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.
FYI: (This is a follow-up article.)
https://humbledollar.com/2018/09/running-in-place-2/
Not exactly. This is a prequel to the prior MFO posting. That posting linked to a Marketwatch Opinion piece with the footnote:
This column previously appea…
>> Maybe you don't believe me. I'm so hurt :-)
I can't tell how this is intended. .It seems emojis have lost their meaning. How about:
Since we do seem to be having problems communicating, I suppose I should add that the footnote above i…
Not finding that at the moment:
https://www.fidelity.com/learning-center/trading-investing/trading/trading-differences-mutual-funds-stocks-etfs
but perhaps hidden elsewhere ...My points were conceptual: that open end funds can be shorted, regardle…
Who was first in discovering the 4% drawdown rule is not significant to me. My number one purpose in my submittals on this topic was to introduce Monte Carlo simulators
Obviously not significant to you, as you didn't introduce Bengen. Rather, you…
Krugman starts off in his first paragraph by asserting that "he [Stiglitz] accused Larry [Sommers] of inventing the doctrine [of secular stagnation]". Krugman says that this was in "The debate between Joe Stiglitz and Larry Summers over secular sta…
"Today their Select Funds operate just like any other open-end fund, trading once a day.any other open-end fund, trading once a day."
Some funds still trade more than once a day.
US is at the bottom and now sinking lower. Haven't reread this thread, but I recall pointing out a lot about how methane (and hence fracking, which is bad at containing methane) is a major problem.
Methane makes up only about nine percent of gr…
Sigh. "The Fidelity Select Portfolios that are available for short selling include American Gold, Biotechnology, Precious Metals and Minerals and Food and Agriculture."
https://www.nytimes.com/1992/05/17/business/mutual-funds-the-risky-business-of…
Open end funds can in theory be shorted. I'm not going to do a search now, but in the past there were a few that were actually set up for shorting (I mean shorting shares of the fund, not that the fund shorted securities).
Whether there are curren…
@MikeM - It sounds like you're saying that you use these simplistic Monte Carlo simulation tools because "they sure as heck are better than hope and a prayer", and not because they are superior tools.
What Bengen did, you or anyone else acquaint…
You're missing a number of points and writing what it seems you want to be true: that the 4% figure "is based on multiple studies that included using Monte Carlo analyses". It wasn't.
If what you meant to say is that subsequent Monte Carlo simula…
All types of Monte Carlo simulators are currently available on the Internet. I never explored life expectancy ones before your question, but they too exist. Here is one from Vanguard:
https://personal.vanguard.com/us/insights/retirement/plan-for…
"The 4% retirement rule ... is based on multiple studies that included using Monte Carlo analyses"
What the WSJ article says: "Based on pioneering research in the early 1990s by William Bengen, then a financial planner in California, the so-called …
I think you're getting a little off point here. I said that this information could be brought to Congress. Your response was that we don't even have to consider whether Congress would do anything, because due to security concerms, Congress might…
"These officials walk a difficult “tight-rope” if divulging these orders to Congress... might also reveal / jeopardize legitimately classified information"
My point was simply that there is no such tight-rope. Congress has a near absolute right …
"All Members of Congress have access to intelligence by virtue of their elected positions."
CIA, How Intelligence-Sharing Works at Present
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/books-and-monographs/shari…
You know that, I know that, the whole world knows that.
Yet most financial institutions ask for the last four digits of one's SSN "for security purposes". To compound this farce, we're supposed to be reassured by the fact that they're not askin…
I agree that an attempt to remove the President would not succeed today. I believe it would however provide the legal protection for advisors that Hank speculated about, and in a legal manner.
