Fed Chair Powell: 'Be careful not to exit too early' on easy monetary policy
"But Powell’s commentary may be an attempt to quell any jitteriness over the Fed pulling back on its accommodative policy. Fed Vice Chairman Richard Clarida said Wednesday that he expects the Fed to keep up its pace of asset purchases through 2021."
Got to keep those bubbles inflated! 2021 will likely be a decent year for equities. Amazing financial system we have here in the US. Simply amazing.

There's no question that he was way wrong about mortgage insurance companies. However, despite this moderate sized bet, the fund performed respectably before and during the housing crisis.
Let's put some dates and numbers to paper. MBI would seem to be a good proxy for his investments in the mortgage insurance business (what in the annual statements is counted in "Financial Insurance/Credit Enhancement").
Oct 31, 2008: 3.57% of portfolio in financial ins., all MBI.
Oct 31,2007: 3.95% in financial ins., 64% of that in MBI.
Oct 31, 2006: 3.55% in financial ins., 65% of that in MBI.
I'm not going back further. MBI's stock price peaked just before the end of 2006 (Dec 28 close of 73.31 per Yahoo). "In 2007, home prices started to tumble." NPR.
From Dec 28, 2006 to March 5, 2008 (the low point for MBI), TAVFX outperformed the average large cap value fund by over 2% (not annualized) while underperforming VEIRX by about 1%.
M* chart.
In January 2008 the fund owned about 10% of MBI. That mistake by Whitman of doubling down brought its percentage of the fund's portfolio to around 5% (end of January N-Q). With the stock declining from his purchase price of $12.15 to a low of $2.29 on March 5, 2008 the position contributed around -4% to the fund's performance. Since then, MBI has gently risen in price.
Though his bets on mortgage insurers had a measurable impact on fund performance, bringing down a once superior fund to an average performing one, they did not seem to be the cause of the subsequent "implosion". That came later.
The fund started to underperform in the 2nd half of 2008, well after MBI had stabilized. Even at that, it had its moments and performed in line with large cap value funds until just a few months before Whitman resigned as manager, March 3, 2012.
M* chart 2008-March 3, 2012.

We always verify current or possible holdings to discover what is inside. 'Course, the contents are subject to change somewhat over time frames.
And to the proposition of an investment into SPY where many may presume an equal weight of holdings among 11 sectors. NOPE. Tis not a balanced U.S. equity holding. We hold 3 of these equity sectors: tech., healthcare and comm. services for our current choices.

Sectors	Fund %	Cat %
Basic Materials	2.42	2.61
Consumer Cyclical	12.66	11.17
Financial Services	13.90	13.42
Real Estate	2.29	2.47
Communication Services	10.26	10.21
Energy	2.60	1.90
Industrials	8.83	10.11
Technology	23.82	22.81
Consumer Defensive	6.78	7.99
Healthcare	13.77	14.76
Utilities	2.67	2.54

SP-500 sector weighing
Regards,
Catch

@Crash, This is my approach, too. Depending on when they were purchased in the fund, I particularly look for holdings that are not 'herd' companies in the top-10, which suggests groupthink and/or closet indexing.

I make sure to check out the biggest holdings, which are not difficult to uncover, and the weight the fund holds in the market sectors: tech, financial, etc. But what I am mostly looking for is to see that the fund does not hold stocks in companies I hate. I call it my ethical filter. But of course, it's of limited value. Once I decide to invest in a fund, the Fund Manager is in charge, and I'm sort of a "back-bencher."

I make sure to check out the biggest holdings, which are not difficult to uncover, and the weight the fund holds in the market sectors: tech, financial, etc. But what I am mostly looking for is to see that the fund does not hold stocks in companies I hate. I call it my ethical filter. But of course, it's of limited value. Once I decide to invest in a fund, the Fund Manager is in charge, and I'm sort of a "back-bencher."

