Demand is bouncing back in China and stimulus packages being unleashed across the developed world promise to transform the long-term outlook -- particularly with spending on copper-intensive green energy infrastructure. The coronavirus has also disrupted mines and delayed new builds, throttling current and future supply.
“Copper is coming out of this crisis differently,” Bintas said by phone from Geneva. “When lockdowns were eased and people started to return to work, we were surprised to see our customers not only taking deliveries of volumes they’d already bought, but requesting more to cover themselves in case there were any further disruptions to supply.”

https://bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-06-10/new-king-of-copper-trading-sees-demand-coming-back-even-stronger?sref=g4EhC0E7
Do investors see GLFOX (Infrastructure funds ), VGPMX (Natural Resources/Precious Metals) funds and even VWO (VEIEX) (which seems to move when PMs move up & down with NR/PM) working again?
Next stimulus bill should include infrastructure projects.
Pro's & Cons for infrastructure stimulus:
case-against-infrastructure-stimulus
stimulus-checks-infrastructure-phase-four

Hi guys,
Hope all is well with you and yours.
On today's walk, the Dukester was kinda chatty. He said, "Pudd, do you know how many funds you sold since the end of last year?" I said, "no." He said, "A baker's dozen." I said, "This time I am gonna do something different." Trying to limit losses by selling instead of just riding it out. And, of course, buying at lower levels with the cash and dry powder we had. Trying to manage the losses so as not to lose as much.....to get back to 0 quicker. So, of course, the next question was, "Did it work?" I said, "I don't know......I'll never know. We're down 3.3% right now as of today. I can only say I hope it helped a little." The buys were the big help. Also did some buying yesterday.....held my nose while doing it. Bought FMIJX. It's my worst fund.....now down 11%. Also bought GLFOX. Playing Euro stimulus plans. I think our market is overbought. Saying that, I will say this again just for laughs and giggles: months back, I wrote down June 19 on a paper. Someone said (from the VIX) high 90 days or so.....you will get a correction. So something to watch for.
God bless
the Pudd

I don't know enough to fool with any of the default settings.
These were the standouts.
GLFOX hits 7.03% at the 10th percentile.
DODGX at 5.36. Which was better than VDIGX 2.51 or VEIRX 2.65. Shoot. DODIX is at 2.82
NBGNX at 5.26%
FDFAX at 5.48
FBIOX at 4.15. By this test perhaps I should have held onto VGHCX instead of selling it, and splitting it between FBIOX and FSMEX. But I wanted to get away from the providers in their portfolio.
PRBLX is at 5.26%. So I'll keep that on my watch list.
Thanks for the link Bee. I'm not sure what I learned though. My plan is to spend down the IRA completely anyway. I hope to leave the taxable to the kids.

@Charles - you mentioned "Our friend Junkster always touted the importance of having predefined "exit" criteria. He was/is a day trader so he watches for instabilities typically in price movements of what he calls "tight channel" funds. If he sees them, he exits the trade.
Others like Meb Faber practice trend following ... when price drops below say the 10-mo running average, they exit their position, either to cash or something (thought) safer."
Then asked "So curious if any on the board practice, in disciplined fashion, such techniques?
And, perhaps even more curious of whether buy-and-hold investors, especially retired ones, EVER think of exiting. Or, is it always just about re balancing?"
Tough questions but I'll try. NO I do not ever think about exiting. I'm pretty much all invested 99% of the time. While accumulating it was 95/5 figuring that SS would cover my wild abandon. Once retired I drifted down to roughly 75/25 by swapping some REIT's for PCI and PDI. MY portfolio is primarily a mix of individual dividend growth stocks and a handful of equity CEF's for income, PIMCO bond CEF's + IOFIX and 5 mutual funds BIAWX, GLFOX, MGGPX, POAGX and VLAAX. I do hold a pittance in SFGIX but I'm not sure why, maybe in case it ever becomes unstuck from it's funk. It is hard to apply the techniques I use across all holdings equally so I use certain ones for certain types.
I pretty much never touch the mutual funds. That's what I hired their managers for.
Likewise the bond holdings although I do check them occasionally trying to follow Junksters lessons along with a weekly MACD signal. I won't get into what it's all about suffice to say that MACD is an indicator used in technical analysis to identify aspects of a security's overall trend. Most notably these aspects are momentum, as well as trend direction and duration. MACD uses moving averages (trend lines and duration) and plots that difference between the two lines as a histogram which oscillates above and below a center Zero Line. The histogram is a good indication of a security's momentum and so I watch for crossovers signalling buying when moving up from a trough or selling from a peak. Ideally I'd check them more often than I do but I try to pretend I have a life away from watching market action so sometimes I'm behind the curve unless price action screams at me.
My equity holdings are also rarely touched because most were bought during previous market debacles and now have considerable capital gains even after this current hosing. If I found suitable similar replacements I might swap them. Or not.
With these holdings, in addition to the MACD signal I also watch the RSI and the Chaikin Money Flow indicators. Again I am never on top of these 100% of the time but I check them occasionally and whenever Mr. Price beats on me. I use RSI to identify the general trend and watch for divergence especially from overbought or oversold conditions.
The Chaikin Money Flow tells the real story of how much demand there is for a stock whether positive or negative. The concepts of divergences comes into play here as well. If money flow starts to fall while price is rising, then the price will generally follow downward soon. Again, a change in money flow is a signal that something is about to change with price. The weekly and monthly tell you the real big money trend and I want to be on the side of the big money. A day trader could use daily I suppose.
Anyway, in this current meltdown all things seemed to have suffered equally so I see no reason to play with rebalancing and frankly I never look at my portfolio and think that I should. Crazy right? But my portfolio works for me and was planned out to do what I needed it to do which was to provide me with enough income to cover my modest needs along with a little extra to play with. To date I have only had one holding that suspended their dividend (can you say lucky) but I fear that we may be just in the first few innings of this game. Good luck out there.

