I will say that I don't think K-1's are much of an issue, especially with one or two that you can prepare or bring to your advisor. If you are getting 10 or 20 (and some people who are invested in a ton of MLPs for the income certainly do), then that may be problematic. The one annoyance is that they in many cases do arrive later - I had one last year that barely arrived by the tax deadline (not Brookfield.)
Brookfield - to me, at least - is a looong term holding and a large holding at this point. I like the infrastructure space a great deal and there is really nothing like Brookfield Infrastructure (BIP), in that you have a company that has global scope and the ability to be involved with many different kinds of infrastructure projects, as well as the flexibility to possibly buy infrastructure assets on the cheap if governments - local or otherwise - start having to sell assets to raise capital. In the meantime, the 4.5% yield is nice.

I entirely see potential danger in buying European stocks, especially for those who do not have a long-term time horizon (although I think one needs a long-term time horizon for a lot of investments these days.) Still, I'd rather own Euro-zone stocks than Euro-zone debt, though. As Marc Faber has said a couple of times: "Look at the history, for example, of Germany, for the last 100 years. They had World War I. They had the hyper-inflation in World War II. The bond-holders got wiped out three times. If you owned Siemens, and you still own Siemens today, it was not a fantastic investment, but at least you still have something. You were not wiped out. I think that in equities you will be better off because you have an ownership in a company, than by being the lenders to companies, and the lenders, especially, to governments." (http://www.zerohedge.com/article/marc-faber-i-think-we-are-all-doomed)
There was an article on Oakmark's Herro seemingly gleefully buying up European financials - it's too early and even if there was a recovery in these stocks, they have years of headwinds ahead of them. I'd rather buy things like industrials or consumer names that have been thrown out then financials. There could easily be a scenario where the financials have a lot further to go down.
I continue to think that this period will end badly, but I'd assign maybe a 15-20% chance that things could become " significantly unstable" (very elevated volatility, currency trouble, crash, etc.) Politically, things are a mess here and elsewhere - politicians certainly cannot be counted on. There are a few too many overly enamored with the Fed, as well - it will not be surprising if the Fed is turned to once again to paper over many of the realities of the underlying economy, but it'll be just another short-term fix that does not lead to anything long-term or sustainable. However, Bernanke's doctrine certainly shows his view, and we haven't really even gone through the entire doctrine's list yet. Europe is a mess and who knows how that will end - kicking countries out, break-up, etc.
As for more easing, you have the issue that many aspects of the economy become addicted to varying degrees to it. Caterpillar today: "The U.S. Federal Reserve's balance sheet expansion in the first half of 2010 benefited the economy, but those gains seem to be slowing. Banks are expanding credit at a moderate rate, but money growth is slowing. We have not detected much benefit to economic growth from the central bank's policy of lengthening the maturity of its securities.
Eventually, we expect the U.S. Federal Reserve will resume expanding its balance sheet, but not soon enough to benefit growth in 2012. (http://www.zerohedge.com/news/caterpillar-beats-estimates-lowers-guidance-blames-downbeat-outlook-china-strong-dollar-and-slo) We have major multinational corporations hinting rather strongly that they would like to see another QE.
I think a little attention should also be paid to the North - two deals with Chinese state-run oil companies for oil investments the other day, one of them quite large. One can debate the current status of the Chinese economy (and it definitely may be more problematic than it would appear), but whatever the situation is, it does not seem to have slowed the country down from venturing into Canada and Africa in search of resources and hard assets. When the Keystone pipeline was not approved, Canada essentially said they would find customers elsewhere, and it appears they continue to find customers in Asia. One can have issues with building an oil pipeline and that's fine, but China's persistence into resource countries shows that we live in a world where there is real demand for resources and other countries will be happy to step in if we do not.
Personally, I continue to move into hard assets, and have increased holdings in infrastructure, especially Brookfield Infrastructure (BIP), which has the flexibility to take advantage of things like the situation in Europe if individual infrastructure projects come up for sale. That is, however, an MLP and results in a K-1 at tax time. I also own a few other things that could take advantage of asset "sales" in Europe.
"Mrs. Merkel is really between a rock and a hard place, and her options are rapidly deteriorating. Even if they figured out how to disassemble the Euro without major problems (and they won't be able to do that)"
Germany leaves. They'd lose their export advantage, but the new Mark would be regarded with strength and they'd maintain purchasing power (and quite possibly even gain purchasing power vs current Euro levels). The remainder of the Eurozone would be kind of a mess, but the currency would drop, giving remaining countries some export advantage with a currency would probably drop to parity with the dollar quite quickly (or worse?).
Cheaper currency would encourage investment. That still doesn't fix the issue of solvency for many of the countries, whether the US or others would respond with intervention of the Euro dropped that far (as I've said before, the "pie" of the world has gotten smaller and everyone can't jump over everyone else to devalue to get an export advantage) or the fact that the world will likely remain a mess for a long time to come anyways, but Germany would no longer have to tend to its neighbors, which would cause economic issues at first but would also probably be politically popular with the German people, who don't seem to like having to bail out their neighbors constantly. The whole cheapening currency to gain exports is a short-term fix, as well, and a flawed approach without any actual substantial attempt to fix the underlying issues.
Who knows (although I do know I wouldn't go anywhere near European financials), just thinking out loud.
Additionally, as for the US, dropping gasoline demand during the busy driving season.
http://in.reuters.com/article/2012/07/24/us-usa-gasoline-demand-idINBRE86N18W20120724

