Hi, guys.
On my EM investments, I'd simple. I have a plan, I stick with it. My average holding time for funds is some combination of "15 years or since inception." I sold my MACSX position mostly because the stock/bond and domestic/international balance was so badly off. That was the same reason that I moved my monthly SIGIX contribution down to quarterly.
As long as Seafarer and Grandeur Peak honor their part of the bargain, I'll honor mine. I'd certainly make more money if I sold at the right time, but I've never shown that skill before and don't suppose it's snuck up on me now.
David

”I played the game for many years … “
That’s my take too. It’s all about risk / reward. Than again, I’m not very “sophisticated”.
:)

This is kind of beating that poor old dead horse (yet again) but all of this stuff totally depends upon one's age, needs, and resources. I played the game for many years: stocks, stock funds (of many areas and types), bonds, bond funds, Mmkt funds, CDs and Treasuries, real estate rentals (both commercial and residential), even second mortgages (did very nicely on those).
Of course results varied over time, and certainly we weren't into all of those things at the same time. Some were certainly turkeys, but overall we did pretty darned well. At this point we are well out of the accumulation phase and into the preservation phase. 5% does the job very nicely, thank you.

>> ... cash should not be thought of as an equity substitute.
>> Investing is a game where success usually follows those who think using probabilities, rather than certainty.
Who thinks like this?
>> Over a five-year period, the difference between stocks and cash is more than 50%. Over 20 years, it’s more than 700%.
Jeez does this need an editor for, what's the word, sophistication. It's the 5%, not only the certainty of cash.
US inflation the last year has been under 4%.

Thanks all for the enlightening thoughts. Especially to @msf for the M* story. Please know the article does not represent the view of the FT. The paper publishes a wide variety of viewpoints. As someone noted, there’s a nearby column in the same issue by El-Erian with a somewhat contrary opinion. I chose to share it more because of the attention-grabbing title plus what seems like a contrarian point of view. FWIW, former head of Bridgewater, Ray Dalio was calling cash “trash” just 2-3 years ago, but has changed his tune and thinks it’s an excellent investment today at higher rates. Who is Karen Ward? First time I ever heard of her. But she works for J.P. Morgan as some sort of investment analyst. Her job description appears in the article.
Cash represents safety. At around a 5% yield it represents a return at / near the recent level of inflation (depending which gage you use or who you believe). Personally, with Social Security and a decent pension I can afford to take more risk in investing than many. So, carrying a very low cash balance doesn’t upset me much. Most of my investments might be described as “alternative” type funds of one sort or another. I try to keep them in relative balance, adding to those that have lagged lately (utilities is one example) and skimming profits from the recent better performers. To me, that represents a more stable less risky approach than owning plain vanilla equity or balanced funds. A caveat, however, is that fees are a lot higher on most of the types of (alternative) funds I invest in. I’m willing to pay that extra price in betting I can at least keep pace with cash over multi-year periods with minimal volatility (ie: pain) and possibly exceed it by a percent or two.
To each his own. I’ve never found El-Erian particularity good at calling the shots. Always sounds pessimistic to me. Since David Giroux is such a favorite here, one might wonder what his position is currently regarding the opportunities in select stocks and longer dated fixed-income securities? Wouldn’t surprise me if his fund is carrying a healthy chunk or cash, being the conservative manager he is.
Investing is always a gamble. With an overweight cash allocation one gambles that other types of investments won’t appreciate substantially during the time one is sitting in cash and that the current appealing cash returns will persist for very long. From @msf’s linked M* article: ”Investing is a game where success usually follows those who think using probabilities, rather than certainty.”
Thanks again for all the comments.

