@FD1000 As someone who has been committed to public service for the past 36 years, your comments are offensive. Federal employees are innocent bystanders in this whole mess and we are just trying to do our jobs. We entered public service because we want to contribute to society in a range of different ways. For me that contribution comes in funding the development of cures for cancer patients. I can’t do that job right now. So before you talk about how “boring” the government shut down is, maybe you should give that some thought. A lot of people are getting hurt by this shutdown

Given the massive run up and the high PE etc ratios, I would not expect the SP500 to do much over the next ten years. that is certainly what has happened historically. It was dead in the water for up to 13 years or more after 1998
Much better to diversify into cheaper stuff or RSP. Lots of other things went up. Trees do not grow to the sky

the best, FXAIX
The best for you and undeniably one of the best. But simply the best, better than all the rest?

ETFs offer greater accessibility at possibly lower trading cost (bid/ask spread vs. TF at many non-Fidelity brokerages). Institutional investors and traders may have difficulty using FXAIX with its restriction of two round trips within 90 days (trading rights are suspended if this is exceeded).
In terms of raw performance, FXAIX is arguably not even the best. Fidelity's Flex fund FDFIX, used by Fidelity's robo advisor, has a better 5 year return (it hasn't been around for 10 years yet). On the DIY front, USPRX ($100K min) has a better 10 year return. Though technically not an S&P 500 fund, Lipper includes it in its S&P500 index category.
Different strokes for different folks. "Best" here can be mathematically quantified by constructing an "objective" function that measures how good a fund is. But each person's priorities translate into different objective functions.

There have been a number of manager changes at Vanguard International Explorer (VINEX).
Schroder Investment Management was the sole manager when Vanguard acquired the fund in June 2002.
AUM grew quickly and the fund was forced to close two years later before reopening in October 2008.
It seemed like the fund would close in 2010 but Wellington Management was added as a sub-adviser instead.
AUM exceeded $3.5 billion in late 2017 — breaching the previous asset high-water mark —
and Vanguard added TimesSquare Capital Management as the third sub-adviser.
Baillie Gifford was added as the fourth sub-adviser three years later.
Vanguard fired TimesSquare in 2022 after only five years on the job.
Baillie Gifford was fired in March 2025 after approximately five years.
VINEX now has two sub-advisors — Wellington Management with 60% of the portfolio
and Schroder Investment Management with 40% of the portfolio.
https://www.independentvanguardadviser.com/iva-quick-take-vanguard-reshuffles-international-explorer-again/
Note: Subscription required to access article in its entirety.

"But timing is everything and I think morningstar stated that most equity mutual funds
show Investor return to be less than NAV return over 3-15 yr periods because people
buy funds when they've already captured much of the upside over those periods."
I believe you are referring to Morningstar's annual Mind the Gap study.
"We estimate the average dollar invested in US mutual funds and exchange-traded funds
earned 7.0% per year over the decade ended Dec. 31, 2024.
That estimate, which is akin to an internal rate of return calculation,
accounts for investors’ purchases and sales of fund shares during that 10-year period."
"The 7.0% annual dollar-weighted return is about 1.2 percentage points per year
less than these funds’ 8.2% aggregate annual total return
(which assumes an initial lump-sum purchase) over the 10 years ended Dec. 31, 2024.
That 'gap' is explained by the timing and magnitude of investors’ transactions during the period."
https://www.morningstar.com/financial-advisors/volatility-bedevils-fund-investors

they key is pinpointing these funds ahead of time and capturing the upside. these funds exist in batches of other funds with similar performance/metrics for a specific period of time.
A financial advisor about 5 years ago published a list of mutual funds with a longtime track record of 12% or more returns and that had a very positive previous 10 years. He was very much like see Dave Ramsey was right this is easy! someone looked at those funds 5 years later and did a memorandum. only 12% of those funds (most sector and large growth) beat the sp500. And it was a very popular post in Dave Ramsey circles which tells me tons of people likely built their portfolios around them.
lots of people have caught lightning in a bottle and captured the upside of funds like AIVSX/DODGX as a result of their proliferation in retirement plans.
But timing is everything and I think morningstar stated that most equity mutual funds show Investor return to be less than NAV return over 3-15 yr periods because people buy funds when they've already captured much of the upside over those periods.

@msf I hear you. But I tend to keep thinking about young people starting out and forming a family while facing job disruptions and high housing costs. Also, from what I can see the direction of the country safety net is headed, they will need to have wages that cover private pay, unsubsidized, of things like healthcare, food and retirement. This means wages that grow from jobs that are secure. What counts is prospering over time. Stagnation won't get them there.