this also calls for patient capital. searching for investable mistakes in a mutual fund setting when markets are down and investors withdraw funds is not possible. the managers are forced to sell at the bottom instead. this works in closed-fund and hedge-fund universe or with some patient institutional separate accounts.

Barron's: Well-Timed Entrance
Portfolio manager Dan Ivascyn led the Pimco Income fund to big gains by buying mortgage-backed securities after the financial crisis started. Why he likes Hilton bank loans and Gazprom bonds.
http://online.barrons.com/article/SB50001424053111904346504577531080010077836.html?mod=BOL_twm_fs

The letter's subject is active management is the search for mistakes. It is linked below for your reading enjoyment.
http://www.marketfolly.com/2012/06/howard-marks-active-management-is.html
Good Investing,
Skeeter

Barron's: Well-Timed Entrance
Portfolio manager Dan Ivascyn led the Pimco Income fund to big gains by buying mortgage-backed securities after the financial crisis started. Why he likes Hilton bank loans and Gazprom bonds.
Picking through the rubble of a financial crisis can have its rewards.
Five years ago, Pimco tapped Dan Ivascyn to run the new Pimco Income Fund, with the aim of providing sustainable dividends, as well as generating additional total return through capital appreciation. The native of Oxford, Mass., had worked in the asset-backed securities group at Bear Stearns prior to joining Pimco in 1998. By March 2007, when the fund (ticker: PONAX) launched on the eve of the global financial meltdown, its parent already had grown wary of mortgage bonds and had begun to cut its holdings of so-called nonagency mortgage-backed securities, or those issued by banks, rather than federal agencies like Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac.
Despite stumbling out of the gate with a loss of 5.95% in 2008, Pimco Income was able to pick up lots of bargain-priced bonds from desperate sellers and has gone on to achieve stellar annual returns of 18.64%, 19.96% and 5.95% in subsequent years, plus a second best-in-category 10.63% this year to date, according to Morningstar. It's done that with an expense ratio of 0.80%.
http://online.barrons.com/article/SB50001424053111904346504577531080010077836.html?mod=BOL_twm_fs

Reply to @MaxBialystock:
Per MWTRX's prospectus: PRINCIPAL INVESTMENT STRATEGIES
The Fund pursues its objective by investing, under normal circumstances, at least 80% of its net assets in investment grade fixed income securities or unrated securities that are determined by the Adviser to be of similar quality. Up to 20% of the Fund’s net assets may be invested in securities rated below investment grade. The Fund also invests at least 80% of its net assets plus borrowings for investment purposes in fixed income securities it regards as bonds. Under normal conditions, the portfolio duration is two to eight years and the dollar-weighted average maturity ranges from two to fifteen years. The Fund invests in the U.S. and abroad, including emerging markets, and may purchase securities of varying maturities issued by domestic and foreign corporations and governments. The Adviser will focus the Fund’s portfolio holdings in areas of the bond market (based on quality, sector, coupon or maturity) that the Adviser believes to be relatively undervalued.
Investments include various types of bonds and other securities, typically corporate bonds, notes, collateralized bond obligations, collateralized debt obligations, mortgage-related and asset-backed securities, bank loans, money-market securities, swaps, futures, municipal securities, options, credit default swaps, private placements and restricted securities. These investments may have interest rates that are fixed, variable or floating.
Derivatives will be used in an effort to hedge investments, for risk management, or to increase income or gains for the Fund. The Fund may also seek to obtain market exposure to the securities in which it invests by entering into a series of purchase and sale contracts or by using other investment techniques.
Don't know from this what pushes the turnover. As a compare, Gundlach's DBLTX fund, which is mostly mortgage stuff has a reported turnover of 15%.
I tend to agree with Investor as to turnover and what the managers choose to sell and replace with other issues.
PONDX, has a 311% turnover reported; but this fund uses lots of special tools, so this may be part of the turnover reporting, too.
If you are pleased that MWTRX fits your bill in this space of fund holdings, I would not be concerned about the turnover. Do your homework to match this fund with all others in this space.
Take care,
Catch

