The author is more than a little confused. He initially mentions the Loomis Sayles International Bond Fund (LSIYX) but links to the Loomis Sayles Bond Fund (LSBDX). Fuss is a manager of the latter (with $25 billion AUM) but not the former.
@Ted Loomis Sayles Global Bond Fund (LSGLX) is a different fund which Fuss also does not manage.

Is there a LC index fund?
IMHO, LC is the area where indexing makes the most sense. Unless you are looking for a manager that has a mandate to preserve capital first, hedge with cash when stocks look pricey and that is the strategy you want (ala funds like YAFFX, PRBLX or SEEDX to name a few) the S&P500 index will out perform most LC funds over time.

@Kaspa: When John Bogle went to Jim Barrow back in 1985 it was the beginning of a great fund. However, in 2003 Vanguard started bring in one fund manager after another spoiling the broth, plus asset blot. I'd take a pass on VWNFX, and in my opinion PRWAX is run-of-the-mill. What other funds are available in her 410 (k) ?
Regards,
Ted

@hank,
These days there are bubbles all around. I don't think the deflation issue will become an issue for stocks until people start at least talking about it. Then it would have to be factored into stock prices. Look at Japan and Europe - it hasn't hurt stocks. It could help stocks as people look for anything paying a dividend.
Even the HYD - HY muni has many revenue backed bonds. So, it should do well.
Look at Autozone AZO - forget about APPLE - people hold onto their cars longer and need to maintain them. But it looks toppy.
Stocks like Home Depot might do well.
I don't own any stocks at this time.
-----
If you want to learn something from Japan - they have a high Gov't debt, as does the USA. They instituted a VAT and recently increased it from 5-8% at a time they want to stimulate consumer spending.
http://www.bbc.com/news/26830486
Eventually, the USA will follow.

FYI: (Click On Article Title At Top Of Google Search)
Loomis Sayles fixed-income guru Dan Fuss retreats from overseas markets and raises cash to record levels.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.google.com/search?newwindow=1&site=&source=hp&q=noteable+sale+of+foreign+bonds+barron's&oq=noteable+sale+of+foreign+bonds+barron's&gs_l=hp.3...1871.22448.0.22796.41.41.0.0.0.0.181.3406.37j4.41.0....0...1c.1.53.hp..17.24.2074.hs5dHdBlC_Q
M* Snapshot Of LSGLX: http://quotes.morningstar.com/fund/lsglx/f?t=lsglx
Lipper Snapshot Of LSGLX: http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/fund/lsglx
LSGLX Is Rank #36 In The (WB) Fund Category By U.S. News & World Report:
http://money.usnews.com/funds/mutual-funds/world-bond/loomis-sayles-global-bond-fund/lsgbx

FYI: (Click On "Profiting From Flaws" Article At Top Google Search)
Regards,
Ted
Joe Huber, chief executive and chief investment officer of Huber Capital Management in Los Angeles, combines research-driven, fundamental value investing with behavioral finance. He and his team try to find attractive and cheap stocks that investors are overlooking owing to biases. One of these biases is a tendency to weight a recent event -- a quarterly earnings miss, for example -- too heavily in assessing a company's prospects.
https://www.google.com/search?newwindow=1&site=&source=hp&q=profiting+from+flaws+barron's&oq=profiting+from+flaws+barron's&gs_l=hp.3...1326.19816.0.23200.33.27.2.4.4.0.226.2185.23j3j1.27.0....0...1c.1.53.hp..9.24.1442.GvqhfH5dYa0
M* Snapshot Of HULIX; http://quotes.morningstar.com/fund/f?t=HULIX&region=usa&culture=en-US
Lipper Snapshot Of HULIX: http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/fund/hulix
HULIX Is Ranked #28 In The (LCV) Fund Category By U.S. News & World Report:
http://money.usnews.com/funds/mutual-funds/large-value/huber-capital-equity-income-fund/hulix

@Dex, @heezsafe: What effect do you think the end of QE in October will have?
And the expected raising of the Fed Funds rate at some point in 2015, sounds like you must doubt that?

@Junkster
A couple of point.
1 - QE has been winding down for awhile and the end is priced into the market.
2 - Fed increase - I doubt it will happen - couple of reasons - weak recovery, velocity of money declining and the possibility of a strong dollar making exports expensive
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/M2V
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/M1V
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/MZMV
Deflation in the EU is the fear and the reality. That could spread to the USA.
I think we all will be surprised how long this low interest rate/inflation period lasts.
I think/hope your HY mini bonds will do well - the supply is drying up and they are off their highs. The HY corps are near their peak and usually track with stocks.

