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Palm Valley Capital Fund (PVCMX)

these guys reported an excellent 1st q. made 2%!

coming out of this, this is their time to shine. of course, none of use can buy it. Mr. Snowball, can you have these guys put their fund on the major ebroker platforms?

Comments

  • Hi Bobby, it is available at Vanguard brokerage and of course you can buy it directly from the firm (download application).
  • hopefully they can get it on the major ebroker sites as these guys know what to do in this environment but have no AUM
  • The fund is now 52% cash only (it was ~ 90%). Eric still has dry powder.
  • Last time I checked a few months ago, it was available at TD Ameritrade too.
  • no looks like only vanguard. he should pick one of the major ebrokers and put in a platform
  • Hi @Bobby
    You stated:
    " as these guys know what to do in this environment"
    What does this mean?
    Thank you.
    Catch
  • Just checked at TD Ameritrade. You are right, Bobby. Probably, I would have checked at Vanguard previously.
  • I find almost ZERO data about this fund, when I just went looking.
  • Eric Cinnamond runs this fund. He previously ran cash-heavy portfolios with an Aston River Road fund ARIVX and at Intrepid Capital.
  • at the fund there's an investor letter. he has a such a strict value bent that he STILL is @ 50% cash. So if it gets to his buy levels, I want to be in as many of those picks will be multibaggers.
  • He previously ran cash-heavy portfolios with an Aston River Road fund ARIVX and at Intrepid Capital.
    'Nuff said in my opinion. ARIVX didn't work. Hopefully he puts that money to work wisely. But isn't everything value now? Maybe more value a month from now?

  • PVCMX

    NAV pricing for the past 12 months.

    They may find their time to shine.
  • Chickens and eggs, if I understand the distribution problem. It costs a mint for a tiny fund to get on a platform, even TF. The fund needs investors in order to be able to pay for it. They get investors only if they're on a platform. Which they can get on only if ...

    The current flood of inflows brings them to almost $6 million!

    I've written Mr. Cinnamond to double-check on distribution.

    - - - -

    ARIVX looked bad because it was over 90% cash while the market was booming. Factor out the cash drag and the individual stock picks were very good, on whole.
  • Mr Cinnamond was quite generous with his time even since he started this fund and sent out a very informative newsletter. I have emailed him several times and indeed he tells me it is far too expensive to get on the Schwab platform currently.

    I would start an account at Vanguard or set up a direct account
  • I caught Mr. C. on a lawn chair in his backyard, trying to place a trade just after a snake slithered under his chair. (His wife is teaching elementary school online, so he was trying to stay out of her hair.) Here's the note on distribution options:
    the fund is currently available directly (our website) and through Pershing and Vanguard. Vanguard is likely the easiest way to buy for most of your readers. We continue to try to get on TD, Schwab, and Fidelity...it's been a bear! They want us to be bigger, but to be bigger we need to be on their platforms. We've had several advisors contact us wanting to buy the strategy, so we're hoping as more advisors request the strategy the better chance we'll have getting on the platforms.

    Also, we just published our quarterly letter. https://www.palmvalleycapital.com/fundletter
    So, about what I'd heard before. I'll try to catch up with him this week, but I need to prep tomorrow's classes first.

    David
  • Thanks David. I appreciate it.
  • edited April 2020
    Remember, Mr. Cinnamond will suddenly decide he has had enough and go to eat Cinnabon. Until funds assets reach critical mass I'm staying away.

    Also we have to look forward. Small Value. I'm sorry but he started fund this time at right time and doesn't have much invested. I don't see how Vanguard Small Cap value index does worse going forward if market is going to recover. I'm going to wait.
  • I have reasonably positive views on Mr. Cinnamond. I made money on ARIVX; and , when he liquidated the fund because he couldn't find any small cap stocks worth buying, I decided that I would try to limit my new purchases until he reentered the game. I followed his Absolute Value blog and tried to keep my powder dry. When he and his associates started Palm Valley Capital, I bought the smallest position allowed through Vanguard, but their ER of 2% for a fund 90% in money markets wasn't encouraging. Since he had very few holdings, and sold some of them when they hit his targets, buying the funds' few holdings seemed a bit risky.
    Admittedly, his fund is the only one of my holdings with a positive return so far this year (probably because he had mostly cash - but there were a few down days), and I do think this is his kind of market. While it might be difficult to buy his purchases in a timely fashion, this probably is a good entry point for the fund, if one can stand the ER. (I think I've convinced myself to buy some more, but I do hate the ER.)
  • edited April 2020
    I remember Cinnamon very well from years ago. His fund looked good when the market crashed and then it looks pretty bad. How long can a high % in cash works?

    The following is from the last report. As expected PVCMX had over 92% in cash on 1/1/2020 and probably in 2019 too.

    The Palm Valley Capital Fund gained 0.79% for the quarter ending March 31, 2020, while the S&P Small Cap 600 and the Morningstar Small Cap Indexes lost 32.65% and 31.61%, respectively. The Fund began the quarter with 92.4% of its assets held in cash and equivalents and ended the period with 52.0% cash.

    I will pass on this fund..."fool me once, shame on you. fool me twice, shame on me."
  • Fortuitous timing. Simple as that. LT this is a loser, and an expensive one.
  • I was reminded of why I sold ARIVX (in which I made decent money, no complaints) when I went to PVCMX's website and read Cinnamond's commentary. He's an Austrian school hard money guy who thinks monetary policy has been propping up a bubble for the last 30 years or so, and that we'd be better off just letting large parts of the economy crash and burn.

    I think that's wrong. I also think it doesn't reflect the world we live in and the Fed we've got. And I don't want to invest with an ideologue whose ideology guides his investing. More the pity because it seems like when he does buy stocks, he picks good ones.
  • For readers and STB65. The gross expense charge is 2.02% but part of he fee has been waived and the current net fee is 1.25%.
  • If you're still tempted by this story, study the Serenity Prayer. Hard stop.
  • Bad fund records are erased by closing funds and starting new ones. Maybe Cinnamond finally reclaims his mojo.

    Full disclosure, I did end up initiating a position with PVCMX. But only because I wanted to keep some "small value", I can buy at Vanguard and I sold of my PVFIX and booked a tax loss.
  • Hi VintageFreak, This is none of my business but did you buy/sell after 30 days due to wash sale rule. Unless you can argue that PVFIX Is a micro-cap and PVCMX is a small cap?
  • @ET91 Yup, I always take care. In any case hard to prove wash sale with those two funds. You cannot simply take M* classification. The legal term is "substantially similar". One would have to prove co-relation.

    I tried doing Fund Compare on M*, but PVCMX is not enabled for that right now. I see it as "Small Blend" while PVFIX is "Small Value". If you look at the holdings there is not a single one that is common - PVFIX you can fund on M*, PVCMX you can find on their website.
  • ET91 said:

    Hi VintageFreak, This is none of my business but did you buy/sell after 30 days due to wash sale rule. Unless you can argue that PVFIX Is a micro-cap and PVCMX is a small cap?

    Buying and selling active funds should not trigger wash sale. They are, by definition, independent and while may have some degree of overlap, will likely never be enough to be "substantially similar."
  • I agree I can't imagine the IRS would ever think this was a washsale.
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