Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.
I periodically use M* Portfolio X-Ray (via my library) to analyze my portfolio. M* Library Services informed me they will retire Portfolio X-Ray when they move to a new platform in September. Which tools do you use for portfolio analysis?
I reached out to M* Library Services with a question regarding adding individual TIPS to Portfolio X-Ray. They said this wasn't possible (no surprise) so I informed them I would just use a TIPS fund as a proxy. This was their reply (my name was changed below):
"Great, sounds good, Observant1! I wanted to share with you that we are going to be retiring the Portfolio X-Ray tool when we move to a new platform in September. Since this is a tool you use, please let me know if you have any feedback to provide to our product team and also do share with me what library you are accessing the database through."
I have moved on to Stock Rover (SR). I use M* Portfolio as backup until it disappears. Some features in M* Portfolio, such as auto-updating for dividends/distributions, are/will be hard to find elsewhere. SR has only manual updating. SR says just to link brokerage a/c but I won't do that.
It is the only thing I find useful at M*. They have me on auto renew so I hope they make it clear before they "auto renew me" next year
I don't know of another portfolio manager that combines industry sector, allocations, country region and stock intersection.
I have looked around several times but don't find anything else as comprehensive. The brokerages will give u asset allocation and sectors but I am not sure they use % cash in the mutual funds for example.
The only way to combine accounts from different brokerages is to give them access to your passwords. Yodelee has been the most common service for this used by many brokerages, and I have never heard of a breach but it makes me uncomfortable.
M* Investor still will not let you download a portfolio and still requires each position be entered one by one, unless you are willing to give them your passwords.
It is very sad that M* has totally gutted their once very fine individual investor services.
Quicken has a link to Portfolio X-Ray. I wonder if that is doomed too
Had same question couple nights back. Not worth subscribing to M* just for that. And there didn’t seem to be any good apps at Apple specifically for that purpose. Honestly, I’ve always allocated by fund type rather than by what they own. Works for me. So X-Ray not very important.
But what I resorted to the other evening was just roughing it out on a piece of paper. If you know what’s in each fund, it isn’t that hard to translate its dollar current value into stocks, bonds, cash, or whatever (Envision columns for each asset type next to each fund.) Than add up the dollars for each asset type and convert that back into percentages. Took less than an hour to do the math and recheck it.
Re M* - For some reason I’ve gotten free access to their analyst ratings / reviews when I access their site for several days now. Must say they’re lengthy, but all that impressive.
I have been a Morningstar subscriber for decades but have been very disappointed in the gradual elimination of services vital to individual investors.
Portfolio X-ray and the ability to download my portfolios from a spreadsheet have been critical to my investment success.
The New Morningstar investor does not allow me to download a list of positions average costs and symbols, but requires manual entry. unless I hand over my brokerage passwords to you. I am not comfortable doing this.
I am still using the "old Morningstar" to download, but I have heard you plan to eliminate this at the end of the year.
IF this occurs I will have little reason to continue my subscription.
How do I cancel auto renew without canceling my subscription until it expires in June 2024?
Please write a simple program that will continue the download function
Sincerely
FCP
I got this in reply
Thank you for writing to Morningstar. Apologies for the inconvenience caused.
I do understand your situation and can relate to it, however, please be informed that the new website Morningstar Investor is under enhancement to imbibe major data points and functionality from the Legacy website morningstar.com. The data points or functionalities that you do not see on the new website might be migrated in future releases of the website. You may use the Feedback button on the right screen of the website investor.morningstar.com to submit your specific feedback regarding the download function to send it to our developers' team.
If you wish to cancel the auto-renew, please follow the below steps
Visit morningstar.com or investor.morningstar.com and sign in using the registered credentials. Click on My Account at the top right or the man-shaped icon. Select Account/Subscription. Click on Cancel Subscription to cancel.
Once you perform the above steps, the subscription shall remain active until your next invoice due in June 2024.
