be to keep 10% in MAPIX and maybe another 5% in MAPTX. You still have TRAMX from your comment above and that is a good one for a small amount too. As for the rest if any, there are many funds that might fit for you but wit the markets at this stage, you might be chasing performance.
I am just one person and one opinion. I hope others will give some recommendations or suggestions. What works for me may not be for you. But I do believe your almost 30% in MAPIX is too much.
Hope this helps.

Sorry bee, with due respect to your Mom, "Conservative" and "Strategic and losing 25%? Something is just wrong here. GLRBX is it.

FYI: (Click On Article Title Top Of Googel Search)
Barry James knows about managing risk.
In 2008, when the Standard & Poor's 500 lost 37%, the James Balanced Golden Rainbow Fund (ticker: GLRBX ) lost just 5.5%.
Yet James isn't just good in a crisis. His fund, which garners a five-star rating from Morningstar, has consistently outperformed its peers and is in the top percentile of its category for the past decade. In the past 15 years, the fund returned an annualized 6.5%, compared with 5% for the S&P 500.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.google.com/search?newwindow=1&site=&source=hp&q=5+stock+picks+barron's&oq=5+stock+picks+barron's&gs_l=hp.3...1971.12349.0.12990.22.21.0.1.1.0.94.1699.21.21.0....0...1c.1.52.hp..6.16.1249.ZoGbSjFJH9A
M* Snapshot Of GLRBX: http://quotes.morningstar.com/fund/f?t=GLRBX&region=usa&culture=en-US
Lipper Snapshot Of GLRBX; http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/fund/glrbx
GLRBX Is Ranked # 22 In The (CAA) Fund Category By U.S. News & World Report:
http://money.usnews.com/funds/mutual-funds/conservative-allocation/james-balanced:-golden-rainbow-fund/glrbx

Ha! That's a "Catch 22" if you ask me. Funds mentioned favorably here at MFO grow very large very rapidly it seems. Than, in so year or two they're too big to manage. What a bummer. Of course, the manager can choke off inflows anytime as Skeet says.
Why does all this remind me of Dodge and Cox in 2009? Go back and read the archives (FA/MFO) if you can find them. Too big, too bloated, and unmanageable were cited frequently as reasons to flee. Seems they've managed to confound their skeptics and make some $$ for those who held on. Having low ERs in the vicinity of .50% hasn't hurt them either.
You may be correct that this fund can function successfully only with a smaller asset base. But, I wouldn't bet on it. There are economics of scale as well. I do think stability of assets is more important than size. So, if they haven't been able to convince their clients to hang in there for longer than a year or two without jerking out their $$ than that's a failing on their part which will come back to bite them.
Don't like any of these goanywhere funds. But hate to see folks flee a fund so quickly. Less than two years ago MFLDX was darling of the board. You could almost hear their cash register going "ka-ching" every time somebody invested in the fund. I think another issue is that these funds by nature will sometimes appear "out of sync" as they are trying to run against the grain and do something different than the general mob. My prediction is that on August 31, 2017 the commentary here will be decidedly favorable towards MFLDX. No special knowledge - just think the odds favor that.

Doubtless old news to those here already interested in or holding DSENX, but a clear summary if you have not studied it:
https://materials.proxyvote.com/Approved/MC5539/20140811/PROS_218034.PDF

FYI: T he average U.S. taxable bond fund continues to boast a higher return than the S&P 500 in the past 15 years, though the general stock market has been catching up since it hit bottom after the 2007-08 financial crisis.
Regards,
Ted
http://license.icopyright.net/user/viewFreeUse.act?fuid=MTg0MDcyMTg=
Enlarged Graphic: http://news.investors.com/photopopup.aspx?path=WEBmutPent082614.gif&docId=714744&xmpSource=&width=1000&height=1063&caption=&id=714746

The first time I ever heard Bob Brinker was around 15 years ago when he was recommending I Bonds with a coupon rate of 3% plus inflation. I knew that anybody recommending I Bonds and low-cost no-load funds had to be okay in my book. He's always emphasized proper investment allocation and the role that fixed income securities have in a portfolio.

