To the AAII members, welcome!
We’re glad you’re here.
Mutual Fund Observer (MFO), with a lineage tracing back to the 1990s, exists to the benefit of intellectually curious, serious investors— managers, advisers, and individuals—who need to go beyond marketing fluff, beyond computer- generated recommendations and beyond Morningstar’s coverage universe.
The Observer is an outgrowth of Fund Alarm, a site launched in the 1990s to cut through the jungle of self-serving “10 Funds You Must Own Now!” stories of the era. With time, Fund Alarm broadened its focus from just exposing the scam-y self-promotion to also providing coverage of less-known funds that were providing exceptional service to their investors.
MFO’s special focus is on innovative, independent new and smaller funds. MFO’s mission is to provide readers with calm, intelligent arguments and to provide independent fund companies with an opportunity to receive thoughtful attention even though they might not yet have drawn billions in assets. Its coverage universe has been described as “the thousands of funds off Morningstar’s radar,” a description one fund manager echoes as “a Morningstar for the rest of us.”
If you check the heart of the navigation bar, above, you’ll see four central sections.
Commentary takes you to our monthly issue. David Snowball writes most of what you’ll see there: investing overviews, fund profiles, Launch Alerts for new funds, Elevator Talks which are micro-interviews with folks running intriguing funds and bunches of industry news (in “Briefly Noted”). The other voices you’ll often hear there are Ed Studzinski, who formerly c0managed Oakmark Equity & Income and who now shares philosophical and historical takes on the day’s events; Charles Boccadoro, who spent much of his professional career as an aerospace engineer before becoming MFO’s data and analytics guru; Bob Cochran, formerly a principal at RPS Planning and now retired, who reflects on life after work; Cheryl Welsch, dean of curriculum at the Eastern Iowa Community Colleges and MFO’s technical director, who tracks dozens of manager changes each month; and Dennis Baran, a long-time reader and member of our discussion board, who writes the occasional but always thoughtful profiles of mutual funds.
Discussions is our long-running public discussion board. You don’t have to sign up to read the board, but do have to sign-up to comment. (Otherwise we get overrun with spam-bots.)
Funds is the archive of individual fund profiles.
The Best is the archive of essays by Ed and Charles.
Like AAII, we are a nonprofit corporation. We are proudly non-commercial, independent and accessible. That means no ads, no fees, and no “sponsored content.” (Ick.) We are supported exclusively by voluntary (and tax-deductible) contributions from our readers. The options, if you care to explore them, are listed on the “Support Us” page.
If you’ve got questions, ideas or concerns, feel free to drop me a note.