I hope the above information helps and works for you.
[snip] I don't know of another portfolio manager that combines industry sector, allocations, country region and stock intersection.
I have looked around several times but don't find anything else as comprehensive. The brokerages will give u asset allocation and sectors but I am not sure they use % cash in the mutual funds for example. [snip]
I use the free version of Portfolio Manager only to track prices and returns for holdings / watch lists. Portfolio X-Ray is accessed via the library for detailed portfolio analysis.
I use the free Portfolio Visualizer Backtest Portfolio feature, but it has some major shortcomings: Allows only 4 funds to be included in portfolio. Doesn't list asset weights (US stocks, foreign stocks, bonds, cash). Doesn't list equity styles (small value, large growth, etc.). Doesn't list sector weights. Doesn't list stock intersection.
I've also tried the free version of Personal Capital (added investments manually, didn't aggregate). It has a bit more functionality: Lists asset weights. Lists equity styles for US stocks. Lists sector weights for US stocks.
However, equity styles / sector weights for foreign stocks are omitted. Performance data is only available for the following time periods: 90 days, 1 Year, this year, last year. Stock intersection data is not provided.
I'm willing to pay a reasonable amount for a good tool with functionality similar to Portfolio X-Ray.
Edit: Added strike-through for most PV Backtest Portfolio shortcomings. See my post below.
One of the reasons why I consolidated all of our retirement accounts at Fidelity is its account analysis feature. I used to use M* X-Ray often to review and and analyze our various accounts. Once M* started stripping away features, I started looking for alternatives and realized Fidelity had what I needed all along. I moved all of our IRAs and former 401Ks to Fidelity and haven’t looked back. And it’s FREE for customers.
I use the free Portfolio Visualizer Backtest Portfolio feature, but it has some major shortcomings: Allows only 4 funds to be included in portfolio. Doesn't list asset weights (US stocks, foreign stocks, bonds, cash). Doesn't list equity styles (small value, large growth, etc.). Doesn't list sector weights. Doesn't list stock intersection.
I can't speak to all of these points off the top of my head, but I have never been limited to four funds in the free backtest tool. I was just looking at six today for my oldest child's new Roth IRA.
But I think all of those things, except stock intersection, are there under various tabs
@Observant1 may be referring to free PV runs that are limited to 3 portfolios + 1 benchmark, so 4 total.
I keep several PV portfolios in Excel that I load 3 at a time to save data entry. PV subscription may store them - a while ago, even free PV used to store portfolios, but now everybody wants money.
[snip] I can't speak to all of these points off the top of my head, but I have never been limited to four funds in the free backtest tool. I was just looking at six today for my oldest child's new Roth IRA.
But I think all of those things, except stock intersection, are there under various tabs
You're absolutely correct. As @yogibearbull mentioned above, I mistakenly conflated adding funds with adding portfolios (three portfolios plus one benchmark allowed).
Clicking the Exposures tab lists style categories (large-cap growth, small-cap value, corporate bonds, etc.), asset weights (US stocks, Intl stocks, US bonds, cash, etc.), equity sectors, equity market capitalization, fixed income credit quality, and fixed income maturity.
Pretty much all the data I need is here except for stock intersection (nice to have but can live without). Unfortunately, PV doesn't allow downloading results to PDF or Excel formats without a paid subscription.
I haven't used subscription-PV. But when it allowed storing portfolios with free-PV, I recall that the stored portfolio could be edited (%) and resaved. But there wasn't any portfolio transactional capability.
On the other hand, SR has transactional capabilities - one can enter buys/sells; as I mentioned before, dividends/distributions have to be entered manually also. I now do this every month and it takes 1-2 hours (this is automatic in M* Portfolio).
I think they dumped the strategy for individuals years ago. They have slowly dismantled almost everything.
