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.
For most investors, the main news of significance is the merger and lowering of ERs for the retail Target Retirement Funds. The Institutional Target Retirement Funds really are for institutions only. And the Target Retirement Income and Growth Tru…
This shows that there's more than price or profits that go into deciding when to sell.
As I recall, you were far from alone in reacting this way. So don't take the following data as a personal comment, or as something one could have predicted. Hi…
There's a difference between liquidating a fund position because one has lost faith in the fund and adjusting the holding because of performance. (Part of the original question included the example: "sell 25% of holding for each 20% gain in a year…
I suppose one has to pick one's vices.
In addition to the vices covered by this ETF, other sins include tobacco and arguably food (when taken to excess). OTOH, I'm not quite sure where pharmaceutical companies come in (oxyContin excepted).
If …
I appreciate the honesty of posters acknowledging losses as well as gains: you win some, you lose some.
One theory of market timing, and let's be frank here this is timing, is that while it may not improve returns it should reduce volatility. One …
I'm wondering if I didn't communicate well here. I asked two simple questions, and then used data to illustrate their significance. What I didn't do was state why they matter; I only illustrated that.
1. Source of cash.
One may have cash si…
Since people were writing about the current "dip" (less than 4%) I used current data. I would have gone back only through 2021 except that there was no dip in 2021 worth mentioning. So I looked at a full year (12 months of monthly investing).
…
BTD sounds good in theory, but then so does "buy low, sell high". Easier said than done.
1. Where does the cash come from?
2. When does one pull the trigger, i.e. how much does the dip need to be to buy?
The examples below are not intended to "…
I was primarily suggesting that given substantial confounding factors, there's not much that can be inferred about the utilities industry from the way it behaved in the 70s. At least not without a lot of work and guesswork that I didn't provide.
…
This name change would concern me if I held the fund (JNSTX).
The SEC says: "The Division takes the position that a 'short-term' ... bond fund should have a dollar-weighted average maturity of ... no more than 3 years."
https://www.sec.gov/division…
I'm not sure about 1968 - 1981, but between 1973 and 1980, while the stock market roughly doubled utilities, well, roughly doubled.
Over the indicated periods, $100 grew to:
Utilities: 1973-1989 $711 (7x), 1981-1990 $352 (3.5x) => 1973-1980 2x
…
RMDs are merely tax events - moving assets from one pocket (an IRA) to another. They don't require you to sell anything.
If you're relying on IRA distributions to meet cash needs, then your concern is not so much that you have RMDs, but rather th…
A little(?) late to this party, but M* finally downgraded the fund from silver to neutral:
This fund has stuck to its guns, and that means it has been wrong for a long time. Manager Michael Hasenstab has been bullish on emerging markets and bearish …
Not mentioned is that TD Ameritrade is reducing its fees on all other TF OEF funds
(by less than a nickel :-()
https://mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/58605/td-ameritrade-new-oef-pricing
I view this more as duopoly pricing (Fidelity, Sch…
@Sven - this article too from Jim Sloan @SeekingAlpha.
I-Bonds Have it All
For I Bonds bought by October 31, the one year yield will likely be 4.8%
This is understated. He's assuming 0% inflation in August and for September. It was 0.3% for the…
A couple of reference links:
I believe this is the Melanie Waddell writing that syzygy quoted.
Ed Slott Weighs In on House Democrats' Proposed Mega-IRA Crackdown (from ThinkAdvisor)
The 881 page markup to the Build Back Better Act that contains t…
An oft heard refrain: I just want to make sure that the small investor isn't hurt. Coincidentally, the definition used for small investor turns out to include the speaker. Though it may sound like I'm picking on BenWP here, my observation is ge…
I was curious because my impression is that fund families seem to start piling into a category once it has done well. That speaks more to a category's past than its future prospects. It sounds like you're basing your expectation of continued goo…
To compare, no pun intended, apples to apples, you need to drop Tesla since it wasn't in the original list.
VRGWX and VFIAX are not all that similar. Six weeks ago, the former had 45% of its holdings in the top ten, while the latter had "only" 2…
Could you explain your thinking a bit?
