From @hank: "On another note, I’ve been hmmming a lot over the events in Seattle, Portland and other American cities.
I’m thinking there must be a graphic buried away somewhere (maybe in a political science department’s vault) that visually delineates the gradual progression from “protest” to “insurrection” to “revolution“. And I’m humming over whether this idea of unidentified (presumably) federal police dressed in military style fatigues showing up and “helping” to police cities that don’t want the help gains traction and becomes a permanent fixture of the American scene. More specifically, I’m wondering whether they’ll be hanging out on Michigan streets come November."
***********************************

The Lincoln Project are exiled Republicans who still own a soul and a conscience. I would still disagree with them about a lotta stuff, but they are not at all like any sort of MAGA drones.

Hearings before the House's antitrust subcommittee of the Judiciary committee this coming week. Dinky linky.
Microsoft didn't even get an invite. Four other guys did. The link provides a rundown of the issues that are liable to be explored. No paywall.

On another note, I’ve been hmmming a lot over the events in Seattle, Portland and other American cities.
I’m thinking there must be a graphic buried away somewhere (maybe in a political science department’s vault) that visually delineates the gradual progression from “protest” to “insurrection” to “revolution“. And I’m humming over whether this idea of unidentified (presumably) federal police dressed in military style fatigues showing up and “helping” to police cities that don’t want the help gains traction and becomes a permanent fixture of the American scene. More specifically, I’m wondering whether they’ll be hanging out on Michigan streets come November.
In case you’ve been living in a cave -
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/07/25/seattle-

One reason maybe that AVEFX ''flies under the radar'' is it is not available at Fidelity or Schwab no load/NTF.

In 2020 peak to trough AVEFX lost about 10% while FPINX lost only about 2%.
AVEFX has 20% in stocks FPINX < 1%
Vanguard VASIX is a better choice than AVEFX. See (chart). VASIX ER=0.11%. It has better performance and SD(volatility) is close.

“They said that as AUM increases, the yield will fall.”
That’s what they told me would happen back in early June. AUM was around 11 million then. If AUM is up to 17, then I has increased by about 55%. Cash has increased to 36%. This was all to be expected. The question is how will they deploy all that cash. It looks like they are expecting a covid second wave, recession/depression, defaults, etc. They want dry powder. By hiring them as managers, I’m paying for this type of tactical allocation. We’ll see how it works.
I don’t need this fund for monthly income. It’s an aggressive opportunistic allocation.

As of 6/30 they have 35.57% in cash. They will probably have an update in the week following this week. It's strange they have so much cash. 17 million is a very small portfolio and it should be very easy to find more bonds for extra 6-7 million.
The next 1-2 weeks would tell us plenty. Is the daily distribution fall around 0.0015, 0.002 or more.
If the expense ratio goes to 9.2% (the waiver of 8.38% ends at 7/31/2020) this fund will not be good.

Stole this from The Balance -
“ Emerging Markets List
The Morgan Stanley Capital International Emerging Market Index (MSCI Index) lists 26 countries. They are Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, and United Arab Emirates.
Other sources also list another eight countries as falling into the emerging market category. They include Argentina, Hong Kong, Jordan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, and Vietnam.
The main emerging market powerhouses are China and India. Together, these two countries are home to over 35% of the world's labor force and population. In 2018, their combined gross domestic product (about US$28.1 trillion) was greater than that of either the European Union ($18.8 trillion) or the United States ($20.5 trillion). In any discussion of emerging markets, the powerful influence of these two super-giants must be kept in mind.”
I wonder if an investor would be wise to be select some countries and rule out others?

Dr. Fauci gets his own basecard made.

https://www.latimes.com/sports/story/2020-07-24/dr-anthony-fauci-first-pitch-baseball-card

However, his action is bringing threats to his family. Quote from article below:

Fauci said the amount of hate mail and serious threats are "not good."
"It's tough," he said. "Serious threats against me, against my wife, against my daughters. I mean, really? Is this the United States of America?" Fauci said.

https://msn.com/en-us/news/us/fauci-says-serious-threats-have-been-made-against-him-and-his-family/ar-BB179wed?li=BBnb7Kz

It was yielding over 20%. Of course it’s going to go down. Even if it went down by half it would yielding about 10%. As AUM increases, yield will fall. This is happening as expected. It’s also actively managed by Tad Rivelle. They may be trimming their risk. Cash looks to be building.

