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M* screwing everything up again

13

Comments

  • Considering recent M* shenanigans, I guess we shouldn't be too shocked by this latest development.
    But it still sucks!
  • truth.
  • I can also confirm that old M* Chart pages are gone now - they generate message, "The report is no longer supported". It was good while it lasted (for 2-3 years).
  • I wonder if M* will still provide Quicken portfolio Instant Xray ( not quite as comprehensive as the one online at M* but quick and easy).

    I just use Quicken on my laptop, so I don't know Quicken App will also track investments

    Hopefully M* will not cut Quicken off.

    If I had to chose between spending $250 on M* or Quicken premier ( $ 8 a month on sale for newbies for $5) I would chose Quicken hands down for portfolio management.

    The sad decline in the information and usefulness of the M* articles and fund reports makes it less and less useful. I get far better fund ideas here

    While I can afford $250, why continue to reward M* for ignoring individual investors?
  • Not sure where this comment belongs. If I click on a fund symbol in a discussion, an array of names of providers such as Yahoo, Smart Money, Barron’s etc. appears. The M* link, just today, takes me to the « not supported » language previously cited. I tried VWICX and the other symbols in the thread on international investing. The other links work as they should. I am a M* subscriber, BTW.
  • Hi Ben- That "array of names" that you refer to is an ancient piece of code that was incorporated into the very early versions of MFO. The fellow who built that hasn't been seen for a very long time now, and likely no longer monitors the MFO site.

    OJ
  • edited June 2022
    BenWP said:

    Not sure where this comment belongs. If I click on a fund symbol in a discussion, an array of names of providers such as Yahoo, Smart Money, Barron’s etc. appears. The M* link, just today, takes me to the « not supported » language previously cited. I tried VWICX and the other symbols in the thread on international investing. The other links work as they should. I am a M* subscriber, BTW.

    Good observation.

    M* link goes to OLD, just discontinued M* pages,
    http://quotes.morningstar.com/fund/f?t=VWICX

    MFO needs to switch them to NEW M* pages,
    https://www.morningstar.com/funds/xnas/vwicx/quote

    Attn @David_Snowball .
  • Thanks, @yogi. I miss not being able to get a quick read on a fund mentioned in a discussion.
  • Here's the thing: the fellow that wrote that code designed it to call up various sites with specific addresses. If M* no longer maintains those sites at those addresses, and if (from what I gather from the ongoing negative commentary here) M* is apparently not creating replacement site pages comparable to the old ones, then there isn't much that can be done other than possibly remove M* from the popup code.
  • OJ nailed it. It's truly sucky and yucky. And I'm a PREMIUM M* user, though I do not pay. Provided via TRP.
  • edited June 2022
    I am not familiar with MFO coding and the URL format change may be trivial or very tedious. My guess is former as there are already so many other changes that the MFO site has to handle -names/tickers, fund family changes, new fund launches, old funds disappearing.

    Many user complaints now are related to new M* Investor pages, not to current M* Homepages. So, using VWICX as example, we have,

    M* Homepage Quote (OK; general public access) https://www.morningstar.com/funds/xnas/vwicx/quote

    M* Investor Quote (Problematic; subscription access) https://investor.morningstar.com/quotes/0P0001I30E

    Of course, the current MFO link to it is dead http://quotes.morningstar.com/fund/f?t=VWICX

    So, something needs to be done by MFO.
  • I can also confirm that old M* Chart pages are gone now - they generate message, "The report is no longer supported". It was good while it lasted (for 2-3 years).

    Same with the other old pages that I'd continued to use - Performance and Ratings & Risk. Gone with the wind.
  • edited June 2022
    Just deleted all M* portfioios and signed out for the last time. Sayonara:)

    Hope everyone that got raked onto the coals is well on their way to finding a suitable tracker - and not at some crazy $200+ yearly price.
  • I've created a portfolio at Yahoo and it seems to meet my needs.
  • +1 hank Congratulations on ditching Morningstar !