You have to assume they have focused on advisors and large firms. Almost every brokerage house buys their stock research to provide an "alternative" to in house experts. ( I wish I knew of a study looking at how successful their targets and recs are)
Their portfolio/indexes are aimed at mid level advisors who I assume use them as they are cheaper or they get kick backs
They must have determined that these professionals didn't use mutual fund research, as they switched to that stupid quantitative model.
Most of the live commentators seem like broken records.
Losing the Portf. x-ray at M*? That sucks dooky. Just another reason to forget about M*. It USED TO BE quite useful and valuable. Whale feces at the bottom of the ocean.
I think it depends what you use it for. I find M*’s breakdown of fund holdings very good. Rely on it a lot. Hit “portfolio” tab to view. On bonds you can check credit quality, duration, maturity and how they’re distributed. . They’re still giving that away for free - so far … if you don’t mind ads.
Freebies are disappearing. World’s changing. Giving away free entertainment, data, research isn’t a very profitable business model, whether we like it or not. As I see it, many subscriptions pay for themselves as you benefit monetarily from their content.
Good luck @Crash. It’s tough when you’ve relied on something like that for a long time and than it disappears.
Yes, I have premium, but I don't pay. The individual fund portfolio zoom-in feature is useful, sort of--- but it's just never fresh and up to date. The automated essays "analyzing" those funds where the "Q" is used is utterly comical.
You get into a certain way of operating, and it’s hard to break. Hard to teach an old dog … Like I said previously, roughing it out on a piece of paper works well. Of course, that requires you to know what’s inside each fund you own.
I’ve used Fido’s X-Ray a couple times since it was mentioned here. Hard to uncover on their site. Need to be logged in. Works great. But appears to be only for your holdings with Fido ( I could be wrong). BTW - The Fido results were nearly identical to what I came up with roughing it out on my own.
”The automated essays "analyzing" those funds where the "Q" is used is utterly comical.”
Yes - They sound computer written. There’s an uncomfortable “sameness” to the composition. They seem to rely a lot on total years of experience of a fund’s management team. And, their overall assessment of the firm seems to weigh heavily in their individual fund appraisal.
You get into a certain way of operating, and it’s hard to break. Hard to teach an old dog … Like I said previously, roughing it out on a piece of paper works well. Of course, that requires you to know what’s inside each fund you own.
I’ve used Fido’s X-Ray a couple times since it was mentioned here. Hard to uncover on their site. Need to be logged in. Works great. But appears to be only for your holdings with Fido ( I could be wrong). BTW - The Fido results were nearly identical to what I came up with roughing it out on my own.
”The automated essays "analyzing" those funds where the "Q" is used is utterly comical.”
Yes - They sound computer written. There’s an uncomfortable “sameness” to the composition. They seem to rely a lot on total years of experience of a fund’s management team. And, their overall assessment of the firm seems to weigh heavily in their individual fund appraisal.
@hank You can add an external portfolio to Full View and you will then have the option of including that in a Fidelity X-ray analysis.
Interesting @Bitzer. It might pay someone to open a small account at Fido just to have access to that tool. AFAIK $1 gets you in the door. Fido doesn’t have any minimum investment amount that I know of.
Comments
X-ray within M* Portfolio still works. M* has promised to keep it going through 2023.
I don't see any X-ray feature in the new M* Investor.
I reached out to M* Library Services with a question regarding adding individual TIPS to Portfolio X-Ray.
They said this wasn't possible (no surprise) so I informed them I would just use a TIPS fund as a proxy.
This was their reply (my name was changed below):
"Great, sounds good, Observant1! I wanted to share with you that we are going to be retiring the Portfolio X-Ray tool when we move to a new platform in September. Since this is a tool you use, please let me know if you have any feedback to provide to our product team and also do share with me what library you are accessing the database through."
Which tools do you use for portfolio analysis?