In the last 4 days it looked like the following
As of Date Ticker Dividend Rate
7/23/2020 MWFSX 0.001582083
7/22/2020 MWFSX 0.001426187
7/21/2020 MWFSX 0.001684689
7/20/2020 MWFSX 0.001714354
If we use 0.0015 daily we get about 4.5% annually.
It is one of the worse performer for one month and 3 months in my list
Ticker..1 Mo...3 Months
MIAYX 3.03 9.85
AIHAX 2.62 2.95
JIPAX 2.6 7.57
ADVNX 2.56 4.91
BMSAX 2.43 8.44
JSTIX 2.41 6.35
PDIIX 2.32 7.89
PLSFX 2.28 9.09
FCDDX 2.25 8.12
STISX 2.23 8.2
JMUTX 2.22 9.38
ASIGX 2.17 6.79
PUCZX 2.1 8.67
FADMX 1.97 7.98
MXIIX 1.73 5.63
JMSIX 1.66 9.01
HSNYX 1.64 10.57
PTIAX 1.61 4.95
IOFIX 1.54 16.42
SEMMX 1.34 10.66
PIMIX 1.3 6.31
TSIIX 1.27 7.29
EIXIX 1.09 8.01
DHEAX 1.08 8.04
VCFAX 0.88 7.78
MWFSX 0.84 4.06
RCTIX 0.43 4.45

SUPPLEMENT DATED MARCH 31, 2020 TO THE SUMMARY PROSPECTUSES AND PROSPECTUS FOR THE GRANDEUR PEAK EMERGING MARKETS OPPORTUNITIES FUND, GRANDEUR PEAK GLOBAL MICRO CAP FUND, GRANDEUR PEAK GLOBAL OPPORTUNITIES FUND, GRANDEUR PEAK GLOBAL REACH FUND AND GRANDEUR PEAK INTERNATIONAL OPPORTUNITIES FUND (EACH A “FUND,” AND TOGETHER, THE “GRANDEUR PEAK FUNDS”) DATED AUGUST 31, 2019Effective April 1, 2020, the Grandeur Peak Emerging Markets Opportunities Fund, Grandeur Peak Global Opportunities Fund, Grandeur Peak Global Reach Fund, and Grandeur Peak International Opportunities Fund will reopen to all shareholders.Also, effective April 1, 2020, the Grandeur Peak Global Micro Cap Fund will reopen to all shareholders who purchase directly from Grandeur Peak Funds. The Fund remains open through financial intermediaries to shareholders who currently hold a position in the Fund. Financial advisors with clients in the Fund are able to invest in the Fund for both existing as well as new clients. The Fund also remains open to all participants of retirement plans currently holding a position in the Fund.

Yes, they opened back in early April. David wrote about it in his monthly commentary.
https://www.mutualfundobserver.com/2020/4/
International Stalwarts is closed to third party financial intermediaries effective June 10.
https://www.mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/56200/grandeur-peak-international-stalwarts-fund-to-close-to-new-investors-via-financial-intermediaries
I picked up GPMCX for a non-taxable account.

