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.
What about testing to know if someone has COVID-19? Bottom line, there is not enough testing capacity to be broadly useful. Here’s why.
■ The leading clinical lab firms, Quest and Labcore have capacity to process 1000 kits per day. For the na…
Here's a NYTimes article on the TP panic buying.
"A retail analyst, Burt Flickinger of Strategic Resource Group, said big box retailers like Costco and BJ’s Wholesale Club have been able to restock most empty shelves within a few hours, or by the …
I had transferred my taxable account holdings (cost basis figures don't matter in IRAs) out of Merrill Edge because of their rounding/fudging and other problems. Merrill provided the receiving brokerage its incorrect figures.
The receiving broker…
"This is why we have to Flatten the Curve."
All the bullet items shown are economic. Why would spreading out the same number of incidents over a longer period of time ("flattening the curve") help the economy? IMHO, we need to (a) flatten the cu…
Now I see for EACH of my $100 x 4 investments I've been charged $50 commission. If anyone contemplating TIAA, stop. I'll try to figure it out. The funds STILL show NTF. And I was never charged for my initial investment. It's also clear additional in…
If we're going to go all technical on a poorly written speech (cargo included), let's get it right. The speech mentioned the United Kingdom in the 7th paragraph, not Great Britain.
https://www.vox.com/2020/3/11/21176001/trump-coronavirus-speech…
I'd give the generic answer that Vanguard is better at running index funds - often holding less cash, trading with an eye to tax implications, etc. But there's an additional reason that Vanguard index funds are more tax efficient. They usually h…
A follow up article, of sorts:
in recent days, as fears of a pandemic have escalated, the market for Treasuries has experienced a liquidity problem — meaning that the buying and selling of this kind of debt at reasonable prices has suddenly gotten a…
Geez, thanks I think. I'm not sure I'm even in the same league as msf and TheShadow, and I often wonder if I'm even playing the same game. You're giving me way too much credit. Having worked a few years in the semiconductor industry (specifically …
As Boris Johnson explained a week ago:
1. Containment
2. Delay (so that resources will be less stressed)
3. Research
4. Mitigate
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1250211/Coronavirus-UK-plan-what-is-UK-plan-four-phases-Boris-Johnson-speech-in-ful…
I see the confusion - terminology. What you call the "retail class" is a fund with two classes, a retail class and an institutional class. The latter (PRAMX) has the same $1M min as the institutional fund's single share class.
The retail fund (i…
To clarify - these are two different funds. The fund being liquidated is "Institutional Africa & Middle East Fund". The fund you own, which has two share classes (investor and institutional) is "Africa & Middle East Fund".
The former (T…
Deposition and photolithography are two distinct steps in the manufacture of semiconductors. A third step is etching.
One deposits a layer of silicon, then applies the mask (stencil) for a layer of circuitry, and then etches the layer. Rinse…
I wonder why TRP isn't simply merging this fund into its retail Africa & Middle East fund, converting TRIAX shares into the institutional class shares PRAMX of the latter fund. Same manager, effectively clones.
TRIAX page: https://www.trowepr…
Corporate money market accounts used to be more common, but many shut down a few years ago. GE Interest Plus was one such account.
Dominion Energy is a holding company rated BBB and these unsecured notes are junior to all notes and other liabil…
"This is why when volatility increases, such as the last 3 years, their funds lag."
Volatility decreased for DODFX and in foreign markets.
Std dev Jan 2014 - Jan 2017
DODFX: 14.81%
EFV: 12.97% (iShares MSCI EAFE Value, used as proxy for foreign la…
"Taking into account bad performance of non-US stocks ..."
Local performance or converted back to dollars? VMVFX "seek[s] to hedge away most of the currency exposure resulting from its foreign stock holdings."