I use M* Portfolio as backup until it disappears. Some features in M* Portfolio, such as auto-updating for dividends/distributions, are/will be hard to find elsewhere. SR has only manual updating. SR says just to link brokerage a/c but I won't do that.
It is the only thing I find useful at M*. They have me on auto renew so I hope they make it clear before they "auto renew me" next year
I don't know of another portfolio manager that combines industry sector, allocations, country region and stock intersection.
I have looked around several times but don't find anything else as comprehensive. The brokerages will give u asset allocation and sectors but I am not sure they use % cash in the mutual funds for example.
The only way to combine accounts from different brokerages is to give them access to your passwords. Yodelee has been the most common service for this used by many brokerages, and I have never heard of a breach but it makes me uncomfortable.
M* Investor still will not let you download a portfolio and still requires each position be entered one by one, unless you are willing to give them your passwords.
It is very sad that M* has totally gutted their once very fine individual investor services.
Quicken has a link to Portfolio X-Ray. I wonder if that is doomed too
But what I resorted to the other evening was just roughing it out on a piece of paper. If you know what’s in each fund, it isn’t that hard to translate its dollar current value into stocks, bonds, cash, or whatever (Envision columns for each asset type next to each fund.) Than add up the dollars for each asset type and convert that back into percentages. Took less than an hour to do the math and recheck it.
Re M* - For some reason I’ve gotten free access to their analyst ratings / reviews when I access their site for several days now. Must say they’re lengthy, but all that impressive.
HI
I have been a Morningstar subscriber for decades but have been very disappointed in the gradual elimination of services vital to individual investors.
Portfolio X-ray and the ability to download my portfolios from a spreadsheet have been critical to my investment success.
The New Morningstar investor does not allow me to download a list of positions average costs and symbols, but requires manual entry. unless I hand over my brokerage passwords to you. I am not comfortable doing this.
I am still using the "old Morningstar" to download, but I have heard you plan to eliminate this at the end of the year.
IF this occurs I will have little reason to continue my subscription.
How do I cancel auto renew without canceling my subscription until it expires in June 2024?
Please write a simple program that will continue the download function
Sincerely
FCP
I got this in reply
Thank you for writing to Morningstar. Apologies for the inconvenience caused.
I do understand your situation and can relate to it, however, please be informed that the new website Morningstar Investor is under enhancement to imbibe major data points and functionality from the Legacy website morningstar.com. The data points or functionalities that you do not see on the new website might be migrated in future releases of the website. You may use the Feedback button on the right screen of the website investor.morningstar.com to submit your specific feedback regarding the download function to send it to our developers' team.
If you wish to cancel the auto-renew, please follow the below steps
Visit morningstar.com or investor.morningstar.com and sign in using the registered credentials.
Click on My Account at the top right or the man-shaped icon.
Select Account/Subscription.
Click on Cancel Subscription to cancel.
Once you perform the above steps, the subscription shall remain active until your next invoice due in June 2024.
I hope the above information helps and works for you.
--
Of course I cannot find a feedback button
@sma3,
Same here - that's what prompted the OP.
I use the free version of Portfolio Manager only to track prices and returns for holdings / watch lists.
Portfolio X-Ray is accessed via the library for detailed portfolio analysis.
I use the free Portfolio Visualizer Backtest Portfolio feature, but it has some major shortcomings:
Allows only 4 funds to be included in portfolio.Doesn't list asset weights (US stocks, foreign stocks, bonds, cash).Doesn't list equity styles (small value, large growth, etc.).Doesn't list sector weights.Doesn't list stock intersection.
I've also tried the free version of Personal Capital (added investments manually, didn't aggregate).
It has a bit more functionality:
Lists asset weights.
Lists equity styles for US stocks.
Lists sector weights for US stocks.
However, equity styles / sector weights for foreign stocks are omitted.
Performance data is only available for the following time periods: 90 days, 1 Year, this year, last year.
Stock intersection data is not provided.
