What Vanguard did here could be legal but inexcusable. It just reeks of incompetence and I think incompetence is not illegal on this planet but lack of duty to care is. Capital gains recognized by departing shareholders can be used by the fund to reduce fund level capital gains. Not too many funds employ this rule to reduce capital gain distributions to staying shareholders. Did Vanguard employ this rule to reduce capital gain distributions in this case?
I hold some Vanguard index equity ETFs (and no OEFs) in my taxable accounts and the thought that they could sock me in the face at YE with cap gain distributions crosses my mind every year. This is more true for Vanguard ETFs because they are a class of the OEFs. Not trying to digress but wanted to convey that blindly outsourcing one's welfare to an institution has its costs and there are a lot of die hard Vanguard fund shareholders with blind faith in Vanguard.

@Derf Yes. It was the latter. But, overall, my portfolio is down 4.4% YTD. So, there has been a slight downturn. Non-stock investments have tended to drop in tandem with stock investments so far this year....somewhat to my surprise. Decisions to overweight energy in 2020 when the sector was very much out of favor and to shift some bond $'s into individual utility stock $'s in the latter part of that year have proved helpful. But 2022 is still young. Perhaps the market will return to emphasizing the potential adverse impact of rising rates on utility stock profitability. The road ahead may be somewhat bumpy for those income stocks. (This original "bond replacement" investment has returned 20.7% exclusive of dividends so far and is providing a 4.34% YOC.)

@Old_Joe is right. Our chitchat is illegal. We MFOers have so much capital and influence that all we have to do is mention a fund or stock favorably to effect massive buy orders. The obverse must logically follow. If a single member becomes disenchanted with a fund and sells, watch out below!!
Enjoy the bball this weekend. The market can’t sting you if it’s closed.

Sold out of MGGIX the other day as part of early tax loss harvesting for 2022. It was acting too much like a concentrated tech fund and that's not what I wanted when I bought into it.
Their 2021 Annual Report came today. Call me spoiled or misguided after years of the informative, descriptive, reflective personal multi-page discussions in the annual letters from Giroux, Capital, Vanguard, and other funds, but when fund management's commentary for an annual report is only one page, unsigned, and doesn't even say 'thank you for investing in our fund' (*) it just suggests to me they don't really care about building a relationship with shareholders.
(*) I refer to the manager of the fund itself, not the Chairman's introduction note on behalf of the fund manager's firm.
I noticed a similarly annoying thing an a recent report from Blackrock. They (Blackrock) were the investment advisor, yet they kept saying "the Investment Advisor...." as if to rhetorically distance themselves for some reason. And it was only 1 or 2 of their funds doing that, the rest were more first-person in tone. Weird, but noticeable.
Edit: Interesting too that the majority of MGGIX directors come from Perkins-Cole. One would think there would be greater diversification there.

I posted a pissed off thread about MGGPX recently, but held on. Good thing I did. Guess, you gotta trust a good manager. Doesn't have the jitters during rough times. He killed it during covid. Let's hope he pulls through on all this.

Here's the page from which @bee's except was taken:
https://www.deepcapture.com/the-story-of-deep-capture-by-mark-mitchell/
naked shorters ... (it's flatly illegal goes the argument
Is naked shorting flatly illegal, or is that just one side's argument?
Naked shorting is not unconditionally illegal, just as going long without having the money to cover it on the trade date is not unconditionally illegal.
Is it illegal to buy a security and then talk it up? It depends.
"[A]busive 'naked' short selling as part of a manipulative scheme is always illegal under the general antifraud provisions of the federal securities laws, including Rule 10b-5".
SEC Rule 10b-21 https://www.sec.gov/rules/final/2008/34-58774.pdf
Absent fraud, naked shorts can be legal, so long as they comply with other SEC regs. "'Naked' short selling is not necessarily a violation of the federal securities laws or the [Security and Exchange] Commission’s rules. Indeed, in certain circumstances, 'naked' short selling contributes to market liquidity."
https://www.sec.gov/investor/pubs/regsho.htm
Apparently naked shorting is not flatly illegal, goes the official argument. The DTCC agrees, saying that "there is some legal naked short selling.
With respect to Overstock, "In 2004, Cohodes, a partner at a hedge fund called Rocker Partners, and David Rocker, the fund’s founder, shorted Overstock after concluding that Byrne was making untenable promises about its financial performance. "
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/12/14/a-tycoons-deep-state-conspiracy-dive
That's 18, not 15 years ago. This matters because Regulation SHO became effective January 2005, and Rule 10b-21 became effective Oct 2008.
For a very different, expansive perspective of the alleged conspiracies, here's Joe Nocera's business column from Feb 2006:
https://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/25/business/overstocks-campaign-of-menace.html
To bring this back to the Reuters piece - put options were purchased. That's a way to gain the same exposure as with a short, but there's no failure to deliver; no security lending is involved. As the CEO of Farmland stated, ""This is not about shorting. This is about securities fraud."