  • M* still matters?
  • Apparently, M* does not rely on its traditional users for income. It has been driving away users for years. I used to visit M* daily, and now I rarely ever use the site. No love lost from my viewpoint.
  • M* has been listening to some feedback. It has included an Export/Download feature to the new M* Investor.

    6.1. Portfolio Export (Download) feature has been added. 7/8/22

    Path: M* Investor/Portfolio/select a portfolio/Holdings/see More for Download (Export)

    https://ybbpersonalfinance.proboards.com/thread/256/interactive-charts-newer-investor-portfolios?page=1&scrollTo=669
  • Seems like M* is creating a real opportunity for someone to step in and harvest all the individual investors they no longer care to serve well.
  • I see the Export function but no Import function yet. We will see
  • A question for veteran M* users/those who found something better. The most valuable feature in the old M* for my (quite idiosyncratic) purposes was not the portfolio tracker. It was the ability to export historical performance into a spreadsheet (an option on the Interactive chart until just a few weeks ago).

    For instance, when I found a very old fund (Vanguard Wellington in this example), I could click max on the date, and the chart would show the value of $10,000 invested in 1929 when the fund began. A little export button gave the spreadsheet option; et voila, I had monthly performance data on Wellington back to 1929.

    Interactive chart is still there, but no export button now
    1. Is the export button there on the new paid M* site?
    2. Can I do the same thing at MFO?
    3. Could I recreate that sort of Wellington returns history on another site?
    -for instance, Dividend Shares was one of the oldest funds and among the largest for several decades. A lucky search, inspired in part by mfs, revealed it was eventually renamed Alliance Bernstein relative value. That fund shows the history to 1932 on the M* site, but alas I cannot download as before:-(
  • No problem on the M* investor site downloading VWELX data going back to 1929. Of course M* data for that era is only monthly. So while daily values are downloaded, they don't change most days. You might want to do some interpolation as a fixup.
  • Thanks msf. Looks like a trial subscription in my future, one two-week period to download them all:-)
    PS: daily data never of concern in my "ancient history" world; monthly data is a bonus, annual data is key.
  • .....It never fails: if it's not one thing, it's another.
    "This isn't working, but it's not your fault. Check back later, or try again."
    https://www.morningstar.com/stocks/XASE/BHB/quote
  • Stock Rover looks interesting.

    Free features https://www.stockrover.com/plans/free/

    Subscription pricing & features table https://www.stockrover.com/plans/compare/

    Serious portfolio analytics tools may be for Premium (most) or Premium Plus (most + larger & more portfolios).

    Data source for lot of mutual fund data is M* (!), https://www.stockrover.com/data-attribution/

    There is a Blog tab that have good useful info, https://www.stockrover.com/category/blog/
  • edited July 2022
    I'm going to check this out. Thanks, @yogibearbull.
    Edited to add: I'm in! Free premium trial. But I find the layout to be busy, un-user-friendly, abstruse, clunky and confusing. (Oops!) I can't even find a way to get past, or preferably REMOVE, their built-in sample portfolio. Appreciate the mention, though. It DOES look very useful when I want to examine particular stocks/funds. THAT is good stuff.
  • edited July 2022
    @Crash, yes, Stock Rover is not user-friendly or intuitive. There are many features with options that appear only on relevant pages, so a steep learning curve. I am still exploring/learning during the 14-day, no-obligation, free trial for its top of the line Premium Plus. I may post pointers in a few days.

    For now, to add/upload/Import portfolios, Click Portfolio on the left-menu, make sure that Portfolio heading is clicked/highlighted on the main page (Down-arrow will show full menu), then there is Create Portfolio in the right-panel. Entries can be made there manually OR portfolio uploaded/Imported from Excel (with Tickers, quantities, costs columns) OR via connections to selected brokerages (I won't be trying that).
  • Does investor.morningstar.com still has "chart"?
  • kl2005 said:

    Does investor.morningstar.com still has "chart"?

    I don't see it, can't find it--- apart from their pre-formed 10-year performance chart.
    https://investor.morningstar.com/quotes/0P00002RQ4

    ...Nor can I find it, looking at their snapshot presentation for single-stocks.
    https://investor.morningstar.com/quotes/0P000000PV
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