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.
So you read Coy’s complex arg or not ?
That market distortions don't impact only one side in a transaction, but rather affects all parties? Yes, economic inefficiencies hurt everyone.
He really doesn't get into tit-for-tat tariffs, more like men…
tariffs amount to a tax on domestic consumption and a subsidy to domestic production.
And they don't balance out. Consumers lose more than domestic producers and the government (tariff revenue) gain. Economists call this deadweight loss.
Here's…
I tend to regard AI as having gone through three cycles:
1. Late 1950s - 1960s. Think ELIZA
https://www.livescience.com/technology/eliza-the-worlds-1st-chatbot-was-just-resurrected-from-60-year-old-computer-code
2. Mid 1980s-1990s. Expert syst…
I just don't want to have to ever again deal with this level of an issue in return for the now negligible benes a VG a/c provides.
Here's a Bogleheads thread on how little is left of benefits for Flagship ($1M+) customers.
https://www.bogleheads…
Re the 2036 due issue, Fidelity shows Yield to worst at 5.267% - that does not sound right
Looks about right to me. A back of the envelope calculation (no yield calculator required) has it coming out to about that (before subtracting the cost of t…
The magic touch. Some of us got it, some of us don't :-)
(To make images work on this board, you need a URL ending in something like .jpg, .png, etc.)
The statement (like this thread) is from six months ago. Since then ARKK is up 23.00% (per …
what are the advantages of converting OEFs to their ETFs? Tax? Lower expense ratio?
Can Vanguard do the conversion by themselves online or this can only be done with Vanguard agents?
Thank you
The cynic in me says that the advantage is marke…
Even with careful instructions to the broker, if the fund sponsor doesn't approve, you may not be able to do a tax-free exchange from one share class to another of the same fund.
I ran into this with a Blackrock fund. I had service class shares. …
A clone is a different fund with a different portfolio. So you can't do a tax-free exchange, let alone a sell-and-buy from a fund to its clone.
Even if the ETF were another share class of the same fund (as VOO is another share class of VFIAX), a …
It's not just the big banks that play these games. Many institutions do. One can counter by being ever vigilant and moving money around from bank to bank. I did this for a time when I was between homes and had cash proceeds from the sale of my ol…
As Yogi mentioned in his earlier post, it's a common practice of internet banks to draw money in with high rates, then lower the rates on those accounts while creating yet another new high rate account type. Capital One did this with its 360 Savin…
I was taking RMD on Jan 2 or 3. But in 2020, the pandemic year, the RMDs were waived - first for those who took it after February or March, and finally for all around mid-2020. So, I was kicking myself for 5-6 months in 2020 for taking RMDs too earl…
Regardless of your institution you should check the RMD setup at the beginning of each year. One year Fidelity set my automatic withdrawal (on an inherited IRA) at roughly 4x the correct amount. Even the best :-) aren't perfect.
From the original paper:
"Spending cutbacks to self-insure against the tail risk associated with medical costs or advanced age is clearly suboptimal when products exist to pool these risks."
I wrote: "The risk is in outliving your money. A traditio…
An annuity-like distribution is certainly possible. I'm using a combination of funds such as SCHD, DIVO, NEAR, JPIE and a handful of dividend paying stocks and CEFs ...
Color me skeptical. Money managers like Vanguard and Fidelity tried to do thi…
I'm playing this game by bundling cap gains into some years and ordinary income into others.
A few techniques to bundle ordinary income
- Do Roth conversions in "ordinary income years".
- Buy short term (1 year or less) CDs/T-bills in "cap gains …
I currently buy insurance on the exchange. So, for each plan, everyone living in my zip code, my gender and my age will pay the same premium - individual prior history has no relevance
Unless they smoke.
The Affordable Care Act allows insurers to c…
I believe one can claim $300 on standard form. I"m probably wrong as I haven't done my Taxes in the last 7 or 8 years. I realize $300 isn't going to help much, but to some people every little bit saved is a plus.