I respectfully disagree with some attributes ascribed above to PSLDX, while acknowledging that it has significantly outperformed funds that could nominally be called its peers.
While PIMCO dates its StocksPLUS strategy to 1986, this strategy is "used across [its] “PLUS” portfolios". The first PIMCO fund to use this strategy was PSTKX in 1993; PSLDX dates back only to 2007. MWATX, previously mentioned, started in 1998.
https://www.pimco.com/en-us/investments/mutual-funds/stocksplus-fund/inst
https://www.pimco.com/en-us/investments/mutual-funds/stocksplus-long-duration-fund/inst
The bond holdings in PSLDX strike me as less opaque than those of most PIMCO funds. It's in the name: long duration. No secret sauce. This fund, by mandate doesn't significantly alter its bond bets. Rather, this fund will soar (at least its bond portion will) as interest rates decline, and will crash as rates rise.
[Effective duration is calculated by starting with modified duration (a well-defined, mechanical calculation based on coupons and maturities). One or more models are then used to estimate the duration effects of all the oddities of the bonds.]
For this fund, effective duration = modified duration = 14.57 years (per M*). So there's very little going on outside of (long) vanilla bonds. Looking at the holdings, PIMCO appears to be tweaking around the edges with derivatives to adjust the bond portfolio attributes slightly.
The 2x strategy (or StocksPlus strategy) gets 100% exposure to stocks at minimal cost by buying swaps on the target stock index. It then uses the remaining cash (almost 100%) to invest in bonds. DSENX is 100.69% long in stocks, 91.32% long in bonds, and short in cash by a similar amount. That's the way it's supposed to work.
PSLDX goes further and adds even more leverage. You've still got the 100% stock exposure through swaps (M* says 102.31%). But the bond portfolio is leveraged: 127.69% per M*. So not only is this fund heavily exposed to interest rate risk (with its long bonds), but it is doubling down with leverage. Okay, it's just 1¼ x down; same idea.
Because the fund must hold long bonds, there's no secret sauce here, or none worth mentioning. Just very long bonds combined with extra leverage on the bond side.
FWIW M* classifies this fund as a hybrid (85%+ equity), while PSTKX, DSENX, and MWATX are classified as large cap blend funds. I suspect that's because the leverage on the bond side increases the bond exposure to the point that M* won't consider it a stock fund with just a bond kicker.
If one is confident that rates won't rise at all for some time and that the yield curve (whatever little curvature there is) won't begin to curve a little more, then going long makes sense. Otherwise, those scenarios will crush this fund, at least relative to the others or to a vanilla stock fund.
NTSX differs in several ways. Instead of 2x, it is 1.5x. Instead of 50/50 stock/bond exposure, it's 60/40. It does not have flexibility in allocating bond sectors; its only exposure is to Treasuries (via futures). Its target duration is 3-8 years, typically less than half of PSLDX, though I suspect more than that of the other funds. But it does actively manage duration.
Its blurb touts the ability of the 1.5x strategy (90/60) "to enhance returns" by investing the the extra 50% (1/3 of the portfolio) in "noncore assets such as long/short equities, risk parity, CTAs, or true alternatives." However, upon reading further, one finds that the fund itself "invests 90% of its net assets in the 500 largest U.S. stocks by market capitalization" and "60% notional exposure to U.S. Treasury futures (2-, 5-, 10-, 30-year ladder)."
That's not the same as the S&P 500 (which is not a compilation of the 500 largest US companies); nor does the prospectus even mention 500 companies. Rather "The Fund invests in a representative basket of U.S. equity securities of large-capitalization companies generally weighted by market capitalization." (Prospectus.) It invests directly in stocks rather than using swaps. That enables it to actively manage its equity side - another point of differentiation from the OEFs mentioned.
Over its short life it has done nicely. Much (not all) of its performance seems to be due to leveraging. If one takes VBIAX's annulized performance over the past 21 months (the lifetime of NSTX), calculates its monthly performance from that, leverages 50%, and compounds that, one gets an annualized performance of 10.45%, still measurably below NSTX's 11.23%.

"The funds are not required to disclose detailed data about the size of their bets"
"Long before the turmoil this spring, the Financial Stability Oversight Council, established by Dodd-Frank, had repeatedly identified hedge fund leverage as a risk."
“These strategies we thought we saw seemed an awful lot like the Long-Term Capital Management strategies"
"Early in 2017, Mr. Mnuchin, a former hedge fund manager, assumed control of the Financial Stability Oversight Council and the hedge fund working group was deactivated."
From "swamp" to stinking cesspool of corruption.

Vanguard Wellington VWELX is open to those who invest directly with the fund. They are also able to make additional purchases.
From July 1, 2020, prospectus:

Important Note Regarding Vanguard Wellington Fund
Vanguard Wellington Fund will be closed to all prospective financial advisory,
institutional, and intermediary clients (other than clients who invest through a
Vanguard brokerage account).
The Fund will remain closed until further notice and there is no specific time
frame for when the Fund will reopen. During the Fund’s closed period, all current
shareholders may continue to purchase, exchange, or redeem shares of the
Fund online, by telephone, or by mail.

The granddaddy of them all in this space is PSLDX. IMHO among the greatest mutual funds of all time. You can get it for $25K at vanguard, but it's no free lunch. After holding for a few years with enormous gains there was a point in the past few months where virtually all of those gains were wiped out (brought tears to my eyes). Whatever derivatives were in the secret sauce were crushed to oblivion. But it came back hard and now up 17% YTD. This is a great strategy but would never put more than I could afford to lose in any opaque derivative-driven fund. For an ETF along the same lines but not as extreme check out NTSX. I'm long this as well as Dseex (a fine long term hold for sure).

oh my
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/23/business/economy/hedge-fund-bailout-dodd-frank.html

