Do you folks think this is a new fierce-bull market rally or just a W recovery in hiding, will DOWS JONES reach 15k by end of summer, or 26.3k???

I know exactly what will happen. The Dow will reach 26123 next week. Then, it will go to 24652 a week later. Then 22521 and finally 27365.
Wait, it was a dream
I sold before the crash, then made some successful trades in stock ETF + CEFs, back to be fully invested in bond OEFs after about 5 weeks, and continue to make money.
I write my portfolio results every week and so far in 2020 I was up every week except one where I lost -0.2%. Life is good. In the last 3 years, I never lost more than 1% from any last top.

Just added nine new evaluation periods to MultiSearch and Portfolios tools, as described here.
I'm finding the new period quite helpful. Thank you @WABAC!

These are all global equity funds. I suppose they are all sort of "allocation" funds in the sense that they allocate their holdings between foreign and domestic stocks. But that's not what's claimed on the page:

These funds seek capital appreciation by investing in a variety of asset classes including equities and bonds from emerging and developed markets across the globe.

The largest fund by AUM on the site's global allocation list is VTIBX. Not global (pure international), not allocation (pure bond). Your guess is as good as mine.
Regarding "what's in a name", these funds could not call themselves global allocation funds. The SEC would be all over them for misleading names.
The author really did intend to say that these are the top (best) funds in some class (though we're not really sure what class that is): "we select the top three funds with the highest one-year trailing total returns."
He goes on to say that BGAFX, with its 1.15% ER is cheap, relative to its peers (like VTIBX?). Well sure, if one compares this with class C (embedded level load) shares of other funds. That's precisely what he's doing.
The second fund on its top three list is PRJCX. That comes in a noload class Z, with a 0.94% ER available NTF at Schwab. The third fund is another C class share: MSOPX. The A class shares of MGGPX are available NTF at many brokerages, and cost 1.23%, compared with the 1.95% ER (including level load) of the C shares.

@sma3, @Mark I'm certainly inclined to agree (and I'm betting that way, my cash level is much higher than I'd like it to be) but at least two pretty brilliant center left economists (Paul Krugman in Bloomberg, Jason Furman in Politico) think a V shaped recovery is very possible.

Hi @rforno & @sma3, Thanks for making comment.
I've been trolling through some commodity strategy funds and find Blackrock's commodity strategy fund of interest. It uses both equities and futures to gain its exposure to commodities.
Investment Approach
Invests in two strategies, approximately equally. One strategy focuses on commodity-linked derivatives, the other focuses on equity investments in commodity-related companies, including mining, energy and agricultural companies.
Exposure Breakdowns
Sectors as of 30 April-2020
Name / Equity Exposure / Commodity Index Related Instruments*/ Total / Benchmark
Energy / 9.84% / 10.68% / 20.52% / 21.07%
Agriculture /20.92% / 19.23% / 40.15% / 37.94%
Industrial Metals / 13.36% / 9.39% / 22.75% / 18.53%
Precious Metals / 5.19% / 11.39% / 16.58% / 22.46%
TOTAL / 49.31% / 50.69% / 100.00% / 100.00%
Below is the funds link
https://www.blackrock.com/us/individual/products/227413/blackrock-commodity-strategies-class-a-fund
BCSAX is the commodity straegy fund that I am currently leaning towards purchasing. The above link takes you to the A share fund details; however, the fund is available, for purchase, in other fund share classes as well. It would have been nice to buy this fund at its 52 week low ($5.08) as it is now at $6.22.

Some additional info about reasons for the name change ...
https://www.artisanpartners.com/content/dam/documents/press-releases/mf/Thematic-Fund-Name-Change-and-Anniversary-27-May-2020-vR.pdf

