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.
And all of the funds we bought get horrible grades from the site recommended by msf. ... CSGZX ha[s] held up reasonably well from our purchase[] in July
CSGZX is 'A' rated on fossil fuels, is scored a 17 on carbon footprint and a 35 on carbon int…
Yes, I agree with you to this point about primary housing. We've not held individual U.S. gov't bonds in a taxable account; but I recall the ordinary dividends (paid two times a year?) are taxable at a Federal level annually, but not at the state an…
If a fund has a $100,000 minimum, is it OK if you invest with this amount and shortly afterwards, remove a large portion of the initial sum while maintaining the rest of the investment?
Maybe, maybe not. It depends on what the fund requires for a …
I did a little poking around when doing a writeup on ESG investing. Criteria and metrics are all over the map, so one needs to take care and understand the underlying methodology in looking at any scorecard. With all that said, a site I found us…
There seem to be several "mostly closed" funds that are listed as open at E*Trade. Closed funds often have a loophole - that you can open a new account if you are investing through an advisor who already has money with the fund. (Another common …
RPHYX/RPHIX still managed to return below 3% for the year, as compared to a few banks/CUs that pay above 4%
This is an apples to oranges comparison, comparing past one year return for RPHYX with the current APY on MMAs. A retrospective comparison…
Anybody buying this year? Seems like a no brainer
Are you all in? One can overpay one's taxes by $5K by making an estimated payment on or before January 17th. That enables you to buy an extra $5K in savings bonds with the refund, though they wil…
They settle on a relatively consistent, usually conservative monthly distribution early in the year, with the result that most years, there's excess income to distribute at the end of the year.
This is by design. Many CEFs including PDI have a m…
Thank you Lewis. I had related thoughts. That wondering about how much the US has to do itself to protect the US carries with it the idea that every other country has to likewise act on its own to protect its own self interests only. From an e…
But it seems to me that the US needs to intensively examine what critical resources we are presently importing from potential enemies (ie: precursor drug ingredients) that could also be manufactured or sourced here, or from a friendly alternate back…
There are many different issues and concepts mixed in here. All worth discussing, but not a simple question. I'll just try to identify some of what's in the mix. Way too much to go into detail in a post of this type.
Supply chain concerns - lo…
Pimco filed its latest report with the SEC just two weeks ago (Dec 8, 2022). That's almost surely as current as there is. That's the date of the data on M*'s page, and it's the date of the individual holdings in the holdings report on Pimco's Inc…
Here's KPMG's description of every section of Secure Act 2.0 that made it into the omnibus bill (19 pages).
https://assets.kpmg/content/dam/kpmg/us/pdf/2022/12/tnf-secure-act-section-by-section-dec20-2022.pdf
Full text of bill: https://www.appropria…
Medicare beneficiaries with an IRMAA who meet certain criteria can request that we make a new initial determination of their IRMAA.
NOTE: The original IRMAA decision takes effect and continues until we make a new initial determination. If we make a…
Even at the highest IRMAA, the Medicare premiums are subsidized. The basic Medicare premium is really a great deal, but we do pay for it partially via payroll taxes.
The Medicare premium is applied to Part B coverage (care providers) only. As you…
HAINX did well with Castegren, but after he was gone, Harbor stuck with Northern Cross for another seven years (2011 - 2018). Harbor wasn't quick to pull the trigger here, as outflows and poor returns piled up.
The firm was axed from the fund foll…
OK, then. And they sent us a credit card we NEVER have used
A Fidelity 2% cash back credit card requires you to have a Fidelity account to redeem that 2%. The WF card doesn't come with a similar requirement.
I guess WF figures that once it's g…
CIted WSJ column: https://www.wsj.com/articles/mutual-funds-professor-is-blunt-with-the-criticism-1415048456
Indexing as in index funds or as in constructing a market (or segment) index?
Total market index funds typically sample and I suspect m…
There's a VA clone of DFAT that oddly has performed about 2% better YTD (-5.24% vs. -7.26%), 3⅔% better (annualized) over three years (11.73% vs 9.08%), 1⅔% better over five years (7.59% vs 5.90%), and 3/4% better over ten years (11.26% vs. 10.44%).…
In the current negotiations, the NewsGuild is demanding a wage increase averaging 5.25 percent a year over four years.... According to the union, the Times’ latest wage offer comes to 2.875 per year...