If you are a member of a CU that offers residential lending, I would look there first.
If not, find out if you are dealing with a broker or an actual lender. If you deal with a broker, you have to pay them something for their time/efforts.
Many mortgage lenders will sell your loan once the loan closes, which you should receive a notice of who acquired your loan.
Also, if you have been in the house for less than 10 years, you can see if you can get the "reissue rate" for title insurance. The shorter amount of time involved in researching the title, the less the cost. Google reissue rate for title insurance. I mentioned this since you mentioned mortgage recasting.
Check with your state regulator who oversees state mortgage brokers/mortgage lenders. You can also find out if there any any complaints against a particular lender. The regulator will not give details about the complaint/complainant, but if someone tells you there are 20 complaints for 2020, you may rethink your selection. Of course, you don't know what the lender's loan volume for the time period in question.
You can ask your state regulator if your state has instituted a loan prepayment penalty; many states do not, but you need to check as a precaution.
Prepaying a loan is between you and the lender/servicer. You may want to ask about that when discussing it with the mortgage lender you ultimately deal with prior to the closing.
You can also check this link which is for public only to see if the company is licensed and other information.
https://www.nmlsconsumeraccess.org/

The DoubleLine Shiller Enhanced CAPE®, [is] an investment strategy pairing Shiller Barclays CAPE® with an active fixed income strategy (DoubleLine Short-Intermediate Duration Fixed Income, or SHINT. ...

Introducing DoubleLine Short-Intermediate Fixed Income Strategy (“SHINT”)
To construct portfolios across multiple sectors of the fixed income universe, including SHINT portfolios, DoubleLine applies a macroeconomic framework, led by portfolio managers and analysts who look across the spectrum of different asset classes. ...
SHINT is a diversified fixed income strategy that, at present [April 2019], targets duration of one to three years while pursuing a yield of 3% to 4%. That yield target appears feasible in the current market environment, allowing the investment team to take a measured approach to both interest rate and credit risks. Freedom to allocate across multiple sectors of the fixed income universe also allows the team to construct a diversified fixed income portfolio with what DoubleLine believes to be the most attractive investments on a reward-to-risk basis. The two-pronged approach of coupling top-down macroeconomic views with bottom-up security selection provides potential benefits from both risk management as well as return-seeking opportunities.
Actively managing the credit risk [non-AGG bond sectors] and interest-rate risk [IG bonds] of the portfolio is a key element to the asset allocation process. DoubleLine tilts the portfolio in the direction of one risk versus another based on the investment team’s macroeconomic forecasts and views on return and risk prospects within the sectors. ...
Sector rotation of SHINT portfolios has tended to be gradual, due to the gradual shifts in the macroeconomic landscape.

https://doubleline.com/dl/wp-content/uploads/DoubleLine-CAPEinRisingRateEnvironments-March2019.pdf
That contains a lot more, including a graph of the bond sector allocations over time.
DSENX tracked CAPE until March, when it underperformed by about 6%. The gap has held steady since then. This suggests that the bond component was fairly flat (neither helping nor hurting) through February, and also after March. But that it dipped 6% in March.
We've seen funds that have not recovered well, notably junk securitized debt. But those also fell much harder than 6%. So without peeking, I'd guess that DoubleLine had a mix of low grade securitized bonds and enough higher grade bonds to temper the dip. Taking more credit risk would also be consistent with trying to maintain that 3%+ yield while keeping a short duration.. Strangely enough, the bond fund I find with the closest match for that 2020 performance is TPINX. The portfolio is consistent with my guess: BBB credit rating, 2 year duration.
Looking at the linked doc on the Enhanced CAPE strategy, it seems that DoubleLine missed a macro call in 2019. The doc is entitled: A Potential Solution for Investors in Rising-Rate Environments.

Given indications that yields on the 10- and 30-year Treasuries put in a durable bottom in 2016, ending of the 35-year bull market in government bonds, investors have good reason to think about how to position portfolios for the next regime in fixed income. The investment team at DoubleLine is not calling for the advent of a secular bear market in fixed income. ... However, DoubleLine sees numerous fundamental factors presaging a rise in interest rates over the long run. Investors should study strategies that may not need the tailwind of declining rates to provide positive returns and perhaps have the potential to outperform in the face of rising rates.

Finally (and why I was curious about this fund), M* started classifying it as a blend fund in 2019. Not all that surprising, since CAPE rotates among sectors that are most undervalued relative to their own prior valuations, not relative to the market. So it can easily rotate into more "growthy" sectors.