For example, someone else posted in the thread announcing First Eagle Global Real Assets Fund that it could simply be a grab for more assets. That was my initial reaction here as well.
Though after che…
For clarity - regulations are enacted by the executive branch, consistent with stautues enacted by Congress. For example, 17 CFR § 240.10b5-1, aka Rule 10b5(1), concerning Trading “on the basis of” material nonpublic information in insider trading…
Next, Forsyth bemoans that [] honors have been denied baseball legend[] Pete Rose (for betting on games he was managing).
I think he's getting the problem backward. It's not that Rose might leverage nonpublic knowledge, say that some teammates we…
Let's try backing up and going through this again, slowly.
I wondered how the differences in methodologies might effect the composition of the fund as a result of the change.
The methodologies here are of two indexes. Ideally then one would comp…
I will try to understand why weighting by proportion of fund's assets makes it almost median market cap square.
Consider that in a cap weighted fund the weighting of each holding is the market cap (well, scaled by the total size of the fund). …
Yahoo reports FXAIX's median market cap as $186.1B vs. the $32.1B figure reported by S&P for the underlying S&P 500 index. Given Yahoo's "non-standard" use of median (which it doesn't define), it makes you wonder what other terms Yahoo is …
(we know how to define median) ... (Vanguard probably doesn't know how to define median.)
Vanguard knows how to define median and gives its definition right on its website:
median market capitalization
An indicator of the size of companies in which…
Like series I savings bonds, series EE savings bonds cannot be redeemed until a year after purchase. Between one and five years, you lose the last three months of interest if you cash out. No penalty after five years.
https://www.treasurydirect.…
Baird is not a fund company that comes to mind when looking for equity funds. It is replacing the manager for these two funds with (as noted above) an affiliate of Baird (which owns 75%-100%).
Here's what little I can find on Greenhouse - it's …
I do not own any shares in any Primecap managed fund.
Flagship customers can open accounts, investing up to $25K in each. You don't see any reason why one cannot game the system and open[] additonal accounts at Vanguard with different account nu…
Now you ask, what prevents me from opening additonal accounts at Vanguard with different account numbers and put $25K of Primecap and $25K of Capital Opportunity in each account, each year?
My answer is nothing.
My answer is that pretty much any f…
Just be very, very sure before you press the "enter" button. Vanguard doesn't look favorably on attempts to cancel orders.
(Orders can be cancelled on the brokerage platform but seemingly not on the legacy mutual fund platform.)
Flagship customers cannot initiate a position in VPMAX by investing money because that fund (share class) requires a minimum of $50,000. Even flagship customers can invest only $25K/year. However, flagship customers can open accounts in VPMCX. …
Actually, HAISX's largest outperformance in 2020 was in February, when it outperformed its peers by 2.34% (-6.57% to -8.91%). In no other month of 2020 did it outperform by 2% or better.
In only two other months did it outperform its peers by …
I should correct my earlier statement that ALAAX held some Oppenheimer funds in 2008. The symbol for ALAAX suggests it’s an old Aim fund that Invesco picked up prior to merging with Oppenheimer. In that case, it could not have included any Oppenhe…
According to the various prospectuses, flagship customers can open new accounts. The prospectuses don't describe the procedure.
VPMCX:
Vanguard PRIMECAP Fund is closed to new accounts for investors not enrolled in Vanguard Flagship Services® or Va…
Good numbers. As an aside, you’ve shown that ALAAX currently holds substantially more fixed income than PRSIX.
PRSIX = 41.21% fixed income
ALAAX = 49.83% fixed income
Difference = 8.62%
Truth be told, a higher % in fixed income (ALAAX) wo…
Overall, PRSIX holds more sub-BBB rated paper at this time
Actually not (see below), though ALAAX holds more IG paper, which could explain it tracking the IG bond market a bit better than PRSIX.
While M* counts unrated bonds as junk, we really don…
Other, lesser reasons:
One cannot open a new account in a Vanguard PRIMECAP fund (Primecap, Primcap Core, Capital Opportunity) unless one is a flagship customer at Vanguard. As Vanguard closes other funds it usually (but not always) continues to …