Here are a couple of more stock market bubble articles, the first one short and second one with a fair amount of detailed background info:

First Article: Warren Buffett's favorite market indicator hits 13-year high, signaling global stocks are most overvalued since the financial crisis
The gauge climbed past 121% last weekend, Bloomberg data shows, marking its highest reading since October 2007. Welt market analyst Holger Zschaepitz flagged the worrying milestone in a tweet.
"Buffett indicator sounds the alarm," he said. "Global stock mkt cap has now topped 120% of global GDP, and thus the same level as before the crash in 2008."

Second Article: Yes, Virginia. There Is A Stock Market Bubble. Lance Roberts
We see that the claims on the economy should, quite intuitively, track the economy itself. Excesses occur whenever the economy’s claims, the so-called financial assets (stocks, bonds, and derivatives), get too far ahead of the economy itself.
The increase in speculative risks, combined with excess leverage, leave the markets vulnerable to a sizable future correction. The only missing ingredient for such a reversion is the catalyst to bring “fear” into an overly complacent marketplace.
It is all reminiscent of the market peak of 1929 when Dr. Irving Fisher uttered his now-famous words: “Stocks have now reached a permanently high plateau.”

@Crash I feel your pain on this but allow me to offer a slightly different viewpoint. I use a password manager that is solid. One master password is all I have to remember. It keeps 100's of other passwords for me (I have more than 500) and they are all generated by the manager. I only have to remember one. HOWEVER... all of my banking and brokerages - I use 2 Factor authentication. So, if I log in to a bank or brokerage... I WANT a text verifying that it's me. This gives me the best of both worlds. I have the password manager to login to most of the sites that I use that require a login but my financial ones... I'm protected by the 2 factor authentication. Edit: And I use BRAVE as a browser. It's an ad blocker built in etc. So I know what you are trying to accomplish there.

Many financial advisors will help you to draw up a balanced and diversified investment portfolio. Ideally, funds chosen will have negative asset correlation to each other. High quality bonds and equities are the classic examples. While in drawdown situations, the bonds will advanced when the equities fall. The net result is to have a reduced level of loss and the portfolio will recover in a shorter timeframe. More importantly, this helps the investors psychologically and they are more likely to stay the course rather than sell at the bottom.
If you read January's article from Lynn Bolin, a plot showing Vanguard Wellington fund (65/35 stocks/bonds allocation) versus S&P 500 index achieved the same level of gain over a prolong period. This is achieved with less ups and down. Wellesley Income fund (35/65) was also included on the plot.
Asset correlation can be found in MFO Premium.

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/915802/000139834421000510/fp0061082_497.htm
497 1 fp0061082_497.htm
FINANCIAL INVESTORS TRUST
Emerald Small Cap Value Fund
(the “Fund”)
Supplement dated January 11, 2021
to the Fund’s
Prospectus and Statement of Additional Information
dated August 31, 2020, as supplemented
As previously disclosed, on December 8, 2020, the Board of Trustees (the “Board”) of Financial Investors Trust (the “Trust”), based upon the recommendation of Emerald Mutual Fund Advisers Trust (the “Adviser”), the investment adviser to the Fund, a series of the Trust, determined to close and liquidate the Fund on or about January 11, 2021. The date for such liquidation is now expected to be on or about January 29, 2021 (the “Liquidation Date”).
If the Fund has not received your redemption request or other instruction prior to the close of business on the Liquidation Date, your shares will be redeemed, and you will receive proceeds representing your proportionate interest in the net assets of the Fund as of the Liquidation Date, subject to any required withholdings. As is the case with any redemption of fund shares, these liquidation proceeds will generally be subject to federal and, as applicable, state and local income taxes if the redeemed shares are held in a taxable account and the liquidation proceeds exceed your adjusted basis in the shares redeemed. If the redeemed shares are held in a qualified retirement account such as an IRA, the liquidation proceeds may not be subject to current income taxation under certain conditions. You should consult with your tax adviser for further information regarding the federal, state and/or local income tax consequences of this liquidation that are relevant to your specific situation.
PLEASE RETAIN THIS SUPPLEMENT FOR FUTURE REFERENCE

@JonGatIII, Be mindful of the risk going forward. I survived both the tech bubble in 2000 and financial crisis in 2008 through my risk-adverse asset allocation. Even then it took years to fully recover the loss. It was a humbling experience and the black swan events will come again. It is a simple question of when and not if.
2020 was an aberration event with the Fed being part of the market as @davfor pointeded out by buying stocks and bonds while reducing interest rates to near zero. Without the Fed the stock market would be still in red as the country is in deep recession. There are consequence to these Fed's action such as higher inflation, devaluation of USD, lower bond yields and etc. While you have the luxury of time, it is helpful to learn to become better informed investors.