For those who don't know, Admiral James Stockdale was a POW during the Vietnam war; the highest ranked 'guest' in the Hanoi Hilton. He was there for eight years and was tortured more than twenty times.
Many POWs didn't make it but Stockdale and some others did.
Collins asked Stockdale, "Who didn't make it out?"
"Oh, that's easy," he said. "The Optimists."
Collins was confused as he thought Stockdale was an optimist as he had no doubt he would get out of his situation.
Stockdale clarified:
"The optimists. Oh, they were the ones who said, 'We're going to be out by Christmas.' And Christmas would come, and Christmas would go. Then they'd say, 'We're going to be out by Easter.' And Easter would come, and Easter would go. And then Thanksgiving, and then it would be Christmas again. And they died of a broken heart."
"This is a very important lesson. You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end - which you can never afford to lose - with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be."
As applied to investors, there are a lot of optimistic investors that don't make it. For example, people who were excited about stocks in the late 1990's were optimistic that stocks will continue to earn 15-20%/year just as it had in the recent past. This was sort of the "we'll be home by Christmas" optimism in Stockdale's story. Maybe it doesn't seem so bad as the market hasn't done much since then, but most likely, these people piled in at the top and then puked out their positions in the following bear market (and most likely didn't get back in).
A very insightful post.
Regards,
Reo
http://brooklyninvestor.blogspot.in/2014/08/good-to-great-stockdale-paradox.html

He did call an excellent sell signal in January of 2000, but only sold 60% of his stock allocation. Then I believe it was August when he said to buy the QQQ's with 20-50% of the cash reserves generated from the Jan 2000 60% sell. Then he later re-issued the QQQ buy several times in 2001. He did correctly buy back into the market in March of 2003. Those were his two best calls, Jan 2000 and March 2003. Since 2003, he has stayed fully invested, and missed the big bear market in 2007-2009. He also sold the market in 1988 after the Oct 1987 crash. That sell signal did not work out.

Hi Old_Joe,
While you are extending the rope for MFLDX ... Mainstay thanks you. I believe in giving a fund manager ample time to position the fund but when Mainstay kept the fund open rather than closing it to where it could be well managed based upon ever changing macro themes ... Well, I recently decided to book my profit in the fund and move on. It has now got to turn some good investment tricks to move the nav. By the way MFLDX shorted DUK during its merger with PGN and it moved the nav big time. With its size today this play would now amount to no more than a drop in a big bucket.
The same thing happened in Ivy Asset Strategy. I held that fund for a good number of years and as the assets under management kept increasing I noticed so did the time it took the managers to reposition the fund. And, it became so large that it was noted and alleged by some that its repositioning and rapid selling of some S&P 500 futures caused and lead to the great ... Flash Crash. With that, I let it go.
Sometime things just get too big to manage.
That leads me to BankAmerica ... It to got too big for its britches, by my thinking, and look what has transpired. Glad I sold the family stock in that monster before it tanked. And, now there is Duke Energy another Charlotte, NC based company. When the board of directors of Duke hoodwinked the North Carolina regulators about the planned merger with Progress Energy ... Well, I sold off my DUK stock too. And, I still do not feel good about the size that DUK has become. From my thinking ... It is just now too big to effectively manage and I am looking for something to crop up if it has not already ... Look at the problems they now face with those toxic coal ash ponds.
Simply stated when I feel things have gotten too big to be managed ... I move on.
Old_Skeet

FYI:
Regards,
Ted
http://www.mfwire.com/common/artprint2007.asp?storyID=49502&wireid=2
M* Snapshot Of ANGLX; http://quotes.morningstar.com/fund/f?t=ANGLX&region=usa&culture=en-US
ANGLX Is Unranked In The (MSB) Category By U.S. News & World Report;
http://money.usnews.com/funds/mutual-funds/multisector-bond/angel-oak-multi-strategy-income-fund/anglx

For all the years I listened to Brinker, and that amounts to around 15 years, he was very much the "stay the course" advisor. Perhaps his change of stance is reflective of a new investing environment we now face. Since 2008 it has been fast changing.

One thing JohnChisum is that he has always been a market timer. His monthly subscription newsletter is called market timer. So I think bailing out of Vanguard GNMA's, Vanguard TIPS, and other high quality fixed income investments goes along with a Marketimer, even though market timing is usually associated with stocks. Actually, he's timing the bond market in a sense.

For all the years I listened to Brinker, and that amounts to around 15 years, he was very much the "stay the course" advisor. Perhaps his change of stance is reflective of a new investing environment we now face. Since 2008 it has been fast changing.

