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.
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Sven
Lynn,
Thank you so much. I am planning on a 3-year ladder since I am a year away from retirement. Lots of spreadsheet work to calculate the income replacement needed. This ladder will create a steady income stream. So thank you for all your help.
I moved back to high quality bond funds this year. Some of which you covered in the SA article. For now, I will stay with agency bonds to the bond ladder. I will pick active managers for corporate bonds.
Sven
Hi Catch, As I recalled you are invested in Utah 529 plan, right? If there is only 6 years of investment time left, your current 80/20 equity/bond allocation is too aggressive in my opinion. At this point the emphasis should shift toward capital …
Reply to @Kenster1_GlobalValue: Thank you for the reminder. The conference calls will be recorded and make available 72 hours on their website for those who cannot attend.
Reply to @bee: Thanks for your input on USAA muni funds. Why are the yields are considerably higher than the respective Vanguard fund with respect to duration? For example, Vanguard Intermediate term tax-free fund, VFICX yielding 2.03% while USSTX…
Reply to @Ted: "ETF's with greater flexability and lower cost will replace mutual funds in total assets within the next five years."
Are ETFs available for 401(K) and 403(b) accounts? We have asked our company retirement administrators and the a…
Thank you for the update. Pimco Total Return ETF "isn't an exact clone of the mutual fund since it won't be able to invest in some derivatives." and this is a sizable component of the fund strategy.
Reply to @Maurice: Excellent comments. For sake of simplicity, why not consider a "balanced" index fund? Admiral share of Vanguard Balanced fund, VBIAX (ER = 0.12%) provides a yield of 2.10%.
https://personal.vanguard.com/us/funds/snapshot?Fu…
Reply to @msf: Not exactly sure why Vanguard makes such a distinction between their brokerage services and funds. Could it be how their company structure itself comparing to Fidelity, for example?
Reply to @fundalarm: Thanks for heads-up with closed-end funds on floating rate funds. Although Fidelity has one in this asset class, Vanguard does not. Do you have the trading symbol ? thanks.
Reply to @Investor: He stated earlier that the Asian convertibles are not growing as it used to be, and this is reflected in the current % allocation (20%). The convertibles provided lower volatility for MACSX and consistent returns. Now he has …
The old M* rating is backward looking; thus, it provides little value going forward other than for advertising purpose.
In addition, he is also avoiding mentioning his prior performance record as part of the lawsuit settlement with his former emp…
Reply to @Maurice: The actual Mayan date is December 12, 2012 - that is 121212. Nevertheless, thank you for the u-tube footage. Animation is so realistic these days.
Cathy, our deepest condolence to you and your family. I hope your diligent will pay off in the near future. Along the same vein, we are facing similar situation with our father-in-law as he is insecure to let the family involved in the estate plan…
I sold my entire position with VIPIX in spring when yield went negative, but the total return continues to move upward - YTD is over 11%! Who know what TIP funds hold for next year.
Reply to @Kenster1_GlobalValue: Thanks. That is a sizable loss in asset considering that MACSX is doing better/losing less than the typical Asia-specific funds.
The answer is "no". All active managers have periods of under-performance and 2011 is one of those year. He will likely bounce back next year.
Quote from the article.
"Still, Mr. Gross's fund continues to beat the benchmark index on three-,…
Reply to @Maurice: That is too bad. I have a 10 year old workhorse Epson scanner (SCSI) and all. Epson continues to upgrade their drivers for each OS upgrade. In the meantime a newer Epson scanner that cost a lot less than the old one, broke afte…
If most of your daily activities involve MS Office and email, then middle-of-the road laptops equipped with System 7 will do. Surprisingly Amazon offers very competitive pricing than those from the major PC makers (Dell, HP, Acers, and Lenovo).
Reply to @msf: Thank you for the info. My 401(K) has access to Fidelity TDFs. We have not used it due to the reason you stated below for the difficulty of integrating into our asset allocation plan.
here is another link if one find difficulty with one above.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/17/bill-gross-pimco-total-return-fund_n_1155363.html
"outflow over the past 12 months to $10.3 billion" from a $241 billion fund. About $1 billion…
Reply to @Investor: Thank you. Lots of concerned customers out there based on the comments of the second article.
Awhile back you mentioned you are planning to move up to iPhone4? Has this affected you decision? We are thinking to upgrade in …
The listing is not complete. It only covered those with best 2011 performance. I would prefer each asset class are represented and detail discussion on the selection process well beyond a single year's performance.
Reply to @00BY: Streamling the number of funds enable easier management. In 2011 we reduced our 20+ funds to less than 10 - many of which have too much portfilio overlap. We also rollovered old 401(K) into single accounts with 2 brokerages. Sam…
Reply to @Investor: We are planning to get iPhone with Verizon once our contract is up sometime next year. For now we only have voice plan with those cheap clamp shell phones.
Reply to @Investor: Thank you for heads up. That's another reason NOT to do financial transaction with Android OS phones. Do you know if Blackberry OS has the same fault?
Reply to @catch22: JP Morgan's comment is just an "opinion", nothing more. Time like today it is ever important not merely listening to anyone without questioning further. Personally I try to read as many views as possible.
Over the several …
Reply to @TheShadow: There is a possibility that Alpine retail business is no longer profitable, i.e. asset under management is not growing but declining. Institutional accounts tend to stay longer and cost less to manage with fewer but larger acc…
Several years ago Alpine funds were popular on Fundalarm discussion board. One particular fund (Dynamic Dividend ??) provided very high yield, i.e. junk quality holding, and it performed poorly in 2008... Fast forward 3 years later there isn't muc…
Reply to @catch22: There are downsides to M.E.T. (or other state equivalent). Due to current economic environment with the tuition rate rising much faster than market returns, the largest public university of the state of Illinois, Univ of Illino…
Reply to @msf: On the bottom of the article some background info of the author was disclosed. The article is overly simplistic for a complex subject.
"Ben Weiss has worked throughout the Asia-Pacific region for hedge funds and private equity…