Yes, I'm not adding to my EM bonds or equity funds for the time being. As always, the EM piece is already too big a piece of my pie. I'm letting divs and cap gains ride and grow. I'm semi-retired, which means I'm unemployed, having taken retirement early. But I ENJOY money coming to me for doing....ummmm... NOTHING! Yes!!!

I own quite a bit of Brookfield Infrastructure (BIP), which I think is a particularly compelling and unique *literal* infrastructure play - it holds timber, toll roads, rail, ports and other real assets around the world. It is an MLP, but there's really nothing like it, and it pays a nice dividend. It has, however, run up a lot. Brookfield Infrastructure is a spin-off from parent Brookfield Asset Management (BAM), which I also own. I also have a small amount in Tortoise Capital (TTO), which is trying to transition to an infrastructure REIT.
As mutual funds go, I like this DWS fund quite a bit, with a pretty sizable amount in mobile and energy infrastructure.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-07-19/no-inflation-with-yields-at-record-low-bolstering-emerging-bonds.html
Bond yields in emerging markets are falling to record lows as inflation tumbles compared with benchmark interest rates, providing policy makers with more opportunities to lower borrowing costs.
The GBI-EM Global Diversified Index on emerging-market bond yields declined 79 basis points, or 0.79 percentage point, this year to 5.79 percent, the lowest since JPMorgan Chase & Co. started to compile the data in 2003. Consumer price increases in 15 developing nations from Brazil to China slowed to an average 4 percent last month, even as central banks cut the mean policy rate to 5.5 percent. The 1.5 percentage-point gap was the widest since December 2009, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Slower inflation and weaker economic growth will prompt policy makers to reduce interest rates further, spurring gains in developing-nation bonds, according to GAM Investment and JPMorgan Chase & Co. That’s a turnaround from four years ago, when inflation exceeded benchmark borrowing costs and investors fled emerging markets as the global economy sank into a recession.

Reply to @catch22: I misused the term though late Peter Bernstein's Book "Capital Ideas Evolving" discusses portable alpha and PIMCO Stocks Plus fund were also discussed during that discussion. Stocks Plus funds in PIMCO also invest in derivatives and invest the collateral in TIPS similar to Real Estate and Commodities fund.