@MSF One thing I think you may be missing is that when a fund makes such a large distribution, often, although not always, it has performed quite well and it may be time to reallocate one's portfolio into another asset class that has underperformed and is cheaper. This however may not apply to TDFs as they do the allocating for investors. Such a strategy as you described may add value in TDFs but in more traditional single asset funds could be just throwing money at an overvalued position for an extra 2%. I've often taken such distributions and put them somewhere else. It's rather interesting from a psychological perspective of an investor thinking about the manager's psychology. If the manager is selling stocks and realizing large gains in them, perhaps his/her portfolio isn't quite as attractive as it once was. There may of course be many reasons why he/she is selling the positions, but valuation is often one of them. A big distribution is almost a tacit admission by the manager in some cases I imagine that it's time for fund investors to move on. I wonder if anyone has ever done a study on how equity funds perform after they've made large distributions.

I greatly appreciate preannouncements because they facilitate YE tax planning - how much gain to take this year (or whether to recognize losses), how much of an IRA to convert.
But in terms of managing large distributions, the preannouncements are a double edged sword. I admit to playing the game (as described below) to the disadvantage of other shareholders when it benefits me to do so. (That happens very infrequently.) It's legal, but it isn't especially fair to other investors.
Total distributions of the retail target date funds were estimated to be around 14%, depending on the fund.
https://advisors.vanguard.com//iwe/pdf/taxcenter/FAFYEEST_122021.pdf
If I had owned shares of a fund that had appreciated less than 14%, I would have sold the shares by the record date (so that I would not receive the distributions). Immediately after that (on the ex-date) I would have reestablished my position. Even if I recognized 12% in gain, I'd come out better than being handed a tax bill for a 14% distribution.
This would hurt remaining investors (in taxable accounts). The same cap gains and income would still have to be distributed, but now divided into fewer shares (because I'd redeemed mine). That would increase the taxable distributions to others.
If I'd had, say, a 16% unrealized gain, I wouldn't make this move. Otherwise I'd recognize a 16% gain when I could have recognized "just" 14% by staying put and taking the distributions.
The fact that this maneuver was available to everyone may be another argument that Vanguard could make to limit damages, assuming it is found to have breached its fiduciary duty.

Mortgage credit in the port now at zero; it was by far my largest allocation in recent years. Last to go was EIXIX. AlphaCentric and Regan's entries in the category have been ~ 75% ROC recently, thus with a pitiful income yield. The category was flat early in the big 2022 selloff, weakening lately, and just not a whole lot of upside left in the tank. This is my obituary for the great debt trade of the last decade-plus. (I might buy in again on a true selloff and signs of recovery.)
I'm probably more cautious than a lot of posters, given no pension and adequate but not massive savings/investment $. #1 position now is cash, #2 is PQTAX, with some ETFs mainly in trading mode. Capital preservation is the main objective at this point.