Meanwhile, the Times raised paper subscription …
That was a quote from the FDIC. Brokered CDs are securities, so if you held them in a brokerage that went belly-up, they'd be handled by the SIPC the same as MMF shares, or TSLA stock.
Lewis provided a link explaining this in a post above.
If we're talking about old times and good friends, it used to be that "You have a friend at Chase Manhattan." Bankers Trust responded to Chase's ad campaign:
IF YOU WANT A FRIEND GO BUY A DOG.
YOU’LL FIND A BANKER AT BANKERS TRUST.
https://www.c…
The average rate on money-market and savings accounts at the five largest banks nearly tripled in the third quarter from where it was in the second
Trippled, wow. BofA's base savings account rate went up from 0.01% all the way up to ... 0.1%. W…
You're not going to sucker me into going through SIPC vs FDIC again :-)
(See thread on sweep accounts).
Suffice to say that brokered CDs are actually securities and thus theft of CDs would be covered by SIPC. The value of the CDs themselves is…
Surprisingly, I found the (relatively short) document interesting. Initially what caught my eye was that the Harbor HY Bond Fund (HYFIX / HYFAX / HYFRX / HNHYX) is being merged into Harbor Scientific Alpha High-Yield ETF (SIHY). Oooh, not just a…
conversely, if issue price is more than 100, the YTM will be lower than the advertised yield.
Exactly. Same as with a bond. Note that if you buy a CD on the secondary market at a premium (price over 100), the excess amount is not insured. Ho…
Congressional bills regarding cryptocurrency (S. 4760 / H.R. 8730) have at most a tangential relation to DOL's regulation of 401(k) plan investments.
Here's a brief negative critique summarizing the bill(s): https://ourfinancialsecurity.org/2022/09…
With all due respect to Elizabeth Warren, Dick Durbin and Tina Smith, IMHO cryptocurrency is no more unsuitable today for employer-sponsored plans than it was a month ago. Their current letter is more or less a followup to a similar but more extens…
While retail investors can log into their individual accounts with brokers like Fidelity and Charles Schwab and purchase shares in ETFs and mutual funds, this usually isn’t the case for interval fund shares. Although these services might offer quote…
Improvements may be depreciated but land is never depreciated. Regardless of the business. A farmer may depreciate his silo but not his acreage. I imagine this distinction is for just the reason you describe - land tends to increase in value o…
Funds from operation (FFO) is a measure of cash flow that is calculated simply by taking net income and "backing out" depreciation and amortization. That intuitively makes sense in terms of cash, since depreciation is a bookkeeping figure, not "re…
All of my brokered CDs have the "Survivor' Option" (commonly called a Death Put) as defined below by Investopedia. When I set up my brokerage account, I included the Transfer on Death component for my heirs.
Sometimes a belt can get in the way of s…
@dtconroe - I appreciate your sharing your thoughts. There is indeed a risk/reward tradeoff. I tend to view RPHIX as something between a MMF and a CD, in that I expect it to have a higher total return, even quarter by quarter, than a MMF, but wi…
I haven't found the 30 day SEC yield on Riverpark's website, which is why I linked to Fidelity.
Regardless of where one finds the figure, it is calculated by the fund itself. I infer this from the fact that even M* does not compute the yield but…
SWVXX has a cumulative (not annualized) return of 1.218% from March 16, 2020 through Nov 15, 2022. (Fund pays divs in mid-month.) Schwab data source.
RPHIX has provided a cumulative return of 7.20% over the same time span. M* data source.
Rec…
FDIC coverage is at owner level rather than at the product level. If you have a CD and a MMA at the same bank each with $250K (and each with same type of ownership), then if the bank fails you're only covered for $250K. If you have $500K in a MMF…
From the horse's mouth:
https://investor.vanguard.com/accounts-plans/vanguard-cash-plus-account
And participating banks:
https://personal.vanguard.com/pdf/Bank_Sweep_Participating_Banks.pdf
For purposes other than same-day trades, I'll stick with …
2. My specific question is > some for the distributions show as at loss - others are at a gain . I can identify and cherry pick and sell off a few of the distributions that are currently at a loss . This would then raise the gain of the remaining…