I didn't go back to check, but I'm…
I'm not sure that I've imported the daily figures correctly from Yahoo (website change among other uncertainties), and I think that daily returns tend to have too much noise (which is one reason why std dev of funds is typically calculated on monthl…
Just like Social Security retirement age, the government has defined two different end points for savings bonds:
SS: full retirement age (65-67 depending on date of birth)
Savings Bonds: original maturity (20 years)
SS: Maximum delayed retirement …
Media might be overdrive/panicking and overkill. Think we may have more patients die annual from flu
Patients less 60 years old usually recover 99%
Meaning that 1% of patients under 60 don't recover - a euphemism for "die". Of course fatalit…
The Aggregate Bond Fund, like its benchmark, is higher grade, investing in virtually no junk bonds. Even among investment grade bonds, it takes more risk, holding a lower percentage of government bonds and a higher percentage of BBB bonds.
It's t…
fido not so much, depending on your definition of skimpI had debated about mentioning that Fidelity's MMFs pay more, but since their top rate for sub $1M min MMFs is just 8 basis points above Schwab's, I didn't feel it was worth going into the numbe…
I would be inclined to use Schwab or Fidelity in the decumulation phase (retirement), because they charge nothing to sell TF funds. Also, they both have excellent customer service, and FWIW both have offices that you can walk into.
If you're l…
My point was that, absent this research to the contrary, one can not conclude that a fund investing based on politics is "not acting on the behalf of the shareholders." Such a strategy could actually inure to the shareholders' benefit (though the …
The paper describes political bias as just another form of systemic bias, like hometown (or home country) bias. Sometimes systemic biases can be justified. Invest in companies near you because you have better information about them (e.g. Mairs an…
"You can't beat the averages."
That's not quite what Rekenthaler wrote. Rather, echoing Sharpe, he wrote that "active funds in aggregate were destined to track their relevant indexes." Emphasis added.
It would have been more interesting had he…
Yes, but you're assuming a binary classification, while the paper classifies firms (and funds) into three categories: Democratic-leaning, Republican-leaning, and neutral. So while a Republican-leaning manager might invest 43% in Republican-leaning…
TGBAX is both a bond fund and a currency fund. Hassenstab seems to invest in bonds anywhere in the world based on how he expects those bonds to perform independent of currency movements. In that sense, one can think of the fund as a hedged inter…
If you're investing a smaller amount, you could invest in the fund via BAWAX. An extra 0.25% in annual expenses is used to offset the brokerage fee enabling you to buy it NTF.
Alternatively, if you invested $20K in BIAWX and hold for a year, you …
Don't be too impressed by these DIY investors. According to the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI):
for 2019 as a whole – well, in a year that the S&P 500 rose more than 28%, and the Dow gained 22% (the NASDAQ was up an even better 35…
Nice piece.
A virtue of slowing the spread, even if as many as 70% of the population are ultimately infected is that the peak is lower. That lessens the strain on the healthcare system (insufficient number of doctors, labs, material, hospital …
How is Amazon going to get orders delivered if all the delivery people stay home?
Drones? According to Amazon’s consumer worldwide CEO Jeff Wilke last June: “You’re going to see it delivering packages to customers in a matter of months.”
https:/…
To stop spreading the virus China they lock down the entire city and it slows the spread somewhat. Cannot image this can be done in a democratic society of large cities in US or Europe.
Lockdowns may not work and may even be counterproductive.…
Fund page: https://www.griffincapital.com/griffin-institutional-access-credit-fund
Prospectus for share classes A & C (including fee structure): https://www.griffincapital.com/Documents/GIACX/Marketing Materials/Sales Kit/CreditFund-Prospectus-…
If the reason why you are considering leaving PIMIX is an increase in its reported ER (0.74% in the 2018 summary prospectus, 1.05% in the 2019 summary prospectus), I respectfully suggest that you take a closer look.
The true operating costs of fund…
I wrote: CreditKarma is offering free federal and state tax filings, no income limits, with no upselling.
When you file with Credit Karma Tax®, you’ll never face unexpected charges or be asked to upgrade to a paid version. It’s always free to file …
Here's a M* chart comparing the performances of PIODX and MITTX over the lifetime of the younger fund (PIODX, starting February 10, 1928).
PIODX gained 2,911,544%, while MITTX gained a mere 241,202%. At least if I got my decimal points in the ri…
May I respectfully suggest we pay less attention to polls of the moment and more attention to cost figures with a little rigor behind them?
Regarding costs: as with investing, it's not how much you pay in taxes that matters, it's what you net afte…
