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davfor
Thanks. She is well now and back to her daily volunteering.....
@bee
I am impressed with your nerves of steel! This retiree is uncomfortable holding an all stock portfolio. My allocation has about 50% in stocks as it has for the past several years (plus or minus a few %). That's where my comfort levels cente…
Hi Again @Accipiter ,
Thanks for your response. I didn't draw any firm conclusions from the article. I just accepted that what the author stated may have some basis "in the data" and may provide some rough guidance for comparing the median income…
Hi @Accipiter ,
Some of your comments regarding the article I posted left me puzzled. I am hoping you can help me to better understand the points you were making. Here is what I am thinking:
1. Re your comment related to https://www.mathsisfun.…
Another tech heavy fund (without the international component) with similar 1, 3, 5 and 10 year returns is FBSOX. And, it managed to sidestep the tech meltdown from 2000 to 2002.
@davidmoran "Not sure what the points are really, yay USA, exceptional us, go go go, no need to do anything?"
My personal sense is there's a lot that can be done to make the income distribution in this country more equitable. But that's where ea…
@Accipiter
I understand your point. The Gallop data is based on information from 2000 or more households in each country. I am not sure the minimum number for the OECD data but assume that each individual country's sample is "large". The distrib…
@davidmoran
I spot checked a small sample of the article's data against the data in the Wikipedia, OECD, and Gallop links provided in the article. The Gallop data checked out against both sources. The OECD data checked out against the Wipipedia s…
Here is a little more info about Polen Capital:
"This is a sign not of laziness but of fussiness among Polen's seven-person investment team, which manages $5.9 billion for institutions, independent advisers and high-net-worth investors, a rapid ris…
Out of curiosity, I pasted the annual yahoo chart data @catch22 provided into a spreadsheet. The average annual return for the 33 years from 1982 to 2014 was 19.2%. The average annual return for the eight election years was 5.0%.....1992 and 2008 …
I think Crash's post provides a snap shot of some of the concerns about weakness in the economy that are reflected in today's 10 year rate...
Crash's Post
@Old_Skeet Thanks for the link. I will add these thoughts to my bonds vs. cash considerations as the time for my year end portfolio tune up approaches.
Hi @Catch22 ,
My take on the comment @hank made was to look at it from the perspective of the investor who still owns the investment that has decreased in value. The funds are "just gone" -- at least for some unknown period of time -- to that indi…
@hank Thanks for your comment: "When markets tumble in unison, the money just goes!" Its a good point to remember. Cash does deserve a place in some portfolios.
@scott Thanks for your follow up comment regarding V and MA. Now I understand what you are thinking. I restrict my investments to mutual funds and ETFs. But, the trend you noted makes sense to me. I made one other small investment last Friday -…
@PRESSmUP Yes...I understand what you were saying. My investment time horizon is probably longer than most. Even in my mad money account, I am looking forward 1 year and 1 day. So, when I sold TTFS on Friday to buy FSRPX, my expectation was that…
The consumer continues to spend. And, despite the recent turmoil in the stock market, the domestic economy continues to improve. I am in the optimist group as I don't see the US economy slipping into recession in the near term. It seems to me the…
@catch22 and @PRESSmUP So, maybe I need to get that '56 t bird my wife likes and a 500 gallon gas storage tank. We'll still want to get out to our beach cabin once in a while!
Well, I guess this gives me another excuse to tell my wife about why I am keeping our 1989 Toyota pick up....I don't think there is a computer chip anywhere on it!!
@davidmoran
What I was saying is that achieving maximum employment does not necessarily mean there will not continue to be wage stagnation or even more wage decline. Wages are more apt to stabilize or increase in a full employment situation than i…
@davidmoran
It is my understanding the Fed's policy objectives are as follows: "The Congress established the statutory objectives for monetary policy--maximum employment, stable prices, and moderate long-term interest rates--in the Federal Reserve …
@scott
I agree with much of what you say. Here is my personal take on things.