@davidrmoran yes, you're probably right, and that was silly of me to call out that particular fund. But my basic thought is that for years we've been in a long-term bull market for bonds due to falling interest rates, so any backtesting for the last few decades is going to make a bond heavy portfolio look very good, but I'm doubtful as to whether that can continue. Interest rates just can't drop much further, and they may start going up.
I'm sure the best funds will do fine, but a repeat of the 9% a year returns PIMIX has turned in the last 5 years is unlikely. Of course some people say stocks are overvalued too... Personally I don't see that, so I'd overweight POAGX in this two-fund portfolio, even if bee's backtesting shows that overweighting PIMIX was the way to go the past 5 years.
I don't have a cristal ball, just my two cents' worth.

I think our 10-year bond is affected much more by yields in Europe than by the pace of new home sales. The German 10-year closed at 0.95% today. And the spread of the US 2-year versus the German 2-year (which is negative) is the highest since 2007:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-08-26/treasury-two-year-notes-yield-most-versus-germany-since-2007.html

Old_Joe, you caught me on that one ! 5.56% down was end of July.
Derf

FYI — Long-term U.S. Treasury yields fell Monday after data showed the pace of new-home sales in July fell to a four-month low, and were once again approaching lows for the year.:
Regards,
Ted
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/us-treasury-prices-generally-rise-2014-08-25/print

Cheer Funds 2014: As of today 8/22/14
Regards,
Ted
FBTCX: 17.97% YTD
PRHSX: 17.89% YTD
QQQ 13.99% YTD
PFF 12.27% YTD
SPY: 9.91% YTD
VWELX: 7.52% YTD
Average 13.25% YTD
Ouch Funds 2014
None

Hi Guys,
“Market timing is unproven.”
That quote was extracted from the FAQ section of The Decision Moose website. It is an accurate summary statement that reflects the controversy between academics and practitioners of that discipline.
I have no ponies in this horserace. So I will not personally handicap the merits of the “Market Timing with Decision Moose” methodology or its track record. I’ll defer to CXO Advisory Group for that task.
I have not done investment market timing strategies for over 2 decades, At one time, I did use methods outlined in the Edwards and Magee classic “Technical Analysis of Stock Trends” book. I won some victories and I suffered some defeats. Overall, I suppose my outcomes were rather ho hum, and did demand a huge time commitment. I mostly shun market timing now, and feel much relieved without its pressures. It can be a task master.
Market Timing has a huge following and has an almost endless array of methods. There are more than 5,000 candidate Timing schemes. Some work for some time. The trick is to discover the appropriate technique at the appropriate time. No easy chore.
My favorite Timing website is operated by Thomas Bulkowski. I especially like his site because he summarizes methods and presents statistical data that helps to define the odds of success for many of these various procedures. Here is a Link to Bulkowski’s powerful and practical website:
http://thepatternsite.com/
The question will always be: How good are these momentum-based market Timing strategies?
William Dirlam’s Decision Moose has generated reasonable results, and respectable reviews from many quarters. But anecdotal statements are not sufficient. A more formal statistical review is warranted. CXO Advisory Group just completed just such an examination. Here is a Link to CXO’s research and findings:
http://www.cxoadvisory.com/2663/economic-indicators/the-decision-moose-asset-allocation-framework/
Please access the reference. As usual, CXO did a very honest, unbiased, workmanlike job.
My three major takeaways from the CXO study are:
(1) The Decision Moose performance has deteriorated over time. Change in effectiveness happens.
(2) A major factor in the perceived outperformance is coupled to a single Gold call made a long time ago. Tossing away that outlier greatly reduces the purported (costs were not included) excess returns of the method.
(3) Decision Moose contrasts its performance against the S&P 500 Index as a benchmark. That is not the best benchmark since the Decision Moose chooses between 9 fund/ETF categories. A 60/40 asset mix of these same categories might be a better measure of relative performance.
The Decision Moose also postulates an All In or All Out policy. Dirlam doesn’t encourage such an extreme commitment, and I doubt if any supporters follow such a concentrated positioning. The non-diversification distorts the scoring somewhat by acting as a result magnifier.
I hope this post is helpful when evaluating the benefits and shortcomings of the Decision Moose’s forecasts. The site seems to be operated by an honest advocate of momentum investing. All this assists the marketplace’s pricing discovery mechanisms.
Thanks for introducing me to the Decision Moose website.
Best Regards.