The sad fact appears to be that for most of those who have sufficient financial resources to be interested in a forum such as MFO, wealth is more important than the attempted overthrow of the United States democracy.

I disagree, Old_ Joe . Interest in this forum is just as likely to be because one has *insufficient* financial resources and is wishing to learn how to invest more effectively. I have not commented in this thread until now, not because wealth is more important to me than democracy (it isn't) but because this forum is not where I want to discuss yesterday's coup (or whatever it was) or to discuss how and why it happened. I have discussed yesterday's unfortunate events elsewhere and at length. I don't think my decision to not also discuss it here is a "sad fact".

Above, to answer a question put by David Moran, I posted the following:

[The OT section] no longer draws much participation from those posters who use MFO primarily for strictly financial matters, and who are not particularly interested in discussing the many underlying social and political factors.

The accuracy of that observation is illustrated by the general lack of interest in this thread, other than by "the usual suspects".
The sad fact appears to be that for most of those who have sufficient financial resources to be interested in a forum such as MFO, wealth is more important than the attempted overthrow of the United States democracy.

Short answer: the credit is what it is; you get to keep it all.

You don't have to pay back your stimulus check, because it's a refundable tax credit
Your stimulus payment is technically a refundable tax credit, which reduces your 2020 tax bill on a dollar-for-dollar basis. It's like having store credit at your favorite clothing shop: When you apply it to your total bill, it reduces what you owe. In this case, even if you have no tax liability, the government is "refunding" your credit back to you as a cash payment.

https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/will-we-have-to-pay-back-stimulus-check-2020-4

What Is a Tax Credit?
Subtract tax credits from the amount of tax you owe. There are two types of tax credits:

• A nonrefundable tax credit means you get a refund only up to the amount you owe.
• A refundable tax credit means you get a refund, even if it's more than what you owe.

https://www.irs.gov/credits-deductions-for-individuals
If it's a gift, it's a per capita gift that nearly everyone (84%) gets. It's a gift like Medicare Part B, where most (92%) participants pay only 1/4 of the true cost and they are gifted the other 3/4 out of general tax revenue (see Medicare Financial Status: In Brief, p. 5, pdf p. 7).

Catch22 has given his reasons for the choice of posting venues:
"The subject matter was placed in "fund discussions" as to the potential fallout implications into all areas of the investment markets; from the events of Jan. 6, at the Capitol building."
The MFO administrators have been very reluctant to directly intervene in any aspect of posting standards. They have provided separate venues for the posting of different topics, and simply requested posters to observe those distinctions.
Objections and protests regarding the posting of certain types of subject matter have not come from the administrators, but rather from a significant number of MFO posters themselves. The administrators reacted to that user input, primarily by modifying the nature of the Off-Topic venue so as to be less visible to those who are not interested in (or even offended by) the topics sometimes discussed there.
Unfortunately, at least from my perspective, that's resulted in a much less lively and interesting OT section. It no longer draws much participation from those posters who use MFO primarily for strictly financial matters, and who are not particularly interested in discussing the many underlying social and political factors. I do think that something valuable has been lost here, but not because of any heavy-handed administration.

For those with an interest....Grantham's "epic bubble" market call and current investment suggestions...