The sharks run fast in the retirement funding industry. Their prey is the worker with no knowledge of the subject of investing and there are plenty of them sadly.

Yeah, and how can you blame the worker? Investing is not taught in the schools as part of the required courses. One job I was on had a 401k plan administered by Fidelity. The employees were given choices of something like 75 actively managed funds, without information about each one other than what category it was in. From lots of different fund families, not just Fidelity.
Employee friends of mine would come up to me asking me which fund or funds to invest in, because they knew I had an interest and was studying mutual funds. As if I could advise them which actively managed funds they should invest in!
Way too many choices, no guidance, not a good situation.
Perhaps people with no clue should be directed to a target date fund based on when they plan to retire?
Human Resources should sponsor employee seminars regarding how to invest in their 401k plan.
Keep it simple. Some basic index funds covering different asset classes is a good idea. Don't overwhelm with tons of fund choices.

@msf Thanks for your excellent commentary and for taking the time to do it.
The first and only time this came to my attention was shortly after the financial crisis. Schwab increased their fees, apparently for the distinct privilege of placing a MF companies' funds on their platform, and about half-dozen fund companies were incensed enough to take the matter public and announced why they were planning to yank all their funds from Schwab. Some did, and set up hotlines for investors who would want to tranfer their fund shares outta there. Then the matter died quietly and I never heard any more about it.
so, I guess your answer to Paul is: "You'll never know exactly what the fund pays to the broker, because those fees are negotiated separately for each fund/family." That's probably close to the mark. Still, ya gotta wonder if some of this isn't disclosed in SAI fine print somewhere and escaping our attention?
But maybe some of these fees are creeping into a little bit of a skim from us and not being disclosed. Maybe that's what these recent SEC investigations are really about:
http://www.mfwire.com/article.asp?template=article&wireid=2&storyID=49595&bhcp=1
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/04/us-usa-funds-sec-idUSKBN0GZ2HL20140904

How does one determine how much of the expense ratio goes to the fund complex for NTF vs transaction fee funds (TF)? From what I gather, it looks like it's the "other expenses" and 12b1 fee combined.

The fund's SAI should list the exact amount paid to its distributor to pay to brokerage platforms for carrying the fund. You might have to do some math, but you can probably figure out an approximation of how much of the ER went to outside platforms.

Does the supermarket get the full .46% or maybe the 12b1 fee and the "shareholder servicing fee" of .10%?

Shareholder servicing is a sort of administrative fee that funds pay to have people answer questions about the fund or to produce marketing materials. It isn't a supermarket expense. It can come from the 12b-1 or elsewhere.

The Institutional share class doesn't have the .25% 12b1 fee. Does that mean they fund supermarket just gets the "other expenses?"
Now, if we look at Fidelity's supermarket, why do some funds get charged a $75 transaction fee (vanguard, dodge and cox- any others?) and pretty much anything else get charged $50? I'm assuming there is some revenue sharing with the lower $50 TF funds but not quite the 45 basis points or so of the NTF funds. Any idea how much of the expense go for these other funds? Thanks as always!

My understanding is that there are varying levels of cooperation between fund houses and broker-dealers. Companies like D&C, Vanguard, Primecap, Tweedy, and Mairs and Power don't really play along with the discount brokerages. They provide their own distribution, which supposedly aids in their independence and, in some cases, lowers ERs. It also means brokerages can charge more to make up lost revenue.

When you say "high fee funds", is that high expense ratio fund, or they came with loads?
What type of fees? Some load funds have the load waived in a 403b plan, depending on the specific 403b plan.
I don't see any way for a high expense ratio fund to not deduct the full expense ratio for all investors in that same share class, whether the investors are in a 403b fund or taxable accounts. The specific share class invested in would be the key. Not sure I would believe the reps from the insurance company.
But I thought Twentieth Century was just a no load family.

