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.
Another matter some may not be aware of. In addition to your Medicare Part D plan through a private carrier, if your income is above a certain threshold there is a Medicare Part D IRMAA. This varies from $12.90 to $81.00 per month and deducted f…
Medicare wasn't up big. So, IRMAA? It's painful the 1st year it hits, then one gets used to it. For couples, it's 2x ITMAA.
Yes, IRMAA. Still a bummer. It will only get worse as I get older because of my increasing RMDs.
Thanks for your input @Junkster. Would SPHY or similar be worth watching in your opinion?
@Mark, not a fan of bond ETFs for several reasons. Here is one of many reasons. Say you are in a bond ETF and real late in the trading day some rare moment…
Always had the utmost respect for Howard Marks. What I got out of the article is the money to be made in bonds going forward is what has been working YTD - non investment grade specifically junk corporate and bank loans. Most bond investors don’t…
@junkster, as imperfect as it may be, I use BKLN ETF as proxy for BL/FR funds. It peaked on Sept 15th and has been trending downward ever since. Are there better alternatives? I hold majority of BL/FR in PRWCX. The fund holds about 10-15 % BL and …
@ Crash, as of September 9th, @junkster said ,
I trade only bond funds because of their persistency of trend combined with their lack of volatility. There are exceptions, but since 2000 there has always been a bond category that has beaten the S@P…
Selling 1/3 of my bank loan OEF position on the close. Ugly day for credit including for a change the floating rate ETFs. If I am wrong will buy back. If this is the beginning of a correction will sell more. Unlike in the past cash is no longer…
If FR/BL are so bullish, why have PRFRX and FFRHX been in redemption for probably 1 1/2 years?
Just read in Wednesday's WSJ that individual investors have pulled $13 billion from FR/BL mutual funds and ETF's this year. Are they the "smart money" o…
Saw something from Steph Pomboy on X where an Illinois pension fund is shifting from high yield junk bonds to bank loan floating rate bonds and private credit. To her this is a “peak risk” headline. Hopefully it will get more crazier bullish in b…
There is a related article on leveraged loans in the Wall Street Journal "The Market-Beating Investment That’s Defying Wall Street Skeptics. Rising interest rates are boosting risky corporate-loan returns instead of hurting them"
Can’t read the art…
Since the advent of the Credit Suisse Leveraged Loan Index (floating rate bank loans) in 1992 there have only been three down calendar years. 2008, 2015, and 2022. In each case the index bounced back sharply the following year more than making up …
There are few pockets of bond funds that are doing well, but they are heavily overbought as @junkster mentioned. So watch for defaulting if and when recession strikes. For now short term T bills and CDs are still attractive, yielding 5.5%. We con…
@dtconroe, thanks for the compliment. Wish it were true but it’s not. If I were to believe that I would become full of myself and that has doomed many a trader. All the good traders I knew had particular traits and one was humility. So I try to …
I trade only bond funds because of their persistency of trend combined with their lack of volatility. There are exceptions, but since 2000 there has always been a bond category that has beaten the S@P annually. Of course those exceptions are pret…
Many of us old timers remember Mr Birinyi fondly. Sorry to hear about his passing. The article @Mark linked is must read, most especially the very last paragraph.
Munis including junk munis have been a major disappointment to date in 2023. Without getting into a bunch of technical or fundamental jargon or research, I would simply say so goes the 10 year so goes munis. It has pretty much always been that way…
Put a little into some allocation funds not too long ago. Otherwise, all short term.
Always been in the higher for longer camp once inflation got going. People seem to think it will melt away like snow in April.
I think none of the guvs wants to b…
It would seem that with MM, CDs, and T-bills getting all the inflows and monopolizing the discussion boards that there has to be a contrarian play out there. Like bond funds. There are many bond funds that are on track for their best year since t…
The first trading book I ever read, “How I Made $2,000,000 In The Stock Market” by Nicolas Darvas, taught me the precept of always cutting my losses and letting my profits run as well as the power of trading momentum, The book had a huge impact on …
I get it, yes.
It has always struck me that many people (and I'm not saying you) are far more worried about the absolute safety of their money than they are about the absolute safety of their own lives. If they were half as worried about their own …
Commercial Real Estate bond fund OEF - RCRIX/FX. YTD 6.10%. Not exactly the Armageddon the pundits have been predicting for CRE. Albeit the fund holds 0% in office buildings.
Edit: https://www.riverparkfunds.com/assets/pdfs/rpfrcf/commentar…
To each their own, @Crash. Thought I'd mention it since there doesn't seem to be much talk beyond junk, mortgages, and bank loans.
Bank loan funds on track for their second best year in history. A few non agency mbs funds on track for double digit…
https://www.reuters.com/markets/default-wave-imminent-will-peak-2024-deutsche-bank-2023-05-31/
From the end of May a very ominous forecast for the default rate on both junk bonds and loans in late 2024. If the default rates of 9% and 11.3% comes …
Then I will just note that SEMMX/SEMPX is having an excellent year in the nontraditional category--focusing on junk mortgages. I know this fund scares investors because of its recent downmarket performance, but it sure seems to be doing well this …
Barron's this week has a positive Cover story and a positive Q&A on real estate. Suggestion is to start bottom fishing cautiously. Sure, there are concerns and lots of bad news, but when everything is hunky-dory, prices would have moved up alrea…
@Charles, check out Barron's,
TRADER. Stocks rose as the wall of worry faded away. The RALLY broadened beyond large-caps to small/mid-caps and cyclicals (financials, industrials). The SP500 was in a bear market for 248 days (Edit - the longest sinc…
Lots of good points.
My caution with FR/BL is just going forward. It has been a good time for FR/BL from mid-2022 to ??? If one has them, hold for now; may be still good for a quick trade. Things do change rapidly for them and lot of backward-looki…
Lots of negativity on bonds here. I can understand the allure of cash when you can get 5.08% at firms like Schwab. Yet many bond funds are on pace for double digit returns in 2023. Albeit much of those gains were front loaded in January/February.…
Today Carlson left (was let go?) from was fired by Fox.
Great day all around. I couldn’t stand Carlson and wouldn’t let my Trump loving girlfriend air Fox News when I was around, On the left side of the coin, CNN fired Don Lemon. Disliked him as…
While news of this settlement was mentioned on Fox News yesterday, it was not mentioned at all in prime time by their three main anchors - or so I read. I must be a terrible Republican. I can’t stand Trump and can’t stand Fox News, especially Hann…
Without any speculation as to what might be driving this murderous escalation, at the very least it would seem reasonable to remove personal assault weapons from the general population.
I suspect that a complex interaction of many elements is causi…
By Chris Sununu:
Some of my GOP colleagues have lost their moral compass on Ukraine
“America First” does not mean “America Only.” It means putting our interests first — and that’s what opposing Russia in Ukraine does.
The Russian invasion of Ukrain…
>>>>“5. the commercial real estate market, which is reliant on floating rate securities, is a major and generally unrecognized risk. High quality lenders like BlackRock “are handing the keys back to the bank.” Eventually the government w…
What surprises me is how well the risk on sectors of the bond market - junk corporates, junk munis, and bank loans - have reacted to the banking chaos. They are still positive YTD albeit barely. At their nadir in 08/09/ they were all down around 3…
Bear Stearns went under in March 2008 and Lehman in September 2008. Lot of pain for the markets lay ahead after those failures. So not trying to be a Pollyanna here but I would think if what occurred the past two days had occurred last year we w…