I dunno if I am even able to describe for you how I've done what I've done. Due to work/career surprises, in one sense, I've always been reacting rather than planning, playing catch-up rather than being even ABLE to be sitting where I want to sit.... But we all live through all sorts of variables. I wouldn't be able to invest at all without being lucky. I've mostly been using inheritance and 403b money.
The 403b is gone, it's now in a Rollover IRA. To reduce tax burden, I have no Roth. I went with Traditional IRA, all the way. In the lowest tax bracket, there's no advantage to paying Uncle Sam NOW rather than later. (Trad. = tax deferred. Roth= pay now, but free-and-clear later, when you claim the money.)
In broad terms, I did a lotta homework, listened to the tv talking heads and read the guys who write on money. Barry Ritholtz is good, and Danielle Park, in Toronto. But along the way, you need to pick-up on the buzzwords and twist-phrases. These tv guests and hosts, and the writers mostly SEPARATE money from anything having to do with ethics. Money can be used for good purposes or it can be a tool to screw others. We're in a dirty game. The very nature of the Market is one-upmanship. Digest that fact, and move on, or else you'll just have to look on from the sidelines...
I became aware of the various niches which together, comprise the Market. I have maintained the KISS Principle. I never went into an investment too complex for me to understand how it worked. Using the information at hand, I created my own Big Picture of what's going on in the Macro sense. But that's just background, not the basis for particular fund choices. I looked and looked and looked at a million fund profiles at Morningstar, starting with those recommended here at MFO.
-Always go "no-load."
-When one particular sector is swooning, that's when to buy-in. I don't mean strange, complex, arcane derivatives. I mean, when the Western World is booming, like S & P, Dow Jones and Germany & England, more than likely, EM bonds will be drooping, so get in THEN.
-Don't try to predict tops and bottoms. You should have a long-term horizon anyhow.
-Babysit, but don't micro-manage your holdings. Watch them ride up and down. Hopefully up, overall. If you hold a fund for, let's say two years, and it has been a "dog" all along, dump it in favor of something else.
-Watch the PROPORTION of your holdings toward one another. Try not to let winners become so big that they become their own source of risk for you. If you have HALF of your stuff in a single fund, a bad day will make you sick to your stomach. But after all, if you're not going to need the money soon and you are generally satisfied with Fund X despite a one-day disaster, don't unload it just on the basis of one bad day.
These days, my biggest holding is in EM Bonds: PREMX. I won't be using the money for at least a couple of years, so I'm still reinvesting the dividends. (That's another thing. You want your money to grow? Re-invest all cap. gains and divs.)
Bonds are inherently less volatile than equities. PREMX never is down more than 3 cents or so in a day. So although it's way too big a portion of my stuff, I can live with it. You'll learn to make these kinds of judgment-calls for yourself, too.
...So, I'm told that I ought to cover these bases: Large Growth, Large Value, Mid-Growth and Value. Foreign. Domestic, safe bonds. Investment Grade FOREIGN bonds. EM bonds. you can find all sorts of categories. DO NOT attempt to cover all these bases using an approach that treats the whole investment process like baking a recipe. You'll NEVER get anywhere by covering all the bases, just in order to cover them all. In my case, here's what I've got covered;
1) Asia dividend-paying equities, bonds and convertibles through MAPIX and MACSX.
2) Asia gov't and corporate bonds through MAINX.
3) EM gov't and corporate bonds including a larger menu of countries through PREMX.
4) Domestic large-caps and bonds through MAPOX.
5) Domestic small-cap via MSCFX.
*I just recently sold PFE Pfizer for a nice profit.
For an amateur, I have become knowledgable enough to be dangerous. Know your limitations. Don't bet the farm on ANY single play. I will make a point here as I finish by specifying just ONE specific fund to stay away from: OAAAX. It carries a big front-end load, and over the last ten years, $10,000 would have today become $8,300.00. I rescued a friend's account from there and put him into TRP. I don't remember ANYONE in here ever offering a NEGATIVE recommendation, but there it is.
'Happy Motoring,' said the old Texaco Tiger...

Reply to @Pat_F:
We're holding the same hands, rnsix, vwinx, rphyx. I was introduced to rnsix, rphyx here at this forum for which I'm grateful, professor Snowball is on somewhat of a roll. Rphyx to address interest rate risk, something of a keen and to date mistaken concern for years. I tried a couple of real return multiasset funds launched by Doubleline and Loomis Sayles, both dismally failed to achieve their complex trading strategy objective of Libor plus a couple percentage points and were rolled into rnsix which succeeds with a gentle upward bias in up, down or sideways markets instead of down, down and down. That's a chunk of risk in a single fund somewhat lessened by three differing subportfolios managed by two separate fund groups. I've mentally reclassified rnsix as an alternative investment class because it actually accomplishes what real return funds propose to.
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?t=1y&s=RNSIX&l=on&z=l&q=l&c=MARYX+DMLIX&ql=1
Favorite buy and hold, VWINX FGBLX, consistent base hitters. Wellesley Income consolidates large cap blue chip dividend payers, a market sweet spot of late with intermediate term investment grade bonds. Fidelity Global Balanced congeals about four funds for diversification, 60/40 stocks/bonds, 50/50 domestic/int'l, dollar/nondollar, meeting or (scantly) exceeding its benchmark over trailing time frames ( MSCI World Index and the Citigroup World Govt. Bond Index using a weighting of 60% and 40%.)
Despite high turnover and the 1% expense ratio the team management somehow earns their keep. Also holding ffnox, Fidelity Four-in-One a cheap fund of index funds. These three funds, vwinx-fgblx-ffnox easily replace a dozen or more fund exposures in a world that is sadly ever more correlated anyway.
off-topic--watched all three parliamentary hearings of the grilling of the deposed Barclay's ceo,
chairman and the BOE contact and also the two Congressional inquiries of Mr. Dimon.
The English are so much better at english, packing a freightload of subtly and nuance into a single exquisitely crafted phrase with precision of meaning without hesitation.
The contrast, parliament/congress, was as a searing bbq to a marshmallow roast.
A differing view of the Libor mania--
http://brucekrasting.blogspot.com/2012/07/bloodletting.html
http://pragcap.com/why-is-no-one-freaking-out-about-the-libor-scandal
Interest rate manipulation, the real point--
http://www.cnbc.com/id/48167868
addendum--
The 4th parliamentary hearing, grilling the former Barclay's COO today.
As with any parliamentary or congressional hearing into past and present fiascos, whether an MF Global,
Lehman's, Moody's or JPM...Sgt. Schultz defense...saw nothing, knew nothing
when not pleading the 5th. I actually believe them, they didn't. Which is, if one
follows these show trial things going back to, say, the S&Ls..is the more condemning
but not most condemning. Most belongs to the inquirers who for decades revisit this Ground Hog Day of private gains/socialized losses and yet see nothing, know nothing.
http://www.parliamentlive.tv/Main/Player.aspx?meetingId=11255&wfs=true