Tax sheltered plans (401(k)s, 403(b)s) can be structured as annuities, which have wrapper fees. It common practice for these annuities to reduce their wrapper fees to the extent that they get kickbacks (um, 12b-1 or other servicing fees) from the underlying funds.
For example, if a 403(b) had a 0.75% wrapper (insurance) fee, and you invested in a fund with a 1.25% fee (including a 0.25% 12b-1 fee that got paid to the insurance company), your total fee would be 1.25% + 0.75% - 0.25%.
You'd get credit for that 12b-1 payment by the insurer issuing the 403(b) annuity.
Technically, you're still paying the full 1.25% ER; pragmatically, you're not paying full freight.
As to Twentieth Century being no load - that's not entirely accurate. While the company was still Twentieth Century, it began offering "special classes of its no-load funds that brokers can sell with higher fees attached." (Quote is from the 1996 linked article.)
More specifically, it offered retail, institutional, services, and advisor share classes. Here's the 1996 prospectus for Growth, Ultra, and Vista. (The company name change occurred in 1997.) (It's a 1MB file.)
If you do a search for "Advisor Class Prospectus", and then scroll down a couple of pages, you'll find the fees for this share class. They charged 0.50% 12b-1 fees.
Current rules (and I don't think these ever changed) are that funds that charge 12b-1 fees in excess of 0.25% cannot call themselves no load funds. (Scroll to "A Word About No-Load Funds in link.)
Thus, this share class of Twentieth Century funds appears to have been a load class.

I should clarify that the Twentieth Century comment was a bit off topic. Yes, they are a no load fund company. I was reminiscing a bit from my early investing years.
In our 403b through an insurance company we had a list of funds to pick from. These were all load funds varying from about 2.5 to over 5%. We could look them up as they were common names like Lord Abbett and Franklin for example.
It was hard for me to believe that a fund with a 5% load would be "free" via the insurance company that managed the 403b. So like you, I didn't believe what the reps stated. Also their scheme was to get one into as many funds as possible. I'm sure there was a commission involved. A lot of these funds were duplicative but per the rep this was to diversify your holdings which sounded good. Most employees had no idea what was going on. That was the hand we were dealt so we had to make the best of it. I know this is a common story in the 401k/403b universe.

I'll add that the TRP funds that are offered NTF are "Advisor Class" shares, and carry a 0.25% 12b-1 fee that likely few here have seen. (I have - that's a story for another day.)

Agree...mentioned here a bit:
mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/comment/46610/#Comment_46610

@msf, I was a investor with Twentieth Century back then. TWCGX is one of their original funds along with Select, Ultra and International. Some of those funds either consolidated or went away. Vista is no longer around. $25 a month would get one into their funds. Now they are much bigger of course.
This is an interesting discussion and one I used to have during my working years with fellow coworkers. Our 403b was filled with high fee funds but the reps from the insurance company said there were no fees attached. I believed that somehow those funds still got their money in the end. Nothing is free.

Fees are a mess. At the 10,000 foot altitude, it really doesn't matter whether there are line items (shareholder servicing fees, 12b-1 fees, management fees) or not. The bottom line is that you, the shareholder, are shouldering the expenses of the fund.
For example, Twentieth Century (now American Century) funds started out decades ago charging a flat 1% fee for management. See, e.g. TWCGX. The only line item for the no-load classes was and is the management fee. No 12b-1 fee, no other expenses.
Management in turn paid (and still pays) all the fund expenses. Something you're not used to seeing is that different fund classes have different management fees. Usually, management takes its cut - the same for all share classes - and the fund pays the expenses itself. Higher expenses for investor shares, lower for institutional shares. But with these funds, since management is responsible for the fund fees, management charges the fund more if it has to pay out more in expenses.
The point is that whether there are line items or not, you are the one paying the fund expenses. Everything else is a shell game. So it doesn't really matter whether there's a 12b-1 line item, whether there's a shareholder expense line item, etc.
You'll never know exactly what the fund pays to the broker, because those fees are negotiated separately for each fund/family. What you can do is look at what Schwab has written about its fees:
Mutual Fund Compensation section (pp. 6 - 9) in ERISA 408(b)(2) Fee Disclosure, Schwab 2015.
Some highlights:
- NTF funds typically pay 0.40% to Schwab (fees generally range 0.30% to 0.50%, though they can go as high as 1.10%). [Note: Schwab raised its fee in 2003 from 0.35% to 0.40%.]
- NTF funds typically pay onetime fee of $10K (first fund) or $1K (subsequent fund) for shelf space, i.e. to be on the platform. [Schwab denies that this is a "shelf space" fee, arguing that funds aren't paying for featured placement - see its SEC comments in 2007.]
- TF funds typically pay $20/account annually to Schwab (could go as high as $30); they have the option of paying 0.25% annually instead.
- TF funds typically pay $20K (first fund) or $2K (subsequent fund) for shelf space.
- Load funds pay Schwab shareholder servicing fees (out of their 12b-1 fees).
- Load funds may pay Schwab $6/account/year.
And all fees are negotiable.
To give a sense of how negotiable fees are, here's the MFWire report in 2011 announcing T.Rowe Price's agreeing to sell on Schwab's OneSource (NTF) platform. Key points:
- It appears T. Rowe Price is paying less than the standard 40 basis points (companies would not disclose agreed upon fee)
- T. Rowe Price is (was?) paying TD Ameritrade 10 basis points to be on its platform
I'll add that the TRP funds that are offered NTF are "Advisor Class" shares, and carry a 0.25% 12b-1 fee that likely few here have seen. (I have - that's a story for another day.)