Their statutory prospectii are very clear. Distributions may be made
Suppose a fund had short term shares and long term shares with the same cost basis. And suppose Vanguard chose to sell the short term shares instead of the long term shares to raise cash. That's something no prudent investor would do.
I don't think there's any doubt that in such a situation Vanguard would have breached its fiduciary duty of care. The fact that shareholders are on notice that the tax liability on recognized gains is passed through to them does not relieve Vanguard of this fiduciary duty in all situations.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/duty_of_care

Yes, Eaton Vance. Since everyone's tax situation is different take a look at last years distributions/share and see how you may be affected. The distributions were all either long-term capital gains or income.
ETV

Sold out of MGGIX the other day as part of early tax loss harvesting for 2022. It was acting too much like a concentrated tech fund and that's not what I wanted when I bought into it.
Their 2021 Annual Report came today. Call me spoiled or misguided after years of the informative, descriptive, reflective personal multi-page discussions in the annual letters from Giroux, Capital, Vanguard, and other funds, but when fund management's commentary for an annual report is only one page, unsigned, and doesn't even say 'thank you for investing in our fund' (*) it just suggests to me they don't really care about building a relationship with shareholders.
(*) I refer to the manager of the fund itself, not the Chairman's introduction note on behalf of the fund manager's firm.
I noticed a similarly annoying thing an a recent report from Blackrock. They (Blackrock) were the investment advisor, yet they kept saying "the Investment Advisor...." as if to rhetorically distance themselves for some reason. And it was only 1 or 2 of their funds doing that, the rest were more first-person in tone. Weird, but noticeable.
Edit: Interesting too that the majority of MGGIX directors come from Perkins-Cole. One would think there would be greater diversification there.

Thanks. Interesting that two consecutive days of good market gains and bearish sentiment got worse for the week.

Really appreciate your assessment. Wild day for emerging market. Will rebalance more once things settle a bit.
What concerns me is China is undergo lockdown in several large cities with several thousands cases of COVID. One is the city equivalent to the silicon valley where they manufacture high value products include Apple products. Could this be a replay of March 2020?

Many of these semi-transparent ETFs from TRP or Capital are based broadly on and/or will try replicating the models/holdings of their 'equivalent' mutual funds but won't necessarily contain the same holdings, too.
(For example TRP's Growth ETF might almost be the same as TRBCX and even have the same name, managers, and relatively similar holdings, but it won't be quite identical.)

SOR - Source Capital is a storied CEF with lots of history. Warren Buffett once thought so highly of the fund that he considered buying it, but that didn't happen. Activist Saba owns a stake. There was a big management change in 2016 and also changes in objectives from aggressive-allocation (70-85% equity) to moderate-allocation (50-70% equity) - so ignore record prior to 2016. Historically, the equity portion has been small/mid-cap using the GARP approach and fixed income riskier preferreds/convertibles, HY; there is income/distribution tilt - there are not many allocation funds with this mix. Effective-equity is 76% vs 61% nominal. Leverage is not indicated but there are common and preferred shareholders, so check this aspect. There is some value bounce lately. Also look at the info at CEFConnect.
https://www.cefconnect.com/fund/SOR

Trading at not an awful discount. Just unearthed it. Consistent dividends. Global equities, with bonds, too. Playing shorts with some cash. Is this the needle in the haystack?
https://www.morningstar.com/cefs/xnys/sor/quote

Yep, state laws set up the basic public utility regulatory structure, and a public commission does the details based on the state law, covering all forms of energy generation. Solar net metering, for example, is governed the same way.
But, there are sources of variability. For example, a number of states have renewables portfolio standards, and the commissions are very political bodies, more than a few of them pure lap dogs of the utilities, while others take the word "public" at least somewhat seriously.
The structure for allowable profit may be different in different states, not sure how much that varies. My state has a return-on-capital formula, which leads the dominant utility in bizarre directions: the more they pay for a new source, the more they get to charge the ratepayer.
The coal in the utility's portfolio costs the ratepayers more than twice as much per unit as the one large wind farm, which almost qualifies as historic now, having been finished in 2005, positively ancient and costly compared to newer ones. And yet, the utility doesn't want another watt of renewable power, and is trying to buy more coal for the portfolio, and thus can charge ratepayers more.
Utility Dive is a good source for learning about the ins and outs of utility policy and regulation. Much of the news these days is about evolving renewables issues, but UD goes into just about every aspect of public utility power generation.
P.S. This may be obvious, but in case it's not, the basic setup for regulated utilities is letting them act as a monopoly provider for a certain area/population, in exchange for public regulation with provisions for the utility's profitability.