Hi MikeM. Thinking there is an easy answer and tougher answer to your question.
Easy first. You would probably enjoy the article by Steve Goldberg entitled "Goldberg's Picks: 5 Best Low-Risk Stock Funds."
Here is link: http://www.kiplinger.com/columns/value/archive/goldberg-picks-best-low-risk-stock-funds.html
The five are: Sequoia Fund (symbol SEQUX), T. Rowe Price Capital Appreciation (PRWCX), Forester Value (FVALX), FPA Crescent (FPACX), and First Eagle Global (SGENX).
All but FVALX have outperformed SP500 the past decade:

Honestly, Goldberg is not afraid to take a stand and explains why in simple terms. He has some similar articles on bond and allocations funds. I first became impressed with him after reading his article questioning Bruce Berkowitz's heavy move into financials in late 2010.
Here is link to that insightful article:
http://www.kiplinger.com/columns/value/archive/kiplinger-25-fairholme-funds-big-bet-on-financial-stocks.html?si=1
I like Bee's suggestion that you assess any gain/risk fund decision against a standard like PIMCO Income Fund PONDX. (Or, PIMIX, its institutional equivalent.)
I see Oakmark Equity & Income (OAKBX) and FPA Cresent (FPACX) suggested by several on the allocation side. Both have done great this difficult decade, although I believe are closed to new investors. I remember when Dodge & Cox Balanced Fund (DODBX) was in same category, until it got slammed in 2008. It still beats SP500 over the long haul, and I want to believe it learned from its mistake and will be stronger going forward. That said, Vanguard Wellington (VWELX) admirably did not stumble and remains a buy-and-hold choice open to new investors, as pointed out by JohnN.
In fact, all of these allocation funds have also beat SP500 this decade:

An under-the-radar equity fund is Auxier Focus (AUXFX), which I first read about on FundAlarm, has consistently done well and is just now starting to get recognized.
Note that all of Goldberg's picks and the ones I've mentioned above have less volatility than SP500. A couple, like Forester Value and Oakmark Equity, are substantially less volatile. So, it's easy to see why these are comfortable buy-and-hold picks.
OK, now for tougher part.
In 1974, Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A) lost nearly half its value...in one year! BRK.A has more than twice the volatility of SP500. But who would not have wanted to own this stock for the last 41 years, where it has gained more than 20% annually? (Granted, not a mutual fund proper, but it represents the best in equities...let's call it a surrogate mutual fund.)
Other examples of higher volatility funds that have never lost more value in any three-year period than SP500's worst...but have made substantially more money over the long term: Vanguard Health Care (VGHCX), FMI Focus (FMIOX), Fidelity Select Consumer Staples (FDFAX), Artisan Mid Cap (ARTMX), and Vanguard Energy (VGENX). All represent excellent buy-and-hold picks, but you really gotta be willing to hold after that one really bad year.
One last thing: You list good choices. But for what it is worth, I personally do not like to own more than 4-5 funds at one time. Currently, I own: RNSIX, FAAFX, FAIRX, SFGIX, and DODBX.

As others have noted, you need a plan. More specifically, you need a plan about what *purpose* or *role* each fund will play in your portfolio.
For example, let's say you pick Fairholme because you like that Berkowitz "ignores the crowd." What happens if the "crowd" is actually right, for example in 2011 when Berkowitz lost a fair amount of money while the overall market had some gains? Are you going to be able to accept that sometimes Berkowitz will be off on his timing, or just plain wrong? If so, then follow your plan and don't be concerned with short term, YTD performance. Fairholme investors have suffered with several years of underperformance before this year's payoff. (Actually, most of them bailed.)
If you can't accept that Berkowitz will sometimes be wrong, then you need to either dump Fairholme from your plan, or you need another fund whose purpose will be balance out Fairholme. For example, maybe a large cap growth fund, because sometimes growth outperforms when value funds underperform. Or maybe you need just a plain vanilla index fund, which by definition can never really be "wrong".
Work out a plan and then you can evaluate funds based on whether they are actually working within your plan, rather than just whether they are doing better than other funds.

