Mak'in a list, check'in it twice...no, make that thrice..... Mak'in a list and check'in it thrice......with the understanding that "if" the "cliff" thing does not "burn down the house"; of course, which could be a non-event; as the Mayan calendar thing hits December 21 !!! Heck, congress and the White House folks may not have to make any final decisions, afterall.
I digress.
Account changes are likely coming to this house in early, 2013.
--- Current funds that will likely leave; and their monies having to find a new home:
DIHYX, FHIIX, PTTRX, ACITX, DGCIX, OPBYX, PLDDX and DPFFX
--- Existing funds that could receive some of these monies:
FAGIX, SPHIX, FINPX, FSICX, FNMIX, FRIFX
--- Existing funds that may be reduced or otherwise:
FTBFX, FBNDX
--- Funds in consideration (the short list)
PAUIX and/or PAUDX / PASDX, PMZDX or PMZIX
.......also building an equity list, which remains a work in progress, and likely more oriented towards U.S.
With only a bah-zillion choices, we should be finished by the end of February :) :
MACSX, SFGIX, GPGOX, GPGIX, ARTHX, ARTKX, FMIJX, VWINX, FBALX
Ok, that's it. Just writing "outloud".
'Course, your input is always welcomed for a house in retirement. Ya, we know; most folks consider our portfolio to be a bit "lite" on the pure equity side of life.
Take care of you and yours,
Catch
Grandchildren Reply to
@Charles: Howdy. I guess I'm thinking less of asset class performance here than of investor behavior. It looks like this might be a one fund portfolio or a few funds with relatively light supervision. And while the recipients are young, the time horizon isn't huge. Alpha hopes to bequeath these no later than the time that (the eldest?) recipients reaches 25. While WAMVX or
SFGIX (which I mention just because they represent my riskier non-retirement investments) might well be splendid choices for reasonably seasoned investors, for a small slice of a larger portfolio or for a black-box retirement portfolio with 20 years to grow, I was less sure of them as a grandparent's gift to a 20-something, "to do with as they like" (retire student debt, buy a home, start a family?).
But what do you do if the portfolio is small and likely to be static? I guess my first impulse is risk management. I keep thinking about the T Rowe Price research on asset allocation and risk. If you go from a conservative portfolio with 20% stock exposure to a balanced portfolio with 60%, two things happen: (1) your average annual returns increase by 1.9% from 7.4 to 9.3% and (2) your volatility explodes - you quadruple the number of losing years you'd expect to experience, you deepen your average loss in a losing year from 0.5% to 6.8% and you double your standard deviation. (That original study was 2004, of the period 1955-2003.)
And so that was the balance: if I thought I could get 7.4% and feel like my legacy (or my inheritance, depend on your perspective) was pretty secure, I'd take it.
As ever,
David
MBIA Slammed Today Down nearly 20% on news that BAC offered to buy up MBIA bonds, providing speculation that holding much of MBIA's debt would mitigate the anticipated settlement to MBIA in the on-going lawsuit.
And with it FAAFX dropped 6%.
Ouch.
Life with our hero can mean steep rises and falls over short periods. Here are YTD charts of the fund's three top holdings (MBI, AIG, SHLD), which make up 60% of positions:


Each experienced roller-coaster runs this year. I'm sure the MBIA comeback strategy is in play. After all, its book value is $20/share, isn't it?
Actually, nearly my whole portfolio was down today: RNSIX, WBMIX,
SFGIX, FAAFX, and DODBX. Only AQRIX did not sustain a daily loss.
Time for some Paso Robles' wine.
Seafarer Portfolio Review Reply to
@davfor: Right, got it. It'll be interesting when there's a significant correction, say like the one in 2011, before
SFGIX existed, to see how that all plays out.
Seafarer Portfolio Review Reply to
@AndyJ: I had noticed the two funds have had different exposures within their Asia/Pacific area investments. But those differences have yet to result in much difference in returns. Perhaps differences will show up if
SFGIX continues to diversify its regional exposures. But, perhaps the continuity in Foster's stock picking style will result in returns that continue to be quite similar to MAPIX. I suspect clear differences will emerge. I'm just watching to see if that really happens.