I'm willing to pay a reasonable amount for a good tool with functionality similar to Portfolio X-Ray.
Edit: Added strike-through for most PV Backtest Portfolio shortcomings. See my post below.
I'm a long-time Fidelity customer and will investigate further.
Thanks for the tip!
Thanks for the tip @Tarwheel
I keep several PV portfolios in Excel that I load 3 at a time to save data entry. PV subscription may store them - a while ago, even free PV used to store portfolios, but now everybody wants money.
PV Pricing https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/pricing
There are two versions of this page. The other version has a drop down menu labeled More after Planning. You can find Analysis in there.
You're absolutely correct.
As @yogibearbull mentioned above, I mistakenly conflated adding funds
with adding portfolios (three portfolios plus one benchmark allowed).
Clicking the Exposures tab lists style categories (large-cap growth, small-cap value, corporate bonds, etc.),
asset weights (US stocks, Intl stocks, US bonds, cash, etc.), equity sectors,
equity market capitalization, fixed income credit quality, and fixed income maturity.
Pretty much all the data I need is here except for stock intersection (nice to have but can live without).
Unfortunately, PV doesn't allow downloading results to PDF or Excel formats without a paid subscription.
On the other hand, SR has transactional capabilities - one can enter buys/sells; as I mentioned before, dividends/distributions have to be entered manually also. I now do this every month and it takes 1-2 hours (this is automatic in M* Portfolio).
It is pretty good, although it does not have all the results in one page like X ray (although with Xray still have to click through to see details
Unfortunately to add an outside account you have to do it manually.
Still Fido analysis much more robust than Schwab's
I sent feedback to the M* development team by using the blue tab on the right at M* Investor.
Maybe if we all did it would make a difference, although I doubt it
Maybe they are making enough money with their indexes. and other products, that they don't need a coherent strategy for individual fund investors.
You have to assume they have focused on advisors and large firms. Almost every brokerage house buys their stock research to provide an "alternative" to in house experts. ( I wish I knew of a study looking at how successful their targets and recs are)
Their portfolio/indexes are aimed at mid level advisors who I assume use them as they are cheaper or they get kick backs
They must have determined that these professionals didn't use mutual fund research, as they switched to that stupid quantitative model.
Most of the live commentators seem like broken records.
I think it depends what you use it for. I find M*’s breakdown of fund holdings very good. Rely on it a lot. Hit “portfolio” tab to view. On bonds you can check credit quality, duration, maturity and how they’re distributed. . They’re still giving that away for free - so far … if you don’t mind ads.
Freebies are disappearing. World’s changing. Giving away free entertainment, data, research isn’t a very profitable business model, whether we like it or not. As I see it, many subscriptions pay for themselves as you benefit monetarily from their content.
Good luck @Crash. It’s tough when you’ve relied on something like that for a long time and than it disappears.
Instant X-ray was free to use by everyone. That is gone now.
The new M* Investor doesn't have X-ray.
@yogibearbull
Yes, I have premium, but I don't pay. The individual fund portfolio zoom-in feature is useful, sort of--- but it's just never fresh and up to date. The automated essays "analyzing" those funds where the "Q" is used is utterly comical.
I’ve used Fido’s X-Ray a couple times since it was mentioned here. Hard to uncover on their site. Need to be logged in. Works great. But appears to be only for your holdings with Fido ( I could be wrong). BTW - The Fido results were nearly identical to what I came up with roughing it out on my own.
”The automated essays "analyzing" those funds where the "Q" is used is utterly comical.”
Yes - They sound computer written. There’s an uncomfortable “sameness” to the composition. They seem to rely a lot on total years of experience of a fund’s management team. And, their overall assessment of the firm seems to weigh heavily in their individual fund appraisal.
Interesting @Bitzer. It might pay someone to open a small account at Fido just to have access to that tool. AFAIK $1 gets you in the door. Fido doesn’t have any minimum investment amount that I know of.