Hi Carefree,
I have linked the Morningstar report below on CAMAX for easy review.
http://quote.morningstar.com/fund/f.aspx?Country=USA&Symbol=CAMAX
Like Scott has said it is a "hot" fund at times and also can be chilling "cold." Also, MSF had some note worthy comments.
For me, it would be the type of fund I would position into, and out of, with some type of timing strategy.
If you hold this in a taxable account and if you have a loss that can be taken for income tax purposes this might be an avenue you might wish to consider. If you have a profit in it ... I'd book the gains and run. That is just me though.
Have a good weekend ... and, "Good Investing."
Skeeter

To add to what Scott said (including Cambiar not being my cup of tea either), Cambiar Aggressive Value is a Cambiar fund on steroids. Unlike the others, it can, and does short (per prospectus and M* shows -24% cash, -2% bond, and short positions of 27% US and 5% foreign, though still significantly net long in equities). In the annual report, just filed, they acknowledge as much: "The key contributors to performance for the Cambiar Aggressive Value Fund were consistent with Cambiar’s other funds, yet more pronounced as a result of the Fund’s concentrated portfolio construction guidelines."
The report points out that the reason for the good performance 2009-2010 was macro - the economy was coming out of a recession.

Given the magnitude of the economic contraction that occurred in the 2007-2009 Great Recession, the starting point for this cycle was unusually low and followed an unusually long contraction, positioning a great many businesses for much better than average cyclical gains and the duration associated with a positive economic and business cycle. For about two and a half years, that view of things was highly accurate and informative, as corporate profits surged and a great many stocks left for dead in the wake of the market crash in 2008 rebounded accordingly. Our view was both accurate and contrarian, at least relative to a shell-shocked marketplace, and we performed quite well across the Cambiar Funds.

So aggressive funds would have tended to outperform.
This gets to my acknowledged bias against this type of leveraged, high turnover, aggressive fund. Such funds magnify trends (increased risk) at a high cost (leveraging, rapid trading, etc.). If you bought the fund because you saw a couple of years of top performance without looking under the covers, then maybe it's not your cup of tea either. But if this is what you knew you were buying, then maybe you'll want to stick with it.
Though even then, consider the rest of the letter in the annual report, where Cambiar acknowledges that its traditional methods don't seem to work in this choppy, close-to-zero interest rate environment. Their underperformance (as opposed to inline performance for a market going sideways) seems to confirm this.

