@MikeW,
As a subscriber to MFO Premium many of your questions can be found through the database collected and analyzed by our very own @Charles. The tools provide powerful insights to analyze mutual fund's performance and risk in terms of Ulcer Index, bear rating and other statistic parameters (Sharpe, Sortino and Martin ratios) over the lifespan of each mutual fund including the bear markets. For example, Vanguard Total Stock Market Index fund, VTSMX had a maximum drawdown of -50.9% during 2008. It took 52 months or 4.3 year to fully recover. The emerging market and developed market indeces have equally if not worse drawdown % and long recovery periods.
There are few bright spots in the mutual fund universe and they are posted here as the Great Owl funds. In order to qualify as Great Owl funds, the funds are analyzed monthly using the above metrics. For example, T. Rowe Price Capital Appreciation fund, PRCWX is an asset allocation fund with 70/30 stock/bond composition. In 2008, the maximum drawdown was -36.5% but the recovery period was 29 months while the annual return is higher by 1% higher from 2008 to Feb 2020. And there are a number of Great Owl funds where I can use to construct a solid portfolio. The subscription rate is $140/year and I am more than happy to pay 10X of that amount. Can you say the same for Morningstar?
Charles Lynn Bolin who writes for MFO's monthly commentary as well as Seeking Alpha, utilized the database of MFO Premium as the basis for his informative articles.

Hi @MikeW
The below chart start point is set in reference to the vote date for the "bail out" program.
SPY large cap, one year, Oct. 14, 2008 - Oct. 15, 2009
So, $100k on Oct. 14, 2008 has a value of $68,500 on March 6, 2009 (-31.5%) and finds a break even point about Aug. 1, 2009. One year out finds a +9.9% on Oct. 15, 2009. Course, the sell down began earlier than Oct. 14, 2008 and many SP500 type holdings had a lower negative, for a short period.
Aside from the commonly known "congressional bail out package" vote that passed Oct. 14, are 2 other support programs; being TARP and TALF. You may read more from this March 17 post. TARP and TALF are clickable links in the March 17 write. From recall, I believe the TALF program continued into April, 2010. These 3 "bailout programs were not solely aimed at the large banks; but towards companies on the edge of "no money" remaining; as in insurance companies that would not be able to support payouts to clients. This list would include life insurance policies and all of the annuities, etc.
Well, anyway. My 2 cents worth.
Take care,
Catch

Yep, in a real meltdown like 2008 and 2020, correlation goes much higher. CEFs actually lost a lot more. Funds with extra risk such as NHMAX+IOFIX lost more than similar funds.
In the above situation, treasuries do best. Remember Bogle 2 simple indexes SP500 + US Total bond index(which is not all treasuries but a good LT index)?

I admire your discipline and your system. Thanks, as ever, for the update. Your reporting gives me an easy-reference standard by which to gage my own progress, survival skills and bloodletting. ;) My biggest holding PRWCX (balanced) now is running neck-and-neck with my largest bond holding RPSIX, but that one holds 12% stocks. (Each about 29% of portfolio.) PRDSX small-caps and mid-caps are down -33.9% but it's less than 2% of portfolio. I lost my taste for the volatility of that sector way before this latest swoon. PRIDX international small-midcaps, -30.9%. Gotta keep my finger in the pie, worldwide, but that one is less than 5% of portf. Small consolation, but my big shift to bonds last year has helped--- though bonds are getting beaten-up, too. Interesting notes you mention about the influence of the shorts. Meanwhile, we're all taking it in the shorts, eh? PTIAX is really holding up well, though very much affected negatively on Friday last.