Generally, Fidelity funds have a $0 min. Likewise, Schwab offers 60 house funds (Schwab and Laudus) with no mins. In addition, Schwab offers nearly 3K outside funds at a $100 min, including 110 from T. Rowe Price. (All figures are for open, NTF funds)
Fidelity Screener
Schwab screener
If you like buying stocks or ETFs by the price instead of by the share, Fidelity lets you do this. Minimum purchase per security is $1. Other, smaller brokerages like Robinhood offer this as well, but with their payments for order flow, you'll likely get poorer execution. (There are additional concerns about these brokerages pushing trades because they make money based on the volume of trading.)
Two points: stick with name brand brokerages and funds, and focus on the investment and not on the minimums.
Of course this depends on your grandson, but for a first investment I might suggest a more traditional "growth and income" type of fund like a basic S&P 500 index fund (e.g. VOO or FXAIX) or an actively managed fund like PRBLX (through Schwab with a $100 min NTF).
On the one hand, a novice investor can get spooked by sizeable drops in value. On the other hand, as a long term investment, one leans toward equity. A hybrid fund like @P_F 's suggested VGSTX could also make sense if one wants to start off more conservatively.
An S&P 500 fund starts one off with a familiar name, adding (one hopes) a measure of comfort. Otherwise I'd suggest a total stock market index fund. The Parnassus fund is a fine long term actively managed vehicle, with a socially conscious bent as an added plus.

Hi @Donna,
Not a suggestion ... Just what I'm doing for my grandaughter. However, this concept might be of some help.
I have my 18 month old granddaughter in AMECX, CAIBX, ANCFX and SMCWX at American Funds, The min. for each fund is $250.00. I make quarterly gift contributions to her account splitting the money evenly. Her mutual fund distributions pay to AFAXX which is a money market fund to accumulate until they become invested into ABALX which is a balanced fund. In this way she will have an awarness of just how much interest, dividends and capital gain distributions play in the overall sucess of investing. I'm thinking over time ABALX will become larger that the first four starting funds by the time she becomes 21 (age of majority).
Even though this is invested conseratively it is up better than 8% over the past rolling year. At her age and with the many years she has ahead I feel a conserative steady as you go approach is the wise one over an agressive growth portfolio that will have, at times, some good volatility associated with it. This might lead one into trading over staying invested for the long term.
I became an investor as a teenager at age 12 (1960). I started investing with some money my great grandparents gifted to me. And, it was put into Franklin Income (FKINX). My father's broker told me that this fund will give you some exposure to income generation (put a little gingle in your pocket if you wish) and also give you exposure to both stocks and bonds as well. It will be a good fund for you to build a base from and help you to understand the facets of investing. My next fund that I ventured into was American Funds Income Fund of America (AMECX) during my early twenties as I was learning don't put all you eggs in one basket, by this time. Today, these two funds are my largest holdings within my portfolio now just short of fifty funds split among twelve investment sleeves. I went the conserative route in the beginning and branched out from there. Now stock market volatility is viewed, by me, as a buying opportunity. While some run and sell ... I am a buyer even at the age of 72. I bought during the past market swoon and now that stocks have recovered I have been selling into the now present market strength.
If you wish to view how the asset allocation, of my grandaughter's portfolio bubles, or any of the other suggestions that has been made, below is a link to Morningstar's Instant Xray analysis tool. It's a good tool to learn how to use.
https://www.morningstar.com/instant-x-ray
Just enter the ticker symbols and amount invested in each fund then press Xray and the Portfolio Xray analysis will appear. For my granddaughter, I felt it wise to mix some income generation funds on the income side with some value and growth stocks funds on the equity side. Sometimes, with the income generation that protfolios produce keeps folks invested. My late father had a saying ... "Income never goes out of style." Thus far, in my lifetime, he has been correct.
Your grandson can follow his portfolio through M*'s portfolio manager which is another tool I use.
My best wishes to you and your grandson in starting this endeavor. It is something that he can begin small and build upon through his lifetime. In the years to come he will remember ... this is something my grandmother got me started me on. And, give thanks that you did.
Old_Skeet
edited on 7/23/2020

Dear friends,
I wanted to share the sad news of passing of Dowe Bynum (1978-2020) last Friday. Dowe, half of Cook & Bynum, was diagnosed with brain cancer about three years ago. (I still remember standing in the Cedar Rapids airport one evening, and taking a call from David Hobbs who wanted to share the diagnosis with us. They knew, even then, that it was very serious.) As you might imagine, his illness deeply affected his family, his friend and partner, and their firm. I have extended our condolences, through the folks at Cook & Bynum, to Emily and their three children.
I wish them, and you, peace.
David