Junkster junkster junkster. Never make a one sided bet. Give heezsafe 10 to 1 odds at least so he pays up something if you are correct. Let him pay you $25 if his bold prediction is wrong. Heezsafe - man up.

CIOVX
I already sold CIOVX last week in my Scottrade Portfolio. Reading through the material Causeway sent, I think their pet peeve is fund has not garnered enough assets in spite of whatever else they might be saying. Also I'm a little miffed about mutual fund accounting rules or Causeways interpretation of them. How can they not know what investor liability is at the point of conversion? Their average NAV cost of CIVVX and CEMVX should determine that. CIOVX is owning THOSE securities. Also I didn't see any mention of taxable events to CIVVX and CEMVX. If $51M odd is being sold across those funds, stands to reason shares will need to be redeemed in CIVVX and CEMVX. In the case of CIVVX there seems to be enough uninvested cash to give to CIOVX shareholders, but then they should state that. In any case, I hate when my mutual fund company makes me think so much. I will look into a suitable replacement.
CVLOX
Selling this was always on the cards. Suspect Convertible expertise, Calamos' taking a back seat, and Gary Black. Now I'm reading Calamos Sr, is really pulling down his investments in even the income vehicles @Calamos of which Convertibles is such a big part. This fund is not doing what I wanted and is not being managed by those I wanted to be in control. Sell order in place @Schwab
PTHDX
As I have mentioned before, possibly utterly shameless behavior by Gudefin/PIMCO pretending manager has skin in the game, only to see she does not. Latest SAI dated 8/25/14 confirms she does not have a penny in the ONLY fund she is managing at PIMCO. Sell order in place @Schwab
Between SFGIX, FMIJX which I've owned for some time and recent FEBAX and CIPYX purchases which have substantial allocations internationally, I don't need any more for such coverage @Schwab. Will continue to DCA (sic) into FEBAX and CIPYX. And I've avoided potential infections of Excessive Funditis.

>OK... Here you go: .....oops, sorry. Wonderful Bill Gates and his wonderful Windows software make finding that simple piece of information impossible
It has nothing to do with windows or Bill Gates on how to find version.
google could tell you that "how do I find firefox version"
the about option in Firefox, tells your version
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/956507
if you don't mung things up with your browser by choosing wrong settings and don't disable javascript or block cookies, all browsers work if they are recent versions (MSIE has its own issues with older versions).
Firefox and Chrome work fine.

A simple three-fund portfolio. What a concept!
Why didn’t I think of that?
Oh, that’s right, I did.
I’ve been suggesting that for maybe the past 15 years
to my investment classes.
Mr. Bernstein suggests Rebalancing, while I suggest using
a simple moving average to avoid market crashes.

Short of signing up for your next class or waiting for you to finally write that book you've been promising us, would you share your moving average strategy? Thanks.
By the way, here's is Mr. Bernstein's piece:
If You Can:
etf.com/docs/IfYouCan.pdf

A simple three-fund portfolio. What a concept!
Why didn’t I think of that?
Oh, that’s right, I did.
I’ve been suggesting that for maybe the past 15 years
to my investment classes.
And I posted such a plan on this venue a couple of years ago.
I guess that I should have written a book.
Suggesting this portfolio is one thing. Getting people to accept
such a simple concept is another. You’ve got to show this
to investors before the Gotcha Experts snare them with the
complex asset allocation methodology.
In this respect, Mr. Bernstein has succeeded by directing
his booklet at the right demographic – the millennials.
Mr. Bernstein suggests Rebalancing, while I suggest using
a simple moving average to avoid market crashes.
Otherwise, we’re pretty much on the same page – own a very
limited number (three will suffice) of broadly diversified funds
or ETFs and go on with your life.