Seafarer Portfolio Review Reply to
@davfor: Just for general information, since it's possible to infer from your post that the funds are similar except for the percentage of Asia exposure,
SFGIX and MAPIX are significantly different funds even within their Asia & Pacific holdings. MAPIX is roughly 2/3 invested in developed markets, vs.
SFGIX at roughly 1/3. For Japan, it's 25% vs. 4%, and Australasia, it's 8% vs. 0%, respectively.
I've been surprised to see that MACSX, which I recall at least some of us were thinking is the most direct competitor to
SFGIX, is also much more heavily invested in developed markets ... like MAPIX, MACSX has about 2/3 of holdings there, with 8% in Japan and more than 11% in Australasia.
SFGIX, at least right now, really doesn't overlap all that much with the two "growth and income" Matthews funds. This has definitely changed my view of the fund, fairly recently.
Emerging Markets: Why So Many Funds Are Flawed Hey, good discussion topic, folks.
The argument as stated in the article parallels one of Andrew Foster's main investment theses at SFGIX.
My EM stock $ is all with Matthews and Seafarer, except for a small position in FEO, Aberdeen's EM 'balanced' CEF. FEO is pretty heavily invested in the global mega-caps; haven't followed it long enough to know if that's always the case ... but it's usually tilted a little toward Latin America and E. Europe, so is a geographic diversifier for this house's port.
MACSX is a little more of a large-cap fund, but MAPIX and SFGIX seem to be pretty much all-cap, so as long as I have $ in the latter two, I don't see a lot of need for a separate EM (or Asia-Pac) mid-small cap fund.
Emerging Markets: Why So Many Funds Are Flawed Interesting premise from the WSJ article...which appears to be that large cap names in the
BRICs can be a drag on performance.
It would be interesting to see any analysis of EM availability within 401(K) plans. My guess is that it is limited, and what would routinely be available falls into this category.
Personally, my 401(K) has one EM name...ODVYX (Oppenheimer Developing Markets). I own this, and am quite happy, but realize that it's big...$27B AUM, and thus has limited options outside of the LC space.
I have equal EM exposure outside of my 401(k) with a handful of names...Matthews (MACSX, MAPTX), Grandeur Peaks (GPGOX) and Seafarer (SFGIX).
I like the barbell of LC and divi payors along with small cap names. If I were to take a guess as to which fund would do the best over the next 10 years, I would say Grandeur Peaks...though it may not be considered a pure EM fund.
Seafarer Portfolio Review I have been tracking the performance of SFGIX against MAPIX, in which I have funds invested, since SFGIX opened for investment. So far, their performances have been quite similar. If SFGIX continues to increase its exposure away from Asia, I will be interested to see if their performances begin to diverge. That, or significant outperformance by SFGIX, will cause me to look seriously at making an investment in SFGIX.
Seafarer Portfolio Review The % ex-Asia continues to grow at SFGIX.
Huh? What the----- Asian bourses all closed way UP on Friday. I'm way too overweight in MAPIX, and also own SFGIX and MACSX, too. Everything, all my equity funds (not bonds: unchanged) was seriously DOWN today, along with my USA stuff. Someone, please tell me WHY? Thank you.
How Did I Miss This One? (Aberdeen Global Small Cap and a bit of a Seafarer discussion) SFGIX= top 2 %ile in cat. as of Sept. 30, 2012. Latest avail. on Y!
How Did I Miss This One? (Aberdeen Global Small Cap and a bit of a Seafarer discussion) Reply to
@MaxBialystock: Hi Max, "YTD" means for the year since January 1, as of the current date; so
SFGIX will never have a "YTD" performance figure for 2012. (It'd be nice if they computed a 6-month figure ... but that's readily DIY-doable from Yahoo historical price info.)