As of market close March 20th, according to the metrics of Old_Skeet's stock market barometer, the S&P 500 Index remains extremely oversold with a reading of 180+. This is on the high side of the barometer's scale. A higher barometer reading indicates there is more investment value in the Index over a lower reading. This past week, the weekly short volume average declined, a little, from 64% to 59% of the total volume for SPY. However, the VIX (which is a measure of volatility) went from a reading of 53 to 62. The stock Index's valuation lost ground during week moving from a reading of 2711 to 2305 for a decline of 15% and a decline of 32% off it's 52 week high. From a yield perspective, I'm finding that the US10YrT is now listed at 0.92% while at the beginning of the year it was listed at 1.92%. With the recent stock market swoon the S&P 500 Index is currently listed with a dividend yield of 2.53% while at the beginning of the year it was listed at 1.82%. As you can see there is a good yield advantage for the stock Index over the US Ten Year Treasury at this time. With this yield advantage, I'm favoring my equity income funds over my fixed income funds due to this yield spread and I feel equities have some good longterm upside potential more so than my fixed income funds. I also feel that the stock market is oversold and bonds are overbought but some bonds are now starting to become more attractive due to their selloff this past week. According to my advisor, and what they are seeing, the good stuff is getting sold to cover margin calls as those margined are short of cash. I would have thought most margin folks would have been gone by now.
I thought I'd include with this weeks blurb a link to Morningstar's Market Fair Value Graph. It reflects that stocks in general are at about a 28% discount. https://www.morningstar.com/market-fair-value
For the week, I was a buyer of equities at the 29% decline mark with also having bought earlier at the 8%, 13%, 19% & 27% decline marks. I most likely will continue to buy equities, at a slower pace though, as long as they remain in bear market territory; and, there is a fit for them within my asset allocation. However, my advisor/broker thinks I should limit my next two equity buys to the decline marks of 36% & 44% (if reached). In doing this would put my average equity buys at the 25% decline mark. For equities I'm still with buying in my equity income funds (IDIVX & INUTX) and in growth area in (KAUAX). In addition, the feeling is I should buy some on the income side of my portfolio since income has taken a beating of late. With this, I'm looking at real estate (FRINX) and muni's (FLAAX). In addition, I'm thinking of buying some more of CTFAX as it recently went from an equity allocation of 15% to 60% this past week. This asset move in of itself (by CTFAX) increased my overall equity exposure by better than 1% and reduced my income exposure by a like amount. My three best performing funds were PCOXX & TTOXX +0.01% ... IDIVX -0.99% ... and TSIAX -5.35%.
With equities taking the beating that they have in this downdraft (and to play the eventual rebound) I am temporairly moving to a 15% cash, 40% income and 45% equity allocation. This will be done in steps, of course, and based upon stock market movement.
In compairing myself against a 50/50 portfolio split between SPY (down -32.5%) & AGG (down
-7.75%) puts the model portfolio off it's 52 week high by about 20% which is in line with some of my asset allocation funds and where I bubble as well. However, the 50/50 model has a yield of 2.25% while I'm at a yield of 3.75%. Now being retired, I'm invested more towards income generation more so than capital appreciation although that is important, to me, to offset inflation.
My late father's asset allocation was 25% cash, 25% bonds, 25% stocks and 25% real estate. He felt that they would cycle at different times and while one might be falling another would most likely would be rising. But, that was way back then when you could make something off your cash. This asset allocation model would be off its 52 week high by about 16.6% with bonds and cash acting as stabelizers.
Thanks for stopping by and reading.
Take care ... and, I wish all ... "Good Investing."
Old_Skeet

A few countries and companies have successfully issued "century bonds" with 100 year maturities, so sure, this could work. Even Petrobras did a few years back. It's all part of that bond game where a whole lot of investors don't plan to hold most of their bonds to maturity anyway, so it's about hedging, and bets on the curve, or all these other things I don't pretend to understand.

I posted this information also in the IOFIX thread but thought it might merit a thread of it's own. For those who are interested:
If you would just like to see the PIMCO blog report: PIMCO's blog Insight Report
For further discussion on mortgage backed securities you might want to give this M* community discussion a look.
PIMCO says mortgage-backed securities are cheap
Also a good discussion of what has been happening in mortgage bond land lately by Lou Barnes at Premier Mortgage Group:
Mortgage Credit News March 20, 2020