Unfortunately, that "above the line"…
It is unlikely at Merrill that a TRP fund being open would determine whether shares could be converted. If being open were what mattered, then one could convert PRNHX shares to PRJIX shares, since New Horizons is open.
As a general rule, if a fund…
As a general rule, with Medicare Advantage PPO plans you can go to any provider who takes Medicare. Same as with Medicare Supplemental (Medigap) plans.
However, while out of network providers will still be covered with the PPO. your copay/coins…
PRWCX vs (TCAF+PRCFX)
If you can't own PRWCX, maybe consider owning a combination of TCAF/PRCFX.
Using a percentage of the eft TCAF in combination with a percentage of PRCFX one can approximate the same portfolio as PRWCX.
PRWCX allocation change…
There's a fine distinction between feeder funds and share classes, and a not so fine distinction between those and clones.
The distinction between feeder funds and share classes is one that only wonks would appreciate. Multiple share classes of a…
Are there AA-AAA rated companies that would do seller financed purchases, with or without life estate (i.e., lease back)? If not, I would think there is a lucrative market for this product.
I'm having trouble making sense of some of this.
"Do s…
There's no sale involved in a reverse mortgage (who would the buyer be?). You may be conflating Yogi's two paragraphs. One is about reverse mortgages where you gradually borrow money against the value of your home. The other is about seller finan…
If workable, legally sell the house to a relative or trusted friend & live on mortgage payments. Terms could be mutually beneficial.
Except for the mortgage payment part, this sounds like the deal Harlan Crow made to buy Clarance Thomas' mother…
We had to max the autos to get an umbrella policy.
My experience is that they typically require 250/500 or 300/300. It doesn't matter whether your auto insurer offers higher limits or not, you just buy the min required. Admittedly, that amount i…
Lawsuit are always in Million$+
A plaintiff can sue for almost any dollar amount, but if it doesn't bear some relationship to the harm done, it's a meaningless number. As far as actual awards go, though multimillion dollar settlements get the hea…
Uninsured motorist bodily injury covers not only the driver (covered by Medicare and presumably Medigap, else potential losses are unlimited) but also other passengers who might have high deductibles. It also covers pain and suffering. Whether the…
If it seemed like I was pushing you to bank at a brokerage, I apologize. I was responding to a statement that banking should be left to banks. Since some brokerages capably provide most banking services, then if one's brokerage is convenient and …
Fidelity has had bill pay/checking in its "regular" brokerage accounts for decades, so there weren't many reasons to move to, or add, a CMA account when Fidelity introduced that.
Though the CMA account does have a few unique or different features: …
"Why not use a brokerage for banking services?"
Actually, we do. Schwab Bank is very convenient as an adjunct to Schwab Brokerage. ...
What I had in mind was skipping the bank altogether and just using the brokerage. One less account to worry abo…
Use banks or CU for banking services. Use brokerages for brokerage banking services.
Why not use a brokerage for banking services?
In 1977, Merrill Lynch took a gamble with a concept known as a CMA (cash management account). This blending of banki…
A couple of brief notes regarding credit unions:
- There is a shared network of brick and mortar CUs so that you can conduct some transactions in many locations (if your CU participates) even though individual CUs tend to have small footprints.
ht…
You may have seen the news that the 39th President Jimmy Carter passed away after about 2 years under home hospice care.
U.S. stock exchanges will close on Thursday, January 9 in observation of a national day of mourning in honor of former U.S. Pres…
FWIW, the culprit is TUHYX. Since most of these funds are from T. Rowe Price, and TRP seems to have provided data for all of them on the same date (M* reports portfolios as of Oct 31), I'm at a loss to explain why M* can't fully analyze this one f…
Which percentage table are you looking at? If it's the world exposure table on the X-ray overview page, that's showing percentage of total stock. I ask in part because that would explain the apparent discrepancy, and in part because I'm having tr…
I made one switch on Friday: exited BHB in favor of BLX..... BHB was 5.9% of my total. Now, X-Ray tells me, suddenly, that I'm holding 16.49% of total portfolio in Latin America.
To clarify your numbers: what was your Latin American holding percent…