So declares Spencer Jakab, a WSJ writer, in the October 11 WSJ.
His argument is that small caps are historically undervalued relative to large caps: "the ratio of the Russell 2000 to the Russell 100 index, which has moved between a low of 58% ... to a high of around 115% ... is back down to 74%, indicating a fairly stressed level." At the same time he admits headwinds: small caps are far more exposed to interest rate changes than are large caps. Their debt is more likely floating than fixed and the average maturity on their debt is 4.4 years versus twice that for large caps.
Why consider them? Small caps have outperformed large caps, by an average of 16.51%, coming out of every one of the past 11 recessions. (SJ's wording is odd here: "in the 12 months after a recession was declared every time." The Lords of Finance generally officially declare a recession about eight months after it ends.)
In particular, small value is a good place to be. Focusing on small-value "could have the added benefit of supercharging returns during a recovery. For example, the years 2001-2004 saw $100 investing in the S&P 500 turn into about $98 which an investment in the Russell 2000 Value grew to $180."
The "almost" is the "they do well after a recession but suffer during one" part, I would guess.
My own exposure to the small cap sub-class is divided between the ultra-cautious Palm Valley Capital (micro-cap value, $250M AUM, 13% invested in stocks, up 5.3% YTD) and the ultra-charged Grandeur Peak Global Micro (micro-cap growth, soft-closed with $41M AUM, fully invested, down 2% YTD, but top 1% over five years).

It's all the money that went in on net basis but then simply went to the "money heaven". Of course, some may ask to look at percentages, but the gross $s lost provide an interesting snapshot of the current times - note the types of funds that made the list; Twitter link also has a similar list from 4 years ago.
Billions gone are billions that are gone from investors and the market.

We have gotten used to crossover SUVs.
There are 2 kinds of SUVs - the original rugged ones (like Jeep Wrangler - basically, a flimsy cabin slapped on a powerful engine) and crossovers.
The rugged SUVs are based on pickup/truck chassis/platforms that are rough and possibly unsafe.
Crossover SUVs are just based on car chassis/platforms. For example, Honda CRV is based on Honda Civic chassis/platform, and Honda Pilot is based on Honda Accord chassis/platform. In mechanical, drivability and safety aspects, the crossover SUVs are very similar to their related car-chassis/platforms. The only difference is the outer shape/shell.
Initially, my wife was hesitant to drive Honda CRV, but I explained to her that it is really "smaller" and "lighter" than Honda Accord that she drove for years. Now, it is "her" car.
For me, CRV was sort of underpowered, so I got Acura RDX with V6. Just a year later, Honda came out of Honda Passport with V6. I like to think that it was in response to my complaints to dealers and Honda about the lack of a bigger V6 in Honda mid-SUV line (I was told just to go with RDX). But Honda listened (my wishful thinking!), and came out with Honda Passport, a mid-SUV with V6.
So, what is the difference between 4WD and AWD? Well, that is for some future post.

@hank, @caerw388, if you don't have a SUV, where do you keep your golf clubs?
Seriously, after driving small Dakota and Ranger pickup trucks for over 20 years, I decided to lease a Toyota Camry. A sedan. Hated it. Not because it was a bad car, but you couldn't carry anything in that little trunk. Convenience is why people buy SUV's and why sedans are becoming obsolete. After that sedan lease, I bought a Subaru Outback. Love it. Now my golf clubs and pull cart have a summer home.

We long-term investors all know that what we really need is for a fund company to lock up our money, throw way the key, issue no quarterly or annual reports, and tell us after 10 years or so how we made out. We just don’t recognize when someone has our best interests at heart.

No offense to Russ Kinnel, but he's been writing "news" pieces like this for 20 years, and I have yet to read anything that did not make me feel dumber after having read it.

Several people have commented in other posts about cumulative performance figures being distorted by a recent year's hot performance ("what have you done for me lately"), including Prof. Snowball, me, and others.
In Prof. Snowball's piece (linked to above, and here), he praises BRUFX by looking at "three metrics across more meaningful stretches: multiple decades, full market cycles and the last two market crashes." BRSVX hasn't been around nearly as long as BRUFX; it started in Oct 2003. With this limitation in mind, here are the data for AVALX, PVFIX, BRSVX. I included IJS (S&P 600 value ETF) as a benchmark in the Portfolio Visualizer link for each period but did not transcribe its figures below.

