From Bloomy -
"Boeing raised $10 billion from a bond sale on Monday that attracted about $77 billion of orders and allowed the planemaker to ease some of its financial strains by refinancing part of its massive debt load. The outsized demand for the bonds—which Boeing attracted by initially dangling a relatively juicy yield premium to prospective investors—allowed the company to ultimately shrink that premium before it priced."

"The company sold bonds in six portions, with maturities ranging from three to 40 years ... The 40-year portion yields 2.25 percentage points more than Treasuries, said the person familiar with the offering. Initial discussions called for around 2.65 percentage points."
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/boeing-looks-sell-bonds-reporting-125719270.html

I have not done anything 'Morningstar' in many years. Guess what, I found other ways to get what I wanted. I don't miss it in the least. Most of my research and inquires are through Schwab, though I must say their portfolio info is lacking. I moved my HSA to Fidelity a year ago, so I have access to that, but I haven't used it much.

I think it is worth reading the articles @msf posted in this thread.
I would be interested in posters' comments comparing BUFB (and BUFF) and HELO, the laddered buffering ETFs. if you have to choose one, which one would it be to buy on May 1?
https://www.innovatoretfs.com/etf/?ticker=bufb (buffering against first 9% loss)
https://www.innovatoretfs.com/etf/?ticker=buff (buffering against first 15% loss)
https://am.jpmorgan.com/us/en/asset-management/adv/products/jpmorgan-hedged-equity-laddered-overlay-etf-etf-shares-46654q724 (buffering against the losses from 5 to 20%)
BUFB has been around for two years and BUFF has been around since Aug 11, 2020 (a different fund before this date) and neither made any distributions - management fees 0.1% and acquired fund fees 0.79%. If we like the returns and risk, tax efficiency is a welcome bonus here.

Looks like PIMIX has done a little better longer term than the previous post reveals. (+7.68% over 15 years). Let’s remember how dastardly low interest rates were over most of the past decade. That said, for a fund that’s invested about 35% in sub-investment grade paper, I’m not overly impressed either. The .62% fee is a bit high as well.
Take a look at (probably riskier) RPSIX over that same term: 3 yr -1.06%, 5 yr +2.03%, 10 yr +2.62%, 15 yr +4.83% . Interestingly, RPSIX carries an identical .62% fee.
So, with a 10-15% equity component, RPSIX lagged PIMIX over all the terms cited. No horse in the fight. Just adding to what’s already been said.

Let's not kid, or let anyone else, kid us.
If you "held onto" PIMIX for the last 5 years, you got yourself an average annual TR of of 3.07%, and for 10 years, 4.27%.
Again, in an attempt to beat a dead horse, our 5-yr CP CD ladder was paying ~4% during that 5-yr period and is paying over 5% now.
PIMIX sounds like a "free lunch" (sic) at McDonald's or worse to me.

When I was researching insurance many years ago I found that Mercury had some pretty poor reviews. I remember finding at the CA Dept of Insurance official site an extensive ratings/ complaint report on all companies operating in CA at the time, but I can't find a similar link now.
I do remember that some sites like the ones you mention had much conflicting information, and if you read between the lines some of those sites have "associations" of one kind or another with the companies that they are supposedly "evaluating".

Here's what bothers me about this one: we read that the expected life span of this type of aircraft is 30 years. The Delta plane is 34 years old. Is there any kind of regulatory requirement for inspection or special maintenance in a situation like this?? None of the news reports that I've seen have followed up on that question. Why?

Absolutely mesmerizing @Level5. Apple swallows the world toward the middle. Then the information age hype of the 90s becomes the Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, NVIDA, META with a dab of Amazon thrown in just teasing of today. But the appearance of some big guys getting chopped off at the knees over the years was worth watching the whole thing.

Funds, even "pure" Treasury funds, have some wiggle room to hold some other assets. As noted in the Boglehead thread (see below), WisdomTree doesn't make it easy to find the numbers. But last year, "only" 99.9868% of the income was state tax exempt. I've looked at the referenced spreadsheet and verified this.
One always needs to check the supporting figures that a fund family publishes at tax time. Once upon a time, VUSXX was 100% (exactly) state-tax-exempt. Vanguard changed the way it managed the fund a couple of years ago. With its wiggle room, only about 80% of the income from that fund was state-exempt last year.
Boglehead post:
https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=7710372&sid=b5b46754ca9e296f26c5f65246618ac5#p7710372
WisdomTree spreadsheet:
https://view.officeapps.live.com/op/view.aspx?src=https://www.wisdomtree.com/investments/-/media/us-media-files/documents/resource-library/fund-reports-schedules/tax-reporting/2023-tax-supplement-report.xlsx&wdOrigin=BROWSELINK

@hank, it's easy to setup, say, a DIY 5-yr Treasury Zeros-ladder. It will have a duration of approximately 2.5 years, comparable to a short-term bond fund.
For Zeros, duration = maturity, so a 30-yr Zero will have huge volatility.

humm … interesting I’ll look at BOXX. Thanks Yogi.
What I’ve been mulling over in recent days is something similar to a zero-coupon, but maybe just out 2, 3, 4 years. (Zeros are crazy volatile as I think everyone knows.) Might be a good hedge / hold if you think a serious recession lies ahead (late ‘24 or ‘25).
I’d guess these can be purchased individually but that funds like the old AC series have pretty much disappeared. I have begun watching AC’s BTTRX for what information it may provide. (This one has 1.56 years to maturity and has a NAV over $108 which doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. My 2 decade old memory is that they matured at $100. But can’t be correct.)