I had several hundred thousand in IOFIX but I sold most of it on Feb 28 and all on March 9. That was based on the fact that stocks are crashing + bonds don't behave rationally to rate drop + even treasuries didn't act on rates properly every day + thousands global coronavirus + VIX > 50. Let's call it what it is..a black swan.
The market will turn and I will first look at the 2 funds I owned several weeks ago. NHMAX = HY Muni (includes leverage > 20%) + IOFIX. What comes down further usually goes up faster.
Several months ago I talked to the manager of EIXIX and he explicitly mentioned that his holdings have a much lower risk than IOFIX and one day IOFIX will explode.
The Pimco guys always say that MBS is the best place to be ;-)
AGC has great articles about CEFs but you get a lot of info on fixed income...see this (article)
"So what do you do at this point?
Sitting still and doing nothing can be the hardest thing in the world but is likely the best course of action. Resist selling and even buying much of anything at this point. We need to see some stabilization before really buying anything further: 1) we need volatility (VIX) to peak and start to subside. 2) Oil prices need to stabilize. 3) We need to see new cases of COVID19 trend similar to China or South Korea with the second derivative trail off.
Once these things happen, we believe that the market will bottom and start their recovery."
As usual, I follow my chart/trends and they come directly from the price which is the end result of the opinions of all traders.

@Charles - For further discussion on mortgage backed securities you might want to give this M* community discussion a look. Let me know if you have trouble accessing it.
PIMCO says mortgage-backed securities are cheap
PIMCO's blog Insight Report is here

BSBSX has outperformed its fund category with a -2.05% ytd .

I'm guessing that the vast majority of their assets are defined as Level 2 or 3 per fasb 157. Investopedia discusses fasb 157 and I'm sure there are additional resources that describe fasb 157 in more detail .

IOFAX fund manager ownership / @zenbrew
Tom Miner
Over $1,000,000
Garrett Smith
$100,001–$500,000
Brian Loo
$100,001–$500,000
These numbers are likely very minimal to the overall portfolios
for these fund managers. I got stuck with a much greater percentage than the managers did. But going back to @newgirl 's question, what to do now?
For me, since this fund shows that it can fall at the same rate as equities, why not sell it and put that money in equities? For example, is IOFAX going to increase more than say BRK/B in the next year or 2 on a risk adjusted basis? I doubt it.
I happened to sell about 1/3 of this fund on the same day of the 1st big drop last week. I took the 17% hit the following day with the remainder. Now, like newgirl, I'm deciding what is next.

When I look at their website, there is a special March update but it is only available to financial professionals & interestingly not for shareholders of their funds.
Most of the above (except for the reference to Covid 19) is the same information they have in their fund "presentation" pdf which seems very reasonable & makes the fund appear quite safe. There are a lot of tables & graphs. However, I don't recall seeing the graph for the scenario where the fund drops straight down off of a cliff.
Back in November 2018 the fund did drop just slightly more than 1% (those were the good old days when 1% seemed large) but that was a one day only event.
From their August SAI:
The following table shows the dollar range of equity securities of the Fund beneficially owned by each portfolio manager as of March 31, 2019.
Name of Portfolio Manager
Dollar Range of Equity Securities in the Income Opportunities Fund
Tom Miner
Over $1,000,000
Garrett Smith
$100,001–$500,000
Brian Loo
$100,001–$500,000
So I assume they themselves are feeling some pain right now.
Fortunately I'm not, as I sold out my position in IOFIX the week before after a very bad feeling about this fund & the bond world in general.

I've removed the prior Dumbfounded title; as apparently the Fed. has fixed credit markets for awhile, and/or all of the folks who had to raise cash are about finished with that exercise; and the big selling is done. I'm sure a few of these folks are surprised at how low their stash of liquors or wine changed in just one week.
Many bonds acted a bit more normal today (March 20, Fri.), in relation to the equity markets.
Friday, March 20 close numbers; which will be reflected in your bond fund holdings or allocation fund; depending on sector exposure and percent mix.
In particular, AAA bonds to the longer duration were the benefactors on Friday.
Corporate bonds attempted a rally on Friday, but I suspect it was from short time traders and nothing meaningful.
Corporate and High Yield continue to behave as noted previous; as these areas will remain twitchy, IMHO. Too much corporate debt and likely very little or no growth or negative growth to support these bonds. An big ouch period has arrived.
A few views from bondland:
DAY(March 20) / WEEK / YTD
--- MINT = -1% / -3.6% / -4.1% (Pimco Enhanced short maturity)
--- SHY = +.27% /+.24% / +2.5% (1-3 yr bills)
--- IEI = +1.2% /+.7% /+5.2% (3-7 yr notes)
--- IEF = +2.6% /+1.5% /+8.4% (7-10 yr notes)
--- TLT = +7.5% / +3.6% /+18.1% (20+ Yr UST Bond
--- EDV = +7.15% / -.23% / +19.8% (Vanguard extended duration gov't)
--- ZROZ = +8.93% /+2.27% /+22.3% (UST., AAA, long duration zero coupon bonds)
***Other:
--- HYG = -2.24% / -12.9 / -20% (high yield bonds, proxy ETF)
--- LQD = +1.6% / -13.25% / -16.2% (corp. bonds, various quality)
--- LTPZ = +12.3% /+4.3% / +3.5% (UST, long duration TIPs bonds
Overview for higher quality, longer duration bonds/bond funds/bond etf's. Will the trend persist? I hope so, but I'll be watching next week with you. This area continues to rely on what's brewing in the under belly of the credit markets.
A the least for the quality bond funds one may have expects more to the positive side these past 2 weeks, but; in a way, these bonds did protect from a larger downside for a portfolio.
I watched the daily numbers for one of the most plain vanilla bond funds available; being BAGIX. The managers were surely scratching and clawing to determine were to place the money. The fund caved a bit this past week and is now at -2.24% YTD.
Let me know if you discovered a data error.
Ok. Nap time for me.
Take care of you and yours,
Catch