Right there with you Starchild. It and GLFOX are the only ones I own at a 9:1 ratio.

Hi Gary,
Yeah, I think we'll do good as long as the market goes up. I saw on Fido they added more info to the fund page. I like that. Also I own GLFOX in that space. Have for years. Looks like they don't clash too much as far as which countries they invest in.
God bless
the Pudd

I've used two for some time now, MGGPX a world fund and GLFOX a sector fund mentioned by WABAC which M* categorizes as a US Infrastructure fund but it's mostly not. I would love to hear the logic behind that placement.

It's mostly foreign, and classified as an infrastructure sector fund based in the US, just as MGGPX is a US Fund World Large Stock fund, i.e. a US based global fund.

What types of firms do infrastructure funds invest in?
Infrastructure funds primarily invest in energy, industrial, utilities, and telecom firms that hold long-duration assets that generate stable cash flows. Examples include toll road operators, pipeline firms, airports, cell tower owners, and electric and gas utilities.
What are the general traits of infrastructure funds?
Prior to the creation of the infrastructure category, most of the funds were classified as world-stock funds. Typically, these funds have about a 30% to 50% allocation in U.S. stocks with the remainder invested in firms domiciled in the developed world. These funds, on average, tend to exhibit lower beta relative to the market.

https://www.morningstar.com/articles/751882/growing-fund-choices-spur-4-new-categories

I've used two for some time now, MGGPX a world fund and GLFOX a sector fund mentioned by WABAC which M* categorizes as a US Infrastructure fund but it's mostly not. I would love to hear the logic behind that placement.

Nice list.
I sold all my Asian stuff. Too much excitement in that part of the world.
You might consider Lazard Global Listed Infrastructure GLFOX for a sector fund. Their definition of infrastructure seems a little broader than others. But it's a stable fund with a good dividend:

It invests at least 80% of its assets in equity securities of infrastructure companies, which consist of utilities, pipelines, toll roads, airports, railroads, ports, telecommunications and other infrastructure companies, with securities listed on a national or other recognized securities exchange.

The rating system used here calls it a Great Owl.
Grandeur Peak International Stalwarts GISYX is another small/mid growth fund. Dodge and Cox has a large world fund DODWX, and a large international fund DODFX. All three funds are low cost for their categories. I don't know if they're owls are not.

As noted before, often you don't need to rewrite the URL. Just put your ticker into the search box and it will (usually) take you to the brokerage page for your desired fund. For example, a search works for VFIAX or GLFOX but not for the institutional class GLIFX.
The modified URL does work for the latter share class though.
http://financials.morningstar.com/fund/purchase-info.html?t=GLIFX
https://mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/comment/117849/#Comment_117849

Hi Catch,
Thanks for the info. The muni thing.....just trying to do better than mm. Have bought TRBUX in that space. carew388 liked it also. Lots of quality stuff. Thanks for the Q update. Will use it in November thread.
New buys are: FSENX (down 2.6% today, so got some); also bought MLPFX and added to GLFOX. The chart is looking good. Might sell some healthcare soon the way it's running. Will try to pick some up later.....near elections, when it's cheaper.....hopefully.
God bless
the Pudd

@Puddnhead: I got out of GLFOX several months ago. 3 of top 6 positions are Italian, and the bulk of the fund's holdings are in European equities with negative YTD performance.
I took profits in DBC last week as commodities seem to have paused, though I could be wrong.