Reply to @BWG: "The Fund pursues its investment objective by allocating assets among various commodity sectors (including agricultural, energy, livestock and precious and base metals). The Fund also invests in fixed income securities and money market instruments. The Fund will obtain exposure to commodity sectors by investing in commodity-linked derivatives, directly or through investments in the Subsidiary. ***The Fund will target an annualized volatility level that is lower than that for the AQR Risk-Balanced Commodities Strategy Fund, which is described elsewhere in this Prospectus. The “LV” in the Fund’s name reflects this “lower volatility” approach. There is no guarantee that the Fund’s investment objective will be met."***
So, LV will be a more hedged and/or less aggressively positioned, etc (?) version of the other fund. LV appears to have been delayed, but Risk Balanced Commodity is available. LV was also not listed in the press release on the new funds that was released by AQR.
This appears same with both:
"Commodity Investments
The Fund intends to gain exposure to commodity sectors by investing in a portfolio of Instruments (as defined below). The Fund will generally have some level of investment in the majority of commodity sectors, which includes over 20 exposures. The Adviser targets balanced-risk weights across various commodity sectors and regularly reviews the risk in those sectors as market conditions change, rebalancing the portfolio to seek to maintain more balanced exposures among sectors. The Fund’s balanced-risk approach can be expected, under current market conditions, to result in less exposure to the energy sector than an approach that mirrors the composition of well-known commodity indices.
In allocating assets among and within commodity sectors, the Adviser follows a “risk parity” approach. The “risk parity” approach to asset allocation seeks to balance the allocation of risk across the commodity sectors (as measured by forecasted volatility, estimated potential loss, and other proprietary measures) when building the portfolio. This means that lower risk commodity sectors (such as precious metals) will generally have higher notional allocations than higher risk commodity sectors (such as energy). A “neutral” asset allocation targets an equal risk allocation among the commodity sectors. The Adviser expects to tactically vary the Fund’s allocation to the various commodity sectors depending on market conditions, which can cause the Fund to deviate from a “neutral” position. The desired overall risk level of the Fund may be increased or decreased by the Adviser. There can be no assurance that employing a “risk parity” approach will achieve any particular level or return or will, in fact, reduce volatility or potential loss.
However, the Fund is actively managed and has the flexibility to over- or underweight commodity sectors, in the Adviser’s discretion, in order to achieve the Fund’s objective. There is no stated limit on the percentage of assets the Fund can invest in a particular Instrument or the percentage of assets the Fund will allocate to any one commodity sector, and at times the Fund may focus on a small number of Instruments or commodity sectors. The Adviser will use proprietary volatility forecasting and portfolio construction methodologies to manage the Fund. The allocation among and within the different commodity sectors is based on the Adviser’s assessment of the risk associated with the commodity sector, the investment opportunity presented by each commodity sector, as well as the Adviser’s assessment of prevailing market conditions within the particular commodity sector. Shifts in allocations among and within commodity sectors or Instruments will be determined based on the Adviser’s evaluation of technical and fundamental indicators, such as trends in historical prices, seasonality, supply/demand data, momentum and macroeconomic data of commodity consuming countries.
Generally, the Fund gains exposure to the commodity sectors by investing in commodity-linked derivative instruments, such as swap agreements, commodity futures, commodity-based exchange-traded funds, commodity-linked notes and swaps on commodity futures (collectively, the “Instruments”), either by investing directly in those Instruments, or indirectly by investing in the Subsidiary (as described below) that invests in those Instruments. The Fund’s investment in the Instruments provides the Fund with exposure to the investment returns of the commodity sectors without investing directly in physical commodities. Commodities are assets that have tangible properties, such as oil, metals and agricultural products. There is no maximum or minimum exposure to any one Instrument or any one commodity sector.
Futures contracts are contractual agreements to buy or sell a particular commodity or Instrument at a pre-determined price in the future. The Fund’s use of futures contracts, swaps and certain other Instruments will have the economic effect of financial leverage. Financial leverage magnifies exposure to the swings in prices of commodities underlying an Instrument and results in increased volatility, which means the Fund will have the potential for greater gains, as well as the potential for greater losses, than if the Fund does not use Instruments that have a leveraging effect. Leveraging tends to magnify, sometimes significantly, the effect of any increase or decrease in the Fund’s exposure to a particular commodity or commodity sector and may cause the Fund’s NAV to be volatile. There is no assurance that the Fund’s use of Instruments providing enhanced exposure will enable the Fund to achieve its investment objective.
As a result of the Fund’s strategy, the Fund may have highly leveraged exposure to one or more commodity sectors at times. The 1940 Act and the rules and interpretations thereunder impose certain limitations on the Fund’s ability to use leverage; however, the Fund is not subject to any additional limitations on its exposures.
The Fund and the Subsidiary use a drawdown control approach to mitigate loss of value and reduce volatility. This approach gradually and systematically reduces exposure across all commodity sectors as commodity markets decline and volatility increases. There can be no assurance that this approach will be successful in controlling the Fund’s risk or limiting portfolio losses.
The Fund currently intends to invest up to 25% of its total assets in the Subsidiary. The Subsidiary is a wholly-owned and controlled subsidiary of the Fund, organized under the laws of the Cayman Islands as an exempted company."
Summary:
https://www.aqrfunds.com/OurFunds/AlternativeInvestmentFunds/RiskBalancedCommoditiesStrategyFund/Overview.aspx
Risk Balancing Across Sectors: In a risk-balanced portfolio, every sector contributes roughly equally to the volatility of the total portfolio and no one commodity dominates near-term returns. To achieve this, less volatile sectors are given larger notional allocations, while volatile sectors get a smaller notional allocation.
Risk Balancing Through Time: Over time, the volatility of a commodities portfolio can vary significantly. During stress periods when the volatility across commodities increases sharply, such as 2008, the riskiness of a commodities portfolio may become higher than desirable. By monitoring volatilities and correlations of each commodity, it is possible to increase or decrease portfolio-wide exposures in order to target a pre-specified risk level for the fund and keep returns smoother over time.
Drawdown Control: We believe volatility targeting should be supplemented by a systematic, pre-set drawdown control policy, dictating how portfolio risk will be reduced during a prolonged crisis to help control the size of absolute drawdowns. As soon as markets stabilize, the drawdown policy ensures that the fund returns to being fully invested. We believe that this improves investors’ odds of sticking with a long-term allocation.
Active Management: The fund is actively managed, and the fund managers will vary the fund’s positions in individual commodities and commodity sectors (even going short in some commodities at time) based on an evaluation of the attractiveness of the positions. These shifts in allocations will be determined using AQR’s proprietary models. Information that is evaluated includes the roll yield, inventory, and supply and demand relationships of each commodity, as well as the macroeconomic environment and other factors.