Just received an email about the fund closing:
May 27, 2020
Dear Fellow Investors,
We are announcing today that the Grandeur Peak International Stalwarts Fund (GISYX/GISOX) will close to new investors through intermediary platforms after June 10, 2020. The Fund will remain open to existing investors. Retirement plans and financial advisors with existing clients in the Fund will still be able to invest in the Fund for existing as well as new clients as long as their clearing platform will allow this exception. The Fund will remain open to new investors who purchase directly from Grandeur Peak Funds.
The International Stalwarts Fund recently reached $1 billion under management, and the investment strategy in total is now roughly $2 billion. As you know, we carefully review capacity at the firm level and strategy level. We are committed to keeping all of our investment strategies small enough to be able to fully pursue their investment strategies without being encumbered by either their individual asset base or the firms’ collective asset base. Achieving performance for our clients will always be our paramount objective.
The International and Global Stalwarts Funds will reach their five-year anniversary this September. When we launched the Stalwarts Funds, we talked about capacity across the Stalwarts line being in the $5-7 billion range given the Stalwarts’ focus on more liquid SMid-cap (Small- and Mid-cap) companies. We also hoped that the Stalwarts Funds would therefore be able to stay open to clients longer than many of our small/micro-cap funds. We are moving the International Stalwarts strategy to soft closed to protect existing investors’ continued access to the Fund.
We have been very encouraged by the performance of the Stalwarts Funds and the value they have added to our collaborative research process over the last 4½ years (click here for Fund performance). We are excited to have recently added the US Stalwarts Fund to the Stalwarts line. The Global Stalwarts and US Stalwarts funds both remain open to new and existing shareholders. Part of the decision to close the International Stalwarts Fund is to preserve space for future assets in the Global Stalwarts strategy. Managing “sister” funds like the three Stalwarts Funds allows us to provide investment opportunities to a diverse breadth of investors.
Thank you for your continued interest and trust. If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out to me or a member of our Client Relations Team.

CE funds can do the same thing, but the problem for some investors is they don't like the discounts they trade at to NAV. There is also an agency problem with CEs in that investors' capital is permanent and thus "trapped" in the fund unless investors are willing to accept the discounted price the CE's shares trade at on the market. Managers who are greedy for fees take advantage of the trapped capital and collect fees regardless whether the fund does well or poorly. The interval fund solves the problem by allowing shareholders to redeem their shares at their full underlying NAV value, albeit slowly--5% of assets per quarter--so it doesn't require much forced selling on the manager's part. Unfortunately, most regular CEs employ leverage too. Sometimes that works in a bull market. Other times it's disastrous. And many funds also collect fees on the leveraged assets, creating that conflict of interest where the manager is incentivized to employ leverage to collect fees on a larger asset base.

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/915802/000139834420011509/fp0054235_497.htm
497 1 fp0054235_497.htm
FINANCIAL INVESTORS TRUST
SUPPLEMENT DATED MAY 27, 2020 TO THE SUMMARY PROSPECTUS AND PROSPECTUS FOR THE GRANDEUR PEAK INTERNATIONAL STALWARTS FUND (THE “FUND”) DATED AUGUST 31, 2019
Effective as of the close of business on June 10, 2020, the Fund will close to new investors, except as described below. This change will affect new investors seeking to purchase shares of the Fund through third party intermediaries subject to certain exceptions for financial advisors with an established position in the Fund and participants in certain qualified retirement plans with an existing position in the Fund. The Fund remains open to purchases from existing shareholders, and to new shareholders who purchase directly from Grandeur Peak Funds.
The Fund retains the right to make exceptions to any action taken to close the Fund or limit inflows into the Fund.
INVESTORS SHOULD RETAIN THIS SUPPLEMENT FOR FUTURE REFERENCE
******* From GP website: International Stalwarts has Total Net Assets as of 5/26/2020:$1 Billion

Cannot envision the current high unemployment figure to improve in the 3 or perhaps 6 months. There are companies that are reducing pay to those they retain just to stay afloat.
https://msn.com/en-us/money/markets/salaries-get-chopped-for-many-americans-who-manage-to-keep-jobs/ar-BB14EOHQ?li=BBnbfcN
@sma3, think you are taking the right approach to preserve capital.

This week’s edition will focus on global allocation funds. These funds seek capital appreciation by investing in a variety of asset classes including equities and bonds from emerging and developed markets across the globe. These funds typically come with a basket of mixed market cap equities across different sectors.
https://mutualfunds.com/news/2020/05/26/trending-three-top-performing-global-allocation-funds/?utm_source=MutualFunds.com&utm_campaign=dbe5abc6d1-MF_newsletter_engage_all_may_6_2020_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_83e106a88d-dbe5abc6d1-295927797

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/935015/000119312520152307/d895980d497.htm
497 1 d895980d497.htm ARTISAN PARTNERS FUNDS, INC.
Filed pursuant to Rule 497(e)
File Nos. 033-88316 and 811-08932
ARTISAN PARTNERS FUNDS, INC.
Artisan Thematic Fund
(the “Fund”)
SUPPLEMENT DATED 27 MAY 2020
TO THE FUND’S PROSPECTUS AND STATEMENT OF ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
DATED 1 FEBRUARY 2020
Effective 27 May 2020, the name of Artisan Thematic Fund is changed to Artisan Focus Fund.
Accordingly, each reference in Artisan Partners Funds’ prospectus and statement of additional information to Artisan Thematic Fund is hereby replaced with Artisan Focus Fund.
PLEASE RETAIN THIS SUPPLEMENT FOR FUTURE REFERENCE