Hi guys!
Last week sold half my PONAX thanks to Italy. My thinking is I should have sold all of it. Also sold some GLFOX yesterday. Really disappointed in it. So, right now, am raising cash and waiting.
God bless
the Pudd

I'd add that semi-odd-duck GLFOX has started to show some signs of life after a rare period of underperformance. Classed as infrastructure, half utes, half industrials, 3/4 Europe, 30% midcaps ... It's US$ hedged, so the flattening out of the buck likely has something to do with the very recent uptick.

Rockstars: PCI & PDI
Holding above water: FCNTX, POAGX and PRGTX but that may have more to do with tech's run-up so far this year
Puzzling surprise: GLFOX. Down the most YTD at a time when I thought infrastructure might finally find some footing.

Hi guys!
Added a little to FTIPX and MAPIX on Friday. Also opened a small position in THOPX. I seem to be in a fund collecting mode again.....damn it. Looking over the portfolio.....some good things: BTBFX, PARMX, WAMVX did well I thought. Many did poorly, though not a surprise. The worst were RAANX, MAPIX, GLFOX, FSHCX and FLPSX. Moving on to other things.....lower dollar better for overseas holdings, yes? More U.S. debt means more dollars in the world, yes? Means lower dollar, yes? Also good for exports, right? Not so good for imports - China, Japan, South Korea, yes.
So, my next question is: could the world slow down because of this? My thinking is yes. Could we, instead of China, now be exporting deflation to the world with a weaker dollar? STOP! I need a longneck. This is getting deep. I'm trying to make this simple---we are importing inflation and exporting deflation like China did a few years ago, no? I know you guys are saying interest rates are going up. Yeah, but.....I think not so much cause we have the highest rates already...... and too high and everything will tank, no? So, saying all that ..... is this a double bottom we're looking at or a new lower level in the market? As things might have changed. More thoughts later......
God bless
the Pudd

I'd owned GLFOX for a few years, until it began to lose momentum middle of last year, then sold it and put the $ into ARTGX.
If I still had it in the port, I'd think about holding at least some of the position for now to see what happens in the near term. The U.S. rate train has slowed a bit in the past few days, and the dollar's come out of its funk (temporarily?), coinciding with a small bump up in GLFOX. I'd also look into what exactly is happening with euro markets, sectors, currency, and rates, which I'm not following closely right now. The currency hedge has certainly been a big downer for the fund over the past year.
Given the latest developments, it's possible it might turn into a buy sometime in the near future. An alternative to sell-all or hold-all would be to trim on this uptick, see how it plays out, and re-enter full position size if it breaks to the good ... sort of a hedged wait-and-see.

@Mark: I knew someone on the board held GLFOX. Thanks for chiming in. I am always looking for other ways to play infrastructure. FIW has done well in water. Will check out UTF.

Since December GLFOX’s chart has fallen off a cliff, and this after a long period of out performance. M* mentions lots of $ coming in recently, but doesn’t say it negatively. However, I wonder if a fund with 5.6 B in assets invested primarily in European infrastructure has become just too concentrated. Some of the companies held (there are only about 30 in all) have declined as much as 20% YTD, not a storm that felt anything like perfect to me. BTW, I’ve already voted, but I thought I’d still seek reaction.

GLFOX is on the chopping block - The Trump effect had little positive impact on this Global Infrastructure fund since the election.

Top 1/3 (34/99) over the past year (though dismal YTD). Here I am, again sounding like a broken record: this fund is currency hedged, so it will underperform as the dollar sinks. A likely event with Mnuchin talking down the dollar.
I unwind taxable positions slowly. It takes me a long time to decide to give up on a fund, and even then, I'm just as likely wrong as right. Some funds never regain their "magic", others do as conditions change. So far, GLFOX wouldn't even be on my sell list - a few (really) bad months under adverse conditions don't tell me its best days are past. Though my thinking is more oriented toward broad based funds and not sector funds. One might want to rotate out of a sector regardless of how good or bad an individual fund is.
As a long term investor, for me it's not so much a matter of taking losses as minimizing gains. So I sell just the highest cost shares at first, gradually selling more if a fund continues to prove to be past its prime.
I just liquidated one fund (at the beginning of 2018) that had continued to underperform. Yet another fund I own (and had sold some of the higher cost shares), has come back to 4 stars, meaning that it's outperformed recently (to recover its stars) and even long term has provided solid returns.
If the market takes a nosedive and I do have underwater shares in a fund on my "unwind" list, I sell them quickly, but in order to swap into a preferable fund, not to hold cash. I don't try to time these things.