The unemployment rate for youth graduates (20-24) has averaged 8.1% over the last three months, its highest in four years.
And you rightfully point out that employers are eliminating pensions and passing on higher health care costs. The government wants them to be popping out kids to help with labor shortages. The employment/economic conditions do not support this.
This is a very interesting read from 2015. Mass deportations will absolutely accelerate the problems with population decline.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/stratfor/2015/02/17/population-decline-and-the-great-economic-reversal/

@StayCalm, that's an amazing fraud story in WSJ.
A chain of fake companies was setup with fancy websites and the companies operated on paper only for 5+ years. But they took real loans (private-credit) with fake collaterals. The likes of HPSInvestments/BlackRock (BLK) and BNP Paribas were duped and their $500 million private-credit loan simply disappeared. Apparently, during a routine audit, a fake email was noted, then another, then the realization that all documents were fake, and the companies too.
This sounds worse than Tricolor and First Brands failures. May be Jamie DIMON was right with his cockroach comment.
Actually, Dimon may know more. Years ago, HPSInvestments grew out of JPM, was spun out and grew on its own for a while, and was acquired by BLK only in 2025. Larry FINK is so rapidly expanding BLK with acquisitions that it may not have had time to look deep into HPSInvestments and its private-credit clients, including the reported fake companies.

"
Mona
September 27 Flag
@bee: Take a look at FISMX. Similar country allocations to VINEX. Better 5-year performance and about the same 3-year performance. VINEX has better performance over the past 3-years.
Anyone taking a buy approach of the three funds mentioned?
I may take a second look after RMD.
Thanks for this comment @Mona & @bee

VOO and QQQ (or QQQM) are the only funds I would purchase.
Very liquid, low expense ratios, low frictional costs, and ample diversification.
Active management is nonsense in my opinion.

Passive funds like VOO and QQQ are tough to beat for investors
who are primarily interested in the highest U.S. large-cap returns

¹.
Investors may realize higher success rates for actively managed funds
in other categories like bonds (broadly speaking) or emerging market equities.
¹ Some investors deliberately select less risky large-cap funds.

Tech has been tough to beat over the last ten and fifteen year periods. So QQQ has been tough to beat outside a tech sector fund.
However, if you were the buy and hold type, there was a window five years ago where you could have picked up a number of funds that are still beating QQQ despite everything since then. Just for fun, I'll mention three small-cap value funds: VSMIX 26.05, BSCRX 21.65, and RWJ 19.72 to 19.21 for QQQ.
Will those funds maintain their leads? Who can say? Sometimes it helps to get lucky. If you had bought DODGX, VFINX, and QQQ on March 24, 2000, your investment in DODGX would have grown by 1024% to 598% for VFINX and 534% for QQQ.
March 24, 2000 was the day the S&P 500 peaked before the bust--if Perplexity can be believed. Let's try March 31, 1999, QQQ's first day. Since then, DODGX 1,168%, QQQ 1311%, and VFINX 739%. As with comedy, timing is everything.
VOO ain't what it used to be. Actively managed BBLU has been beating it for fifteen years with less tech and less volatility. Tech-heavy funds like FELG and SCHG also beat it.
Over the last five years it has become rather easy to beat. Just the other day I bought EISIX, which has been beating it for five years; so have BSCRX, AICFX, and AFIFX for that matter. Then there are any number of growth-oriented funds that are doing it.
But what if I had bought VOO and VSMIX five years ago, and continued to invest 100.00$ a month since then. I would guess that the day you actually bought would make some difference. But I'm not going to parse that when Portfolio Visualizer can get me close enough--dinky linky. For those that don't follow links, you would have 44K in VSMIX to 32K in VOO. The worst year for VSMIX was +4.58 versus -18.19 for VOO. Will VOO catch up to VSMIX some day? Maybe. Stay tuned.
Forgot to include QQQ in the previous scenario. Here you go. DFL: VSMIX still winning.
Buy tech? Absolutely. Buy the S&P 500? If it floats your boat, why not?

My SIL has been buying 50/50 VOO/QQQ for years now. He can already retire.
In the early 1990s, a good friend invested in ten individual stocks, putting about $3,000 into each. The rest of his monthly contributions went into the S&P 500.
Nine of those stocks didn’t amount to much — but the tenth, Microsoft, grew into more than $1.5 million.

VOO and QQQ (or QQQM) are the only funds I would purchase. Very liquid, low expense ratios, low frictional costs, and ample diversification. Active management is nonsense in my opinion.

Just finished reading his book. Great read.

+1 Agree
Numbers are strange things in that there’s often more behind the raw data (like dividends) than first meets the eye. But it is worth noting that, according to Sorkin (interview), the initial drop of around 50% in “the market” in 1929 was largely recouped by year’s end when the market had pulled back to only a 17% loss for the year. Major publications in summarizing the year’s top stories didn’t even find that notable enough to highlight.
It was in the years following ‘29 that the real unraveling occurred. By about ‘39 or ‘40 the market had fallen by 90% from its 1929 high. A lesson might be that dips and relatively quick recoveries are what we’ve become accustomed to. A prologued near decade-long decline can’t be completely ruled out and something I doubt any of us are prepared for. It’s the time span that I find most intriguing. The ‘07-‘09 fiasco by comparison lasted only about 15 or 16 months by my memory.
Have a nice day!

