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.
Target-maturity funds (OEFs or ETFs) don't promise par or anything specific at the end. They progressively turn into cash as maturity approaches and you get whatever that ends up being.
Hold individual Treasuries or bonds if you want the return of …
@zenbrew, the issues mentioned don't apply to margin a/c.
I have had margin a/c for years, but I don't use margin loans anymore.
Without margin a/c, you are relying on good graces of the brokerage to extend you a penalty-free overnight overdraft.…
ETFs are more accessible than great m-mkt products from Fido and Vanguard.
Institutional-prime m-mkt funds already have floating NAVs. These ETFs will operate under similar rules and may be even less volatile that ultra-ST funds (OEFs, ETFs).
BTW…
Beyond volunteer activities and QCDs from IRA, consider DAFs. By bunching deductions in some years, you can get a good boost from Itemized deductions for contributions to DAF.
There are several ST and Ultra-ST muni ETFs. I doubt that fund managers can add much value in this space.
ST Muni (Indexed) SUB, SHM, VTES
ST Muni (Active) MEAR, SMMU
Ultra-ST (Active) FUMB
American Funds R1-R6 are just share classes, not plan designations. Those are 401k, 403b, 457, H.S.A, etc.
Smaller plans may have R1-R4 available, larger plans R5-R6.
AF has specific classes for 3rd party channels (DIY, independent advisors), F1-…
@mskursh, before our 403b was changed ("improved", as they said), I had AF RERGX (Euro Pacific R6) in our large plan and owned it for years. So, they are available in plans, not just for AF TDFs.
3rd business day of February & no update.
May be the guy who was doing this is gone and the new IT kids at Treasury have no clue about the TSP G Fund or its update. It's easy to forget about only $285 billion when they may be handling trillions.
Good points by @InformalEconomist and @Derf.
But I think that there are other issues too.
Looking at other allocation funds with MFOP, ABALX / BALFX is doing OK in AUM, but VBINX, FBALX, FPURX are showing similar outflow patterns. An explanation …
CFPB is an oddball agency that has a complicated history. It's funding came out of the Federal Reserve, but the Fed, Fed Chair or FOMC didn't have much say in the operations of CFPB.
As CFPB tackled consumer finance issues, it wasn't a popular agen…
From this AM news, it looks like China has counter-tariffs. Xi hasn't called Trump to ask for temporary postponements of the new tariffs as Scheinbaum (Mexico) and Trudeau (Canada) did. Old news was also that Xi was invited to the Inauguration but s…
Puerto Rico munis are triple tax exempt regardless of the residence of bond holders. So, they are found even in other dedicated state muni funds as well as general muni funds. This was very popular until Hurricane Maria disaster hit Puerto Rico in 2…
Sentiment Scale: v low avg + 1*SD, v high >> avg + 1*SD
So, +/- 1*SD are thresholds.
"" are just below or above.
"" are much below or above.
Very rarely +/- 2*SD thresholds are reached, so those isn't used.
It looks like off-exchange trades don't contribute to bid-ask displays, but actual trades are reported in real-time (prices, volumes) and included in the consolidated tape.
From FINRA link, https://www.finra.org/investors/insights/can-you-swim-dark…
Frontrunning is illegal but it happens. Options volume tend to spike ahead of important news, so some people know and start trading based on it in the options market. Serious cases are investigated and people fined or jailed.
Exchange bid-ask and …
YBB Notes After the Press Conference
Rates: Fed funds held at 4.25-4.50%, bank reserves rate at 4.40%, discount rate at 4.50%. Treasury QT continues at -$25 billion/mo, MBS QT at -$35 billion/mo.
Financial conditions are restrictive considering th…
Lot of large-block & institutional trading is under SEC ATS regulations. The idea is not to overwhelm exchange trading systems with huge trades - that may have to be broken up into smaller lots. Retail investors cannot participate in this tradin…
CFTC does have enforcement powers. But the regulations for commodities are quite different than those for securities (under SEC). CFTC in its current form has existed since 1974 when various regulatory powers for commodities were consolidated under …
@rforno, yes, Bluesky came out of Twitter, so there are similarities, but also big differences now. See more details on Bluesky here, https://ybbpersonalfinance.proboards.com/thread/732/bluesky
Schwab Symantec VIP works well. It's similar to Google Authenticator that's used by some other sites.
Once Symantec VIP froze & I deleted the app and reinstalled - a huge headache that required calling Schwab for reset.
I don't use ThinkorSwim, …
Interesting exit strategies from the Fido article linked by @bee when one has high unrealized gains. Link may need subscription.
Option 1: Donate to charity or a donor-advised fund (DAFs have more flexibility)
Option 2: Hold until death (Step-up, bu…
DeepSeek
If the results from DeepSeek are as impressive as Nadella/MSFT and others say, then the mixture-of-experts (MoE) for AI training will soon be adopted by other AI models. But it will change the nature of the AI race - from throwing $billions…
@BaluBalu, but due to weekly reset feature to 3m T-Bills, FRN duration is 1 week (not 2 years). Buying FRNs at auction at Schwab would be commission-free, so 15 bps in ER for USFR would be saved. The other thing is the (small) spread that is fixed a…
Fido charges $19.95 for buying Treasuries through agents. FRNs can be bought only through an agent, not online.
FRN USFR has 15 bps ER.
Breakeven is 100*19.95/0.15 = $13,300.
So, buying in amounts larger than $13.3K via Fido agent is worthwhile. …
So, that 1% bonus is all you get over 90 days holding period. The interest rate of 0.01% applies on deposit. Or, just keep the money in a m-mkt fund.
"Bring $250,000 or more in new deposits to qualifying linked accounts by Day 45 and maintain at le…
Inflation Reduction Act, 2022 cannot be cancelled by an Executive order. So, Part D out-of-pocket limit of $2K, insulin cap of $35, Medicare authority for drug negotiations, etc remain.
However, somethings where Biden used Executive Orders were re…
Barron's limited sharing feature has been around for a while - my bold below. But as Barron's also sells reprints, I don't know when it puts its foot down. Of course, it won't know who's who at MFO, but it may ask MFO admins to act.
"9.3.1 You may …
Although this didn't happen to me at VG, it has happened at another site.
On a failed login, it said to login after certain date & that worked. But the days or date to re-try logins were specified.
Also, if you have phone screen protected by c…
@Sven, specific info on buyers and sellers is hard to get.
But beware of the news and analysis that may be outdated by the time you may read it.
Checking TLT flows via MFOP, there were outflows from 11/11/24 to 1/2/25. Now there are some inflows f…
@Sven, bond market returns depend a lot on the Fed policy (and even the Fed doesn't know that ahead) and bond vigilantes (they were in hibernation for a long time).
Barron's recently noted that we are now in the 6th year of the 3rd great bond bear …
People can make their own predictions for SP500.
%TR = %Dividend_yield + %Earnings_growth + %Change_in_P/E .
Over the next few years, IMO, yield 1-2%, earnings growth 5-8%, change in P/E -3% to -7% (fwd P/E).
So, %TR range -1% to +7% annualized o…