re: 2018's Christmas swoon ... yes, I did some buying back then, mostly adding to existing positions. Nothing like what I've been doing these days, though.
I had some dry powder in my 403(b) that I normally use over the summer to invest into things when my employer contributions stop - but I deployed it 2x during the China spring swoon of what ... 2015? and have used it a few times now to buy into my one mutual fund holding as it has fallen. The dry powder left in that account now is down to about the equivalent of a month's employer contribution.

In combo with rforno comments. Youngsters, does it make sense to hold some dry powder in your 401-k accounts to fire a shot or two at times like this ? Or would it be better to rebalance if 90-10 or 80-20 , before the downdraft ?
Just some Sat. morning thoughts running through my coffee induced head.
Enjoy your weekend, Derf
P.S. @rforno did you
buy during 3/rd qter
drop 2018 ?

To be honest, I wouldn't be surprised if there are lawsuits over this one because as I've said before pricing of the underlying debt can be so difficult. How was it possible that on March 16th, a day when stocks lost 12% and closed-end funds for the same kind of debt crashed and Mr. Market was saying really non-agencies are worth X, this fund only fell slightly--from 12.88 a share to 12.58--relatively speaking? And then a few days later it falls 17.2% in one day. Anyone who sold the fund on March 16th where it claimed it only fell 2.3% probably got a lot more money than they should have and those who've sold on March 20th when it dropped 17.2%, even though the stock market only fell 5%, probably have gotten a lot less than they should have. Those still in the fund are left holding the bag.

@Old_Skeet; Thanks for the comeback. Although listed as (10-30% allocation), equity % can go up to 90%. I'll mention also no load at Schwab. 5 stars rated .
Have a good weekend, Derf

just go slow and keep your required reserves in cash. For me that's 50% right now but mainly because my other allocations have shrunk do to price declines!

Yup. I've found the cash % of my portfolio rising significantly over the past month... since everything else has fallen!
I'm still too nervous to pull the trigger with my modest dry powder. I'm guessing we get a quick bump when stimulus passes, then another longer leg down. At least that's what happened in 2008.

Hi @Derf, Yes the fund is down ... I have CTFAX off its 52 week high by -11.1% and down ytd by -7.41%. In comparison, I have the S&P 500 Index (SPY, my stock proxy) off its 52 week high by -32.5% and ytd down -28.48%. Interestingly, AGG (my bond proxy) is off its 52 week high by -7.75% and ytd down -1.67%. Since, CTFAX loaded equities on Monday and reduced bonds I am surprised that it is not down more than it is. Skeet

A nibble is definitely not 10% in one shot, way WAY less. I like to look at individual positions and the opportunities presented. My largest holding is VWALX at around 18%. Getting blasted but I doubt the muni bond market will collapse but it could go lower, I'd be a buyer slowly and the lower the price the fewer shares you need to bring your cost basis down. I always try and buy below my cost basis and now is the first time in years that I can. That said, at some point you also need to stop and wait for stability. Don't always need to catch the bottom...and if you do you're probably just lucky. If you're happy with your potions review them one by one and do some buying when your down and the market is down, just go slow and keep your required reserves in cash. For me that's 50% right now but mainly because my other allocations have shrunk do to price declines!