RiverPark Strategic Income: Portfolio Statistics

AndyJ

Yesterday I noticed that RiverPark's June 30 fund fact sheet for RSIVX/RSIIX shows data that (to my knowledge, anyway) they haven't put in a document before: go to the fund page and click on "Fund Fact Sheet" to see the PDF.

They show the credit ratings for the holdings now, and it is pretty junky - 19% investment grade, 4% BB, 29% B, 39% CCC, and 7% unrated. It took a small hit during the recent credit risk-off days, but not as much as OSTIX did, for example.

So I'm thinking short junk does appear to be the personality, and the portfolio slot where it belongs.

Ted

So far a run-of -the-mill fund in it's short life

Vert

Even if it is in quite short maturities, you really have to trust the manager with a portfolio like that. I know he'd say that these instruments are fully covered by the companies' assets and so forth, but...

JohnChisum

The first thing that caught my eye was the fact that Riverpark outsourced the fund management to a company called Cohanzick. It happens more often than not but I wonder why it is not managed in house?

This fund is coming up on one year in existence. You will need more time before classifying it.

Sven

Just a thought. Another consideration is either Vanguard's investment grade short term bond, VFSTX, or the short term bond index, VBIRX. In either case, the expense ratio is ~ 0.1-0.2%. YTD returns this years have been quite good, 1.7 % and 1.0%, respectively. I still like OTSIX and the management team are quite good communicating with their shareholders.
http://osterweis.com/files/Fixed_Income_Outlook_2Q14a.pdf

Lawlar

I purchased RSIVX based on the very favorable write-up it got from MFO in January. I'm retired and have placed money in this fund to balance some of my equity holdings. Should I move to a better fund? What conservative income funds would you recommend? [I've been tempted to put some money in FPA New Income]

Bitzer

I have found myself in a similar situation with a similar question in many instances. I switched mostly to ETFs. As much as I enjoy this forum, I have seen several forum darlings (PAUDX, MFLDX, etc) show subsequent underperformance with resulting "should I sell?" questions.

Old_Skeet

Hi Bitzer,

Within the past year I sold PAUAX & MFLDX ... but, I held on to PASAX.

PASAX is now the thrid best performing fund within its hybrid income sleeve ytd in my portfolio. One of the reasons that I decided to hold on to it was that it pays a quarterly distribution that was in the four percent range and I felt that I was getting paid while it was positioned to the fast moving market currents. Where as PAUAX and MFLDX do not make quarterly distributions and there was nothing there to recieve in the form of a distribution while I waited for a turn around.. With this, I elected to moved on.

Old_Skeet

Amir

David Sherman and his Cohanzick Team write in their 2nd quarter 2014 commentary that its funds are managed "very conservatively against most fixed-income risk categories."

However, he goes on to write "...a substantial percentage of the holdings in both funds are invested in below investment grade securities. Therefore, arguably the funds have above average credit risk. Our strategy to maneuver in current markets is founded in the belief that by staying small and nimble that we can take advantage of special situations where our perception of credit risk is different than the market or ratings agencies."

Once it gets three years under its belt, I would imagine RSIVX/RSIIX will have excellent standard deviation/return, Sharpe and Sortino ratings.

The only gripe - and it's a big one - is its expense ratio.

maxlib421

As RPHYX nears a 3 year anniversary with almost $900 million in assets, I would have expected to see an expense ratio considerably below 1.17%. That's over $10 million being raked in annually for this fund. I guess the prospects for the RSIVX expense ratio to come down much from the current 1.24% are not too bright. I think that RSIVX is delivering about what I expected - 4.4% YTD with low volatility - but expenses ought to be lower.

Mark

Old Skeet - I see PAUAX as paying quarterly dividends at a higher yield than PASAX? I don't follow any of these funds but did you mix them up or ...."

Old_Skeet

Hi Mark,

My bad, seems that PAUAX does make a quartely distribution.

Old_Skeet

VintageFreak

Lawlar said:

I purchased RSIVX based on the very favorable write-up it got from MFO in January. I'm retired and have placed money in this fund to balance some of my equity holdings. Should I move to a better fund? What conservative income funds would you recommend? [I've been tempted to put some money in FPA New Income]

RPHYX, RSIVX and FPNIX is where my "risky cash" is. So far so good.