#3
I think the Chinese recognize ( but will not admit) that their vaccine is only 50% effective against delta; it may be even worse against Omicron.
While we all think Omicron is milder, I do not have data on it's relative virulence vs delta in unvaccinated, or ineffectively vaccinated people ( will find some).
Hong Kong ( apparently only 30% of old people are vaccinated) is having a bad time with covid, with seven day average death rates currently as high as 35/1,000,000. At it's worse, last summer USA death rate was 10/1,000,000 ( that was Delta. Omicron peak was 8.
They hope with draconian measure they can stop deaths and hospitalizations unlike USA where both just kept on trucking.
I don't think many people in China have died yet or at least the Chinese haven't said many people have died)
If you are still interested in China investments, look at Krane ETFs. they have a long article on avoiding ADRs and buying only shares listed in Hong Kong or China directly. While the ADRs may stop trading, shares overseas will not, although they could fall in value, as capital in ADRs disappears.

Appears, @hank, that Starlink might be available in SE MI in 2023, or so they say.

@BenWP - Wow.I’d assumed they covered the entire U.S. by now. It was such a high priority with me I signed up / applied for the beta version in early 2020 and was fortunate to be included in the very early rollout in late 2020. I’m surprised it’s not more widespread by now. Suspect it’s more related to bandwidth capacity than geography - particularly in urban areas. Also, learned that the kits are in limited supply due to a silicone shortage - of all things.
One may log on to their webpage and enter zip code. They’ll let you know if and when available.
Found this. Appears quite recent: “Starlink is still in its early stages as a satellite provider and isn’t available everywhere yet. Even if there is service in your region, you might live in a place where it's oversubscribed for the number of satellites in orbit. If that's the case, you'll have to wait for additional Starlink launches to bring more bandwidth to your area.”

Between marcom babble, poorly informed writers, and sometimes well intentioned attempts at "simplification", some of what's written about annuities winds up as confusing and contradictory as it is enlightening.
Basic annuities (ignoring bells and whistles), while not as simple as bank accounts, are not as complex as they may seem. There is what annuitization means, and then a few parameters to think about.
Annuitization is where you give an insurance company a lump sum and in exchange it promises to pay you a stream of checks. When you choose to annuitize, when the checks start after that, and how long those checks keep coming - those are some of the basic parameters.
One often (not always) buys an annuity with a lump sum. That is called a "single premium" annuity.
Buying an annuity with a lump sum and waiting to annuitize is to buy a single premium deferred annuity (SPDA). See Investopedia:
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/single-premium-deferred-annuity.asp
Until you annuitize (give the money to the insurer in exchange for that promised income stream), an annuity is like a nondeductible IRA. Tax sheltered, growing in value. This is called the "accumulation phase".
If you wait before annuitizing, i.e. if there is an accumulation phase, the annuity is said to be deferred. Otherwise the annuity is immediate.
One you annuitize (exchange the money in the annuity for a promised income stream), you can start getting checks immediately, or you may postpone the income stream. That's deferred income.
Annuitization may be deferrred and income (post-annuitization) may be deferred. People are so used to the idea that when one annuitizes one starts getting checks at once that they tend to conflate the two types of deferral.
Regarding Partnership for Long Term Care policies: one can find official state sites (each state runs its own program), but I do not believe there is any official national site. The AALTCI site looks solid. Recognize though that this is a website of an insurance trade group with a mandate of promoting all types of long term care coverage.

The national trade association for professionals dedicated to serving the long-term care planning needs of individuals, businesses and organizations.... Request a free, no-obligation cost comparison from an Association member today.

Your state doesn't have an official Partnership site because yours is one of the few states that hasn't legislated to implement Partnership plans. The most recent bill (not passed) was proposed by the 2019-2020 legislature, not the current one.
Sample official state sites include New York (I'm disappointed to read that no new policies are currently being written), Kansas, and South Dakota.