Best guess (based on annual statement calling this GO VR with maturity 11/1/43) is CUSIP 74514L3T2. The GO means General Obligation; I'm guessing that TRP used VR to mean variable rate. It's actually a CVIS.
That's a really funky type of bond. A few years ago I helped someone who held this specific bond with their taxes. Not going to revisit.
Quick Bloomberg summary:

contingent value instruments ... only repay if sales-tax revenue collections surpass budgeted estimates.
The CVIs are taxable and do not carry interest.

US Savings I-Bonds Rate, 11/1/25 – 4/30/25
Total 4.03% (vs previous 3.98%)
Fixed rate is 0.90%, the semiannual inflation is 1.56%.
www.treasurydirect.gov/savings-bonds/i-bonds/
Keep in mind the following:
1. There is a 3-month interest penalty for selling in years 1-5.
2. Interest accrues monthly on the 1st of the month but is added to the principal only at 6-monthly intervals from the purchase date. So, simple interest applies from the month of purchase up to 6 months, & then is compounded (i.e. added to the principal) at 6-monthly intervals.
3. Buy late in the month, or sell early in the month, to get full month interest.

I was looking through my watch lists and I see that many funds are missing their periodic returns; which makes it kind of hard to see how some old funds behaved fifteen years ago when you can't even tell how they did over the last week.
Who still pays for their drivel?

Are you dollar cost averaging? If your broker won't accommodate that for you, you need another broker.

I don't follow. Drop = Invest. $10K invested in Tech in 2022 has gone a lot further than $10K invested in 2021. Don't plan to sell anything for at least 10 more years. Had a broker for 5 years, learned from him, then discarded him and his bias, and now do it myself.

Dollar cost averaging means you spread the allocated money out over a year, rather than dropping the bundle all at once. So divide your available funds by 12 months or 52 weeks.
Maybe that is already happening with an employee contribution program you are already involved in where the deductions are made whenever your paycheck is issued.
If you are dropping money all at once outside of an employee contribution plan, you might want to look into spreading the drop out over a year.
The theory is you're going to catch lows and highs. If you're confident in your own sense of market timing, and feel that the market is on an upward trajectory, then dropping the bundle when the cash is available might make the best sense for you.
Just shooting the breeze.

It has been this way for years. They used to give you some interesting information. Then they cut all that and acted like they were doing you a favor so you wouldn't be inundated.
And the service has still been intermittent.
I would hate to be an IT worker for M*.

I never said I'm better. I already made my comments then and now.
No one should predict the future.
Predictions based on valuation have been wrong for over 10 years.
Lastly, did you make changes in real time to your portfolio based on the memos?

Are you dollar cost averaging? If your broker won't accommodate that for you, you need another broker.

I don't follow. Drop = Invest. $10K invested in Tech in 2022 has gone a lot further than $10K invested in 2021. Don't plan to sell anything for at least 10 more years. Had a broker for 5 years, learned from him, then discarded him and his bias, and now do it myself.

A conservative rule of thumb is to keep anything you expect to need in cash or something very close to cash, between 5 and 10 years in substantially IG bonds, and longer term in equity or near equity (e.g. HY bonds). A more modern rule of thumb is to use timeframes of 0-3 years, 3-7 years, and 7+ years.
However you slice it, 20% in equity is more like a low risk portfolio for the beginning of retirement (age 65) than one half-way through that phase. It's not high risk but adding the equity changes things significantly. Here's Portfolio Visualizer's simulation, I substituted WSHFX for CGDV because CGDV latter has too short a life to work with PV. WSHFX hasn't returned as much as CGDV, but it has a lower std dev and is the best quick hack I could come up with.
This portfolio will almost surely return positive inflation adjusted returns as opposed to an all bond portfolio that gradually loses value over time. The question here is whether that matters since you're looking to fund your wife's expenses after your death, not grow a portfolio. The tradeoff is double the volatility (probably even a bit more with CGDV instead of WSHFX).
Looking at worst case, drawdowns between 3/29/22 and 4/30/22 9/30/22 were (from M* charts):
CGDV: -21.81%
SCHD: -15.43%
ICMUX: -4.76%
RSIIX: -4.26%
RCTIX: -3.51%
DHEAX: -1.89%
CBLDX: -1.12%
SWVXX: +0.10% (my guesstimate)
RPHIX: +1.07%
Equally weighted portfolio: -5.73%
I helped nudge an 80 year old I knew into an 80/20 portfolio, so I'm not knocking 80/20. But that portfolio had more than 20% in cash and near cash.
It really depends on how you view risk, both pragmatically (will the portfolio last long enough) and psychologically (can you sleep at night). If you're trying to replace a pension one thought is a (possibly deferred) annuity. An annuity is just a stream of payments like a pension, which is why I bring it up.
An annuity would provide lifetime income to your wife, much as your pension is providing lifetime income to you. If you defer the income (either with a deferred annuity or a deferred income annuity), then there are no income payments until later. Since you're thinking about this portfolio as a replacement for your pension, it doesn't sound like you need the income stream until your pension vanishes.
A deferred fixed annuity can also guarantee that you won't lose money. As always, TANSTAAFL. The safer the investment, the lower the return. But since you expressed concern about bond funds possibly losing money it seemed worth mentioning this feature (drawback?) of some annuities.