Bond Investors Are Better Off in ‘Interval Funds.’ Here’s Why. - Lewis Braham
“In the world of bond funds, one major underappreciated risk is the liquidity imbalance that exists between funds and their shareholders. Traditional bond mutual funds and ETFs must provide their shareholders with daily liquidity—in other words, investors must be able to withdraw any part or all of their investment on any day. That’s a mismatch to what the funds own, such as bonds that can have maturities of up to 30 years, or bonds that don’t trade daily.”
By Lewis Braham, Barrons May 25, 2020
https://www.barrons.com/articles/bond-investors-are-better-off-in-interval-funds-heres-why-51590152400
(Good luck with above link. Better idea - Buy a copy of Barron’s or subscribe. Amazon lets you cancel digital subscriptions anytime.)
There seems to be an increasingly loud chorus of premonitions concerning bond funds of late. I’ve taken the liberty of adding a couple warning shots from two other seasoned observers. Notwithstanding: Lewis’s article is unique and approaches the issue from a different direction.
- - - Plague Investing - Ed Studzinski
“So, for your investable assets, I am sticking with my recommendation for a barbell strategy. For fixed income, limit yourselves to short-duration, short-maturity investments where the funds are managed by experts who have been doing real credit analysis for years. You can find them by paying attention to the reviews that David has written. These situations are to be differentiated from those fixed income funds run by generalists who did things based on rating spreads in quality rather than real analysis. They are nothing more than high-yield tourists.”
Edward Studzinski - Mutual Fund Observor May 3, 2020
- - - What You Don't See Might Be What You Get - Bill Fleckenstein
“ (For) those who have any bond funds, you have to be very careful unless they are all government bonds, because there's a lot of garbage in these funds and a lot of the credits -- which were probably overrated to begin with -- have certainly now deteriorated.
Thanks to one of our longtime readers, who runs a bond shop, and pointed out what happens when these funds see redemptions, which is that the most liquid bonds tend to get sold first, and they also tend to be the highest quality. In his words:
‘Without any change in investment strategy, such investors are left with a portfolio of assets that can be very different to the same portfolio at the time of investment … It is imperative for investors to ensure that they are not left in funds that are deteriorating in asset quality due to such redemptions.’
So, any of you in bond funds need to make darn sure that you know what you own. If you don't, it might be a good time to exit stage left.“
Fleckenstein Capital .com (Subscription Required) Excerpted from March 26, 2020 edition
https://www.fleckensteincapital.com/home.aspx
“In the tranquilly resounding corner, listening to the echoing footsteps of years” - Charles Dickens

I have no idea which direction the market's going and neither does anyone else. The S&P 500 crossed its 200 day moving average, potentially signaling more market gains. IF these gains hold, small caps have traditionally done well coming out of recessions. I've been dca'ing into WAMCX which has been one of the few small caps funds to do well this year. I've also continued dca'ing into PRGTX, PRMTX and AKREX. Best of luck John!

I have discussed D&C inferior risk/reward. I would not select any of their funds.
Why would I look what DODGX did since the bottom?
YTD...VFIAX(SP500) is at -7.8% while DODGX is at -20.2%
One year...VFIAX 5.5%...DODGX-10.9%
3 year........VFIAX 9.4%...DODGX 1.4%
VFIAX continues to beat DODGX for 5-10-15 years and with better SD, Sharpe,Sortino. See 15 years PV(link). How long can you underperform + have higher volatility and claim that you are OK because you can't compare DODGX to the SP500?
For moderate allocation, I would look at PRWCX,VLAIX. VLAIX has more mid-cap and higher rated bonds so owning both is a good choice.
For conservative allocation, VWIAX/VWINX is a good choice.

I'm less concerned about a bear market than about having maybe missed my chance to deploy my dry powder. When I decide to stop waiting and pull the trigger, I'll let you all know -- it'll be a sign that we've hit the top.
Jason Furman, Obama's former top economist, says the early data is showing a V-shaped recovery, though of course that would change if we have a second wave. On his Twitter feed, he also notes that federal stimulus so far has been equal to 30% of GDP.