The Fed has been providing "extraordinary" monetary accommodation for going on 7 years now. At some point, the Fed needs to reinstate its "normal" policy. Otherwise, …
@scott I agree. It might be more accurate to say those were characteristics of the world at the time of the crisis in 2008 rather than the immediate cause of the crisis. But, its my sense there are several grains of truth in the article related t…
@MJG My primary motivation for visiting MFO -- which I do on most days -- is to gain information about investing and the world of finance. Off Topic postings that focus on these topics make the most sense to me. Off Topic posts that are light hea…
Thanks to @Old_Skeet for his recent post and to those who have shared their ideas in response to it. The comments are very useful for a mutual fund investor such as myself. They generally reflect a fairly cautious attitude.
My current allocatio…
You might consider BERIX if you haven't already. It and GLRBX are the two funds I have in that space. Looking back as far as 1991 periods of out performance have alternated. BERIX has performed slightly better overall but it has recently lagged. …
Its my understanding that stock market gyrations over the past 15 years have made millennials disproportionately reluctant to invest the stock market....even if they have the income and savings needed to do so. Another big near term dip in the mark…
This table is interesting. Using the 1928 to 2014 time period includes the negative impacts resulting from the 1929 crash and the crashes in the 30's. So, it hopefully provides a fairly good "worst case" scenario. The results support the view tha…
About 40% of the stocks in my core portfolio are foreign stocks (via mutual funds). About 36% of the foreign stocks are emerging/frontier markets stocks per M* data. (That equals about 15% of the stocks in my portfolio.) The core portfolio is ess…
@JohnChisum China and other nations in the international community are already deploying white model QT helicopters. Their vacuum cleaners have been re-engineered to facilitate reductions in their current levels of reserve holdings of US Treasurie…
@Edmond and @scott Thanks for your comments. My interest in the phrase Quantitative Tighening was sparked by an article I posted here on 8/27. The article included the following image:
It is interesting to observe the relatively tight positi…
The Fed appears anxious to get the rate above the "abnormal" level of 0%. And the global markets appear to be hyper focused on and fearful about the Feds plans. Perhaps a nominal increase of 10 to 15 basis points would be the best way thread the n…
Thanks MJG. There is a saying sitting next to my computer that reads "In Prosperity Be Prudent. In Adversity Be Patient." That's a similar message. It would be interesting to see the chart and graph extended to take in 100 years so the 1929 and …
I have the Fidelity AmEx card and the Citi Double Cash Mastercard as my 2 primary cards. Each has quirks. You need to build up points...as I recall they need to equal at least $50....to be able to redeem them for cash to your Fidelity account. W…
@Old_Joe No problem. Your original post got me to wondering how my foreign funds have been behaving. It was simple to insert the fund symbols into the chart. I will try to figure out your method for creating links to unwieldy urls.
@Old_Joe Out of curiosity, I took a look at the foreign equity funds in my core portfolio. The YTD results through yesterday were:
MAPIX 8.8%
ARTJX 7.6%
FMIJX 5.4%
SGOVX 4.9%
MEASX 1.0%
WAFMX -4.5%
I also ran a year-to-date chart…
Here is one more perspective for you to consider....
This is a fund I evaluate over a full market cycle (or maybe 10 years). I made my first investment in YAFFX in 1997 shortly after the fund opened for business. The fund lost about 20% during it…
@David_Snowball Thanks for the quick look "behind the scenes". It has been obvious The Core Four spark plugs you mentioned put a lot of thought and effort into helping make sure MFO continues to be here every day. It sounds like substantial effo…
It had occurred to me it would make sense for MFO to be organized as a non-profit corporation. That organizational status seems to be a good mesh with my perception of its "public" purpose. I am glad to see that has happened. One thought....perha…
@Ted Thanks. That was interesting. Their process continues to make long term sense to me. I recall a similar interview with Don Yackman in 1997 about the time I first invested in YAFFX. YAFFX is up about 510% since inception in 1997 while the S…
@Ted - Thanks for the link. That was an interesting discussion. I noticed the comment about the Higgs boson not being discovered that suggested to me it was a few years old. But the broad sweep of the presentation made that detail unimportant ( …