While somewhat impressive, I regard the op-ed as subs…
I'm disappointed with "Anonymous" as well as all the other senior level actors. When called upon to do something illegal, there are only a few options for people at that level:
- Persuade the President to do something different
- Take action to le…
It sounds like Ben was asking about double taxation, e.g. do you pay tax on cap gains to the US plus tax on the same gains to your country of residence? At least in some situations, the answer is not exactly. You don't pay the sum of the two, you'…
Intent is an element of most crimes. Motive is not, despite what you may have seen on Perry Mason. (Means, motive, opportunity are forms of evidence to prove that a person committed an act.)
https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/is-motive-requir…
"the United States has wildly high tariffs, such as 350 percent on smoking tobacco, 130 percent on peanuts and 99 percent on prepared groundnuts", even before any of this nonsense.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/06/08/there-are-nu…
You both won't be saying that when you go to your neighborhood super market and find nothing on the shelves.I've been expecting shelves to be overstocked with bargains this year, such as soy beans from Iowa, lobsters from Maine, etc. What else are …
86% of households currently do not contribute to IRAs (except via rollovers)Proposed: expand eligibility so that those over 70½ can also contribute to traditional IRAsMost investment income (cap gains/qual divs) currently not taxed if income is belo…
"Trump also said he is considering legal action against the Times."I'm sure the Times would be ecstatic if Trump were to sue the paper. However, the Times will have to get in line:"Every woman lied when they came forward to hurt my campaign," Trump…
I can't see it being Pence. On the Op-Ed page, the Times wrote that the paper published this column by "a senior official in the Trump administration whose identity is known to us and whose job would be jeopardized by its disclosure."
You can arg…
There was a recent article in the NYTimes talking about how retail has changed. It used to be that people liked the experience of walking into a cavernous store and wandering around for hours looking for things they liked. (This is how Quinn desc…
Continue reading from that same section ...... It is expected that the fund will normally invest a larger percentage of its assets in the securities of a smaller number of issuers. As a result, the fund is “nondiversified,” ...
The fund has the abi…
This looks like an unconstrained bond fund on steroids, if that is possible.
It can short any bond - I'm not finding that much flexibility when spot checking the prospectuses of other unconstrained bonds funds - they seem to not explicitly mention …
"Laddering can be done with any fixed income product of a predetermined maturity, including bonds, CDs or fixed annuities"
Fixed annuities have a period of time when their interest rate is fixed, but they don't "mature" after that. They simply co…
It's certainly fun to pile on, but what exactly are people piling on to?
Bruce Berkowitz, head of Fairholme Capital Management, has cut his personal exposure ...Get a grip. This is "just" a half million of his own shares shares, give or take. Tha…
Did you take a close look at the criteria?No institutional share classes. I exclude these to help you get a list you can use. (I allow funds called institutional if the minimum investment is $25,000 or less.)
Maybe you were just lax with your ticker…
Such hype and salesmanship, but nothing novel.
What's being suggested is a zero coupon bond that converts to a fixed maturity coupon bond after a specified number of years. I recently owned such a bond (and not for this purpose). So there's no…
Generally speaking, funds are allowed to make only one capital gains distribution per year, plus "fix up" distributions for residual amounts that they didn't get in the first distribution.
Funds would risk incurring serious tax "penalties" by mak…
Consumer Report's October issue (got ours yesterday) has an insert to its article on buying cars and options, entitled "Don't Go Home Without These" features.
Under "Must-Haves" are: "Knobs for volume, tuning, and power for the audio system ... bec…
The original intention language is indeed in ERISA (Pub. L. 93-406), right at the top, Title I, Subtitle A, Sec 2, "Findings and Declarations of Policy". That section was subsequently codified as 29 USC §1001.
Here's how the ICI summarized th…
Mandatory withdrawals from an IRA do not mandate spending. The money that is withdrawn, less taxes, can compound in a taxable account forever. It will even get a step up in basis at death, which doesn't happen in an IRA.
I do though have a real …
These are not very early estimates of the annual distributions, but of Sept. distributions. Some Fidelity funds typically distribute gains in Sept and again in December.
It seems that in addition to HAINX, we have a couple more examples of what c…
Suppose there were a cap, where all amounts greater than the cap had to be withdrawn:
Age 71: $1,000,000
Age 72: $ 970,000
Age 73: $ 940,000
...
Age 81: $ 700,000
...
Age 91: $ 400,000
...
Age 101:$ 100,000
Age 102:$ 80,000
Age 103:$ …