@davidrmoran - Here’s what I get this morning looking at Yahoo Finance (cross-checked NAV with MarketWatch). My mathematical skills are always suspect, so others may have a better way to compute DODGX’s gain.
Closing price DODGX 3/20/2020: $122.40
Closing price: Friday, May 22, 2020: $151.57
Increase in NAV: +23.81%
Dividend paid March 26: $2.80 per share
Increase including dividend: Approximately 26%
If the above doesn’t satisfy, try running the numbers from the next trade-date, Monday March 23, when DODGX closed at $118.38
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/DODGX/performance/
-
@Davidrmoran said: “Second, what's the goldenness from early Jan 09 onward ” They lag SP500 hugely to date “ David, I’m not sure whether you purposely misrepresented my remark or perhaps, I needed to add some additional qualifiers to the statement. I thought that within the context, it was concrete enough. As you are no doubt aware, comments like that need to be considered in light of the context in which they appear.
The whole point I was making is that D&C funds tend to have erratic (roller coaster) patterns of performance. So, my comment “when they rocketed back to the top of the herd beginning in 2009, they became the golden boys once again” was meant to refer to another sharp reversal in performance which lasted several years. Obviously, that “golden boys” moniker no longer applied in recent years. If it had, we wouldn’t be discussing a remark like @Shostakovich‘s “in light of some of the controversy here around D&C funds”. You don’t see that during the hot performance periods.. More likely, people are asking whether thay can buy D&C funds NTF.
“S&P 500”? Where did that come in? I thought we were discussing actively managed funds.
No dispute that if you could buy past performance, the S&P500 would be a better investment than most actively managed funds - at least since sometime in the ‘90s. I suspect by now that’s included in high school history books.

Hi @kings53man,
Just wondering what your overall asset allocation might be? Cash 10% ... Fixed (income) ? ... Equity (stocks) ?
I have been retired now for more than five years. My basic asset allocation is 20/40/40 which I can overweight the income area and equity area by 5% each should I feel warranted. Currently, I'm at 15% cash, 40% income and 45% equity. Since, the yield on cash is in the 1% range (or less) I'm thinking of raising my income allocation to 45% and reducing cash to 10% as my CD's mature. The last CD I had mature, a week or so ago, I rolled into three good generating income funds with a package yield of a little better than 4%. The three fund package consisted of BLADX, FLAAX & PFANX.
Here is more on how I roll now in retirement.
Old_Skeet's All Weather Asset Allocation.
My all weather asset allocation of 20% cash, 40% income and 40% equity affords me everything necessary to meet my needs now being in the distribution phase of investing. The benefit of this asset allocation is that it provides sufficient income, maximizes diversification, minimizes volatility, and provides long-term returns.
The 20% held in cash area provides me ample cash should I need a cash draw over and above what my portfolio generates plus it can provide the capital necessary to fund a special investment position (spiff) should I choose to open one during a stock market pullback. In addition, cash helps stabilize a portfolio during stock market volatility. Example of investments held in this area are cash, money market mutual funds and CD's.
The 40% held in the income area provides me ample income generation to meet my income needs in retirement. It is a well diversified area that incorporates a good number of income generating type funds. Some examples of investments held in this area are BAICX, FLAAX & PONAX.
The 40% held in the equity area provides me some dividend income along with some growth, that equities generally provide, that offsets the effects of inflation, over time. Some examples of investments held in this area are IDIVX, NEWFX & SPECX
Generally, for my income distributions, I take no more than a sum equal to what one half of my five year average total return has been. In this way, principal grows over time. And, as principal grows the amount available for distribution does as well.

Will maintain current strategy as I learned from this down cycle. There is, however, another risk beyond cornoavirus such as trade war with China as it is gaining momentum. If it repeats as in late 2018 another double digits loss can resulted.
https://cnbc.com/video/2020/05/22/us-china-trade-tensions-are-a-bigger-risk-than-coronavirus-invesco.html
I don't agree with Hooper that the coronavirus risk is neutralized by QE's by the Fed. The current 14.7% unemployment number could go even higher even as lockdown eases across the country. Mails are open and there are few customers as many fear to venture out.

related
Where to look for higher yields without taking on unintended risk
johnN
5:37PM in Fund Discussions
https://www.azcentral.com/story/money/investing/2020/05/24/looking-higher-yields-try-convertible-securities-covered-calls/5251111002/
Where to look for higher yields without taking on unintended risk
NANCY TENGLER
As if we didn’t have enough economic trouble, unemployment has hit its highest rate since the Great Depression, small businesses are hanging on for dear life, and real (after inflation) interest rates are negative. This creates serious problems for savers and retirees who are relying on investment and savings income to live.
Couple of interesting ideas regarding HY vehicles discussed- stocks options, securities, bonds...
Thinking maybe add more JNK or ExxonMobil /GAP