I used ICSH for years. USFR was a recent addition. Different approaches to ultra-ST bond funds. On my watch list is JPST if I want another. I never warmed up to MINT.
These are genuine inv-grade funds. I don't use ST-HY for this purpose, but have IT-HY and multisector bond funds (that have HY).

If you are going to remain "overweight" in equities, the 1 phrase that sticks in my mind is:
"A rising tide lifts all boats" - JFK
....and the reverse is true as well. Defensive sectors (Utilities, Health, etc.) don't always hold up. So it would be nice to think that there are "low risk" strategies that could work. But they rarely do.
The M* article that YBB posted pointed out that both Low-volatility and Alternative investments have been hampered severely by extremely low interest rates (earned by Treasuries and Cash collateral) over the past 15 years.
The article finished with:
"But what feels good is not necessarily what is right. As a rule, competitive gains do not occur without accompanying pain.
That’s a message worth remembering when investment vendors respond to a stock downturn by selling safety. They always do."

Nice @msf
I liken the “drag effect” of portfolio hedging to brakes on a car. A car would be much more efficient and would travel farther if you just left it rolling along.
PS - @msf said “Shilling (attrib Keynes): The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent.”
That’s scary if true. It suggests our perspective on markets based on most of our investing lifetimes may not reflect reality. My “hands-on” experience dates to 1995, or about 30 years. Prior to that I paid little attention. Despite a few awful downturns (2000, 2008, 2020, 2022) U.S. equities have dramatically outpaced just about every other kind of investment. I dare say that holding bonds or other hedges over that 30 year span would have resulted in a lower overall return.
But, as I think Shilling / Keynes implies, that 30 year period may represent some type of alternative universe rather then reality.
FWIW / Fido’s analytics currently put me at 51% equities. Too high. Waiting for a good chance to reduce that.

”This column should not be read as a criticism of low-risk investments. They aren’t required for younger investors, who need not worry about redeeming their funds at the wrong time (at least, if they are sensible), but they are critical for retirees who are withdrawing their assets. Ballast prevents them from entering a bear market spiral in which they spend ever-larger percentages of their portfolio to realize the same amount of money. Do that for long, and you are in real trouble.”
Do younger investors (ie ages 25-45) really pay much attention to portfolio construction / hedging? Sure, some do. And likely if they’re reading this board they pay greater attention than the average working stiff with a job, kids in school, a big mortgage and 25 + years to retirement.
Good article. Hopefully (as the author suggests) well considered portfolio specific hedging may reduce short term volatility for those already in the withdrawal stage. In no way, shape or form would I ever argue that hedging improves longer term performance. And … there’s always the option (hedge) of moving a big chunk into cash and / or CDs, as one well-heeled poster appears to have done recently. As a sometimes landscaper / gardener, I’m aware that hedges come in many different shapes and colors.

My first & last boat leans up against back garden shed. I paid all of $100 for 11'6" flat bottom v hull. Many enjoyable hours spent fishing !
To each his own.

For fishing I never thought it made much difference what size boat. Over 45 years I owned both an aluminum 14’ and a deeper wider 16-footer. Was crazy enough to troll out on Lake Michigan with that 14-footer and just a single 15 HP outboard during the 70s & 80s. The larger boat had a second engine.
Back to fishing … I think size is overrated. Have enjoyed catching bluegill from the edge of a pond in the spring just as much as hauling in 30 lb + salmon on the great lakes in August. You could argue the bluegill taste better.

@rforno, new M* Investors (subscription) does have downloadable 1- or 2- page PDFs. Here is a sample for FMSDX that I uploaded to PDF Host and linked below for demonstration. More can get me into trouble. In the old days, these PDFs were free at M*, but now not much is free at M*.
https://pdfhost.io/v/MFfvjfNFz_FMSDX_Investment_Report

Thx. I actually re-sub'd a few weeks ago b/c I got a fairly solid educator's discount and figured it was worth it to see what had changed over the years. TBH while there are a few nice things there, on the whole I'm not that impressed w/the 'new' site and already killed the virtual card that I used to subscribe to plan to let the subscription die off on its own when it comes time for renewal.

Personally, I find the Fidelity website more useful than M* ever was. I can compare funds, analyze holdings, asset allocations, etc. I have found M* ratings and analyses to be poor predictors of future performance, giving users a false sense of security in picking funds. The Fidelity portfolio analysis tool is every bit as useful as M* X-Ray ever was. The only M* feature that I find useful is portfolio view - watch lists, which is good for tracking performance of funds over various periods of time. M* star ratings and fund recommendations are a joke. Over the years, I purchased many funds that were highly rated by M* and turned out to be bad investments. Likewise, many funds that have been very profitable for me get poor to mediocre ratings from M*. For example, M* tends to “damn with faint praise” many excellent Fidelity funds such as FCNTX and FBALX. They seem to bend over backwards to promote many T Rowe Price funds that are mediocre at best (eg, TRPBX).

@bee. It took me many years to convince my spouse that there is no point in paying for advice that should more, or less, boil down to a few funds covering equities and bonds if you are dealing with someone reasonably honest.
Thanks for the link to the article. I look forward to sharing it. :)

It seems I am using I bonds differently from several other people. So far, I haven't sold any, though I suggested a "swap" (buy new one with higher rate than an older one I would sell).
I regard them as long term cash, since they only accumulate interest, like a bank account or MMF. In this respect they differ from longer term treasuries (whether nominal or inflation-protected).
[snip]

I also regard I Bonds as long-term cash.
My I Bond holdings were accumulated over a number of years.
I haven't sold any of these bonds since they will be used for cash during retirement.