The long, long bull market since 2009 has finally matured into a fully-fledged epic bubble. Featuring extreme overvaluation, explosive price increases, frenzied issuance, and hysterically speculative investor behavior, I believe this event will be recorded as one of the great bubbles of financial history, right along with the South Sea bubble, 1929, and 2000.
Today the P/E ratio of the market is in the top few percent of the historical range and the economy is in the worst few percent. This is completely without precedent and may even be a better measure of speculative intensity than any SPAC.
investors are relying on accommodative monetary conditions and zero real rates extrapolated indefinitely.
This has in theory a similar effect to assuming peak economic performance forever: it can be used to justify much lower yields on all assets and therefore correspondingly higher asset prices. But neither perfect economic conditions nor perfect financial conditions can last forever, and there’s the rub.
I expect once again for my bubble call to meet my modest definition of success: at some future date, whenever that may be, it will have paid for you to have ducked from midsummer of 2020. But few professional or individual investors will have been able to have ducked.....we believe it is in the overlap of these two ideas, Value and Emerging, that your relative bets should go, along with the greatest avoidance of U.S. Growth stocks that your career and business risk will allow.

https://gmo.com/americas/research-library/waiting-for-the-last-dance/

The (only) land border affected is Ireland/Northern Ireland, and an exception was made to make sure things flow freely there--- after all the deliberations and efforts at cooperation between Stormont and Dublin, ever since the Good Friday Accords in the 1990s... Otherwise, I think there's a sigh of relief, because there was NOT a no-deal Brexit, after all. The British fisherman got screwed. And the "deal" that was agreed to contained precious little about how the financial sector will work things out. Direct, simple access to the EU's banks and such is no more. A unified Europe is a step further away, now. The Brits never did adopt the euro. There are one or two others who "joined" without adopting the euro, too. Anyhow, it's hard for me to imagine Europe at war with itself, AGAIN. When I was back visiting Ireland in 2009, the euro was killing me at $1.51. But look at it, now, eh? There will be no more tension in the air about the prospect of a no-deal exit. That, at least is something. A near-term consideration.

I think an increase in individual investors was also a factor. Betting on stocks when sports weren’t available. - WSJ article, open for some reason
“ 2020 will be known as the year that individual investors dove into financial markets and doubled down, ....Driving the interest was a combination of factors that started with an industrywide shift to commission-free trading in 2019 but swelled as market volatility grew. As the coronavirus rolled across the U.S., millions of new investors found themselves stuck at home, some with extra time on their hands to learn about the markets. Others, unable to bet on sports or visit casinos, found the stock market’s outsize swings presented the perfect outlet to make bets.”
And as posted earlier this week: Market Edges Toward Euphoria, Despite Pandemic’s Toll
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/26/business/investors-bull-market-pandemic.html?referringSource=articleShare
“ The appetite of individual investors has been an unexpected byproduct of the pandemic. For many, trading stocks started as a way to indulge their speculative itch when other avenues, such as sports gambling, were effectively shuttered.”

@Mark,
thanks
A very experienced financial writer friend whom I freelance with sometimes quickly fixed Uppaluri's comical regurgitation:
The fund's concept is to track the total return of the Russell 1000 Index while having less of that return consist of income. It invests in a representative sample of stocks in the index, favoring those with low or no dividends, and also minimizes capital gains in two ways: by managing how they're offset by losses and by keeping turnover low. In recent performance the fund's total return has been well within its target [+/- tktk] limit, while on average trading only 14% of holdings a year.

Even though, as I read in Al Jazeera: four-fifths of UK GDP is in the financial sector. And the "deal" includes absolutely zero content about financials. So, free and easy access to the continent's financial sector will END for the UK on January 1st. So, as I'm fond of stating here: "ORK!" What sort of "deal" is THAT????? Politicians just lying to us all again. What a f*****g surprise, eh?

I just looked at this WSJ article But it’s far from clear. It states:” This will provide many U.K. service suppliers with legal guarantees that they will not face barriers to trade when selling into the EU and will support the mobility of U.K. professionals who will continue to do business across the EU," according to the document.“
The article ends with: “EU Officials are watching the U.K. closely for signals that their former partner will become too much of a competitor....[currently(?)] More than 90% of euro-denominated interest-rate derivatives and 84% of foreign-exchange trading in the EU take place in the U.K., according to New Financial.”