Reply to @catch22:
Bummer. Will be interesting to know where Rao ends up. MFCFX had done really well and is a unique fund...world stock fund with ability to go defensive and invest across capital structure. I am also interested in hearing about alternatives/replacement funds.

RBC Wealth Management
Michael D. Ruccio, AAMS
Senior Vice President -Financial Advisor
25 Hanover Road
Florham Park, NJ 07932-1407
(p) (866) 248-0096
(f) (973) 966-0309
[email protected]
michaelruccio.com
MARKET WEEK: JULY 9, 2012
The Markets
Even the small gains seen in equities early in the week fizzled after the holiday on discouraging economic news from around the globe. Only the Nasdaq and small-cap Russell 2000 were still in positive territory by Friday's close. U.S. Treasury prices benefitted once again from the bad news as the 10-year yield headed south.
Market/Index 2011 Close Prior Week As of 7/6 Week Change YTD Change
DJIA 12217.56 12880.09 12772.47 -.84% 4.54%
Nasdaq 2605.15 2935.05 2937.33 .08% 12.75%
S&P 500 1257.60 1362.16 1354.68 -.55% 7.72%
Russell 2000 740.92 798.49 807.14 1.08% 8.94%
Global Dow 1801.60 1831.63 1814.28 -.96% .70%
Fed. Funds .25% .25% .25% 0 bps 0 bps
10-year Treasuries 1.89% 1.67% 1.57% -10 bps -32 bps
Equities data reflect price changes, not total return.
Last Week's Headlines
Unemployment remained stalled at 8.2% and the U.S. economy added just 80,000 new jobs in June. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average monthly increase in new jobs during the second quarter was only 75,000 compared to the 226,000 monthly average in Q1.
Economic news abroad wasn't encouraging. Eurostat said the unemployment rate in the European Union hit a record 11.1% in May, and there also were signs of weakening manufacturing activity in Germany. The European Central Bank cut its key interest rate to a record low 0.75%, and Spanish and Italian 10-year bond yields rose above 7% and 6% respectively. China also cut its one-year rate for the second time in two months, lowering it to 6%.
According to the Institute for Supply Management, manufacturing activity in the United States fell in June for the first time in three years. The ISM's index dropped to 49.7% from 53.5% the previous month; any number below 50% is considered a contraction. The ISM said new orders and exports also contracted for the first time since mid-2009. However, the Commerce Department said factory orders were up 0.7% in May, and durable goods orders were up even more, by 1.3%.
Meanwhile, China's manufacturing sector also slowed in June to its lowest level in seven months; the National Bureau of Statistics' 50.2 reading was just barely in expansion territory. However, China's services sector saw solid expansion with a 56.7 reading by the NBS.
The U.K. Serious Fraud Office announced it will investigate possible criminal charges in connection with manipulation of the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR). Barclay's PLC was fined £290 million by the U.K.'s Financial Services Authority the previous week after it admitted that false LIBOR-related information had been repeatedly submitted since 2005. It also had previously been fined $160 million by the U.S. Department of Justice.
The International Monetary Fund urged the United States to reduce uncertainty about the impending "fiscal cliff." The IMF said the package of tax increases and government spending cuts scheduled to take effect in 2013, coupled with the anticipated renewed wrangling over an increase to the U.S. debt ceiling at year's end, could threaten an already tepid economic recovery.
Eye on the Week Ahead
The week kicks off with Alcoa's earnings release, which marks the unofficial start of the Q2 earnings season. Also, eurozone finance ministers will meet to try to figure out how to implement the recent agreement to tighten fiscal union among countries. Meanwhile, auctions of 10- and 30-year U.S. Treasury securities will suggest whether recent strong demand will continue.
Key dates and data releases: eurozone finance ministers' meeting (7/9); balance of trade, Federal Open Market Committee minutes (7/11); wholesale inflation (7/13).