Period		CAGR				Std Dev			    Sharpe Ratio
AVALX	PVFIX	BRSVX		AVALX	PVFIX	BRSVX		AVALX	PVFIX	BRSVX
15 yr	11.02%	5.54%	9.51%		28.77%	10.78%	22.81%		0.75	0.69	0.72
Full Cycle 2007-2020
6.81%	4.59%	5.24%		28.18%	10.20%	21.97%		0.35	0.41	0.30
Down Cycle 2007-2009
-5.09%	2.65%	-9.59%		36.83%	11.35%	28.03%		-0.01	0.11	-0.37

Looking at these broader picture numbers, it seems not so much that BRSVX benefited from one hot year, but rather that it doesn't do quite so well in down years. Comparing the BRSVX with AVALX not by a calendar year (i.e. 2020), but trough to peak (roughly 3/19/20 - 6/4/21), one sees similar performance though following different paths.
http://stockcharts.com/h-perf/ui?s=BRSVX&compare=AVALX&id=p85687049134
It's in the latter half of 2021, when the market turned and AVALX's greater volatility worked to its detriment that the funds diverged radically.
https://stockcharts.com/h-perf/ui?s=BRSVX&compare=AVALX,IJS&id=p37670197904
PVFIX is certainly a steady performer. But at a cost of way underperforming in good years. From its chart (see the 15 year performance link above), it almost looks like a SCV cousin of RPHYX - ridiculously steady relative to peers. Something I value in a "near cash" fund. But in an equity fund, my personal risk tolerance is a bit higher than that.
If you like AVALX, did you look into DFFVX? A clone of it is available in variable annuities, e.g. TIAA. So unlike the Fidelity fund that is used only internally by Fidelity, some investors could access this fund (sort of).

I'm still learning to navigate in a world in which the Morningstar fund screener is ... well, worthless. A once-useful tool has been reduced to being able to answer a single question: "what does Morningstar think about this fund?" Star rating, analyst rating, ESG rating: yes, yes, yes. Comparisons of absolute and risk-adjusted returns over meaningful periods? Go 'way, kid, ya bother me!
Today's adventure sought to answer the question: what are the most consistently solid small cap value funds around? I used MFO Premium to look at domestic and global funds, checked Sharpe and APR for the past 3-, 5-, 7-, 9- and 11-year periods. I found two disappointments: two Great Owl funds were consistently in or around the top five, but one was only available to Fidelity fund managers (Fido Series Intrinsic Opps) and the other (Kinetic Small Cap Opps) had a 41% stake in a single stock, Texas Land & Power.
Pinnacle Value and Aegis Value were frequently, but not always, top five funds. They're both rock solid, distinctive, tiny one-man operations.
The surprise was Bridgeway Small Cap Value, the fund that was in the top five more often that any other. Small- to micro-cap. 130 names. Quant. Five star.
All of which I was going to share until I scanned its Morningstar profile and noticed that its success was entirely driven by one year: 2021. The fund made north of 67% and left everyone in the dust. That number then elevated all of the trailing comparisons. It otherwise trailed more than two-thirds of its peers in five of the past 11 years. It's trailed its index six times but I have no idea of what to make of it since it's a custom Morningstar index which apparently cannot be entered into their charting tool to generate a detailed comparison ... though I can get the index denominated in Euros, pounds, Canadian dollars...). Overall, 2020-2022 was a solid stretch for the fund. 2013-19 and 2023, not so much.
All of which I share as a cautionary tale: look carefully, then look again, differently.

Excellent interview, and I agree with a lot of what he says -- especially with his investing style and comments about utilities. The last question is precisely why I like being along for the ride in PRWCX (and potentially TCAP) because it suggests he still has his priorities right.
"People who know me, just know I’m not wired to rest on my laurels or take it easy. I’m just not wired that way. I think we talked about last time when I was on the podcast, I had won couple of Morningstar Manager of the Year awards, trophies. I gave one away to my APM, Steven Krichbaum, and one is in a bag somewhere down in the basement that I don’t know where it is, honestly. And then, I’ve won 18 or 19 awards from Lipper. I’ve never asked for a plaque. I’ve never received a plaque. I don’t want a plaque. I don’t want reminders of past performance making me soft. That’s really important for me. I want to look forward, not backward. That’s really, really important."
< - >
"The last thing I would say is—and it puts a little pressure on me, honestly—is there are so many people that are counting on me: clients, friends, family, my mother, my colleagues, my colleagues’ families, people I grew up with, advisors, and they’ve kind of become accustomed, they’ve come used to generating incredible returns over time. You do it for 15 to 16 years in a row, they expect you to do it next 15 to 16 years. And I have this horrible fear of letting them down. And I’m going to do everything in my power every day that I’m doing this job to make sure that I never let them down. I think if I underperform, my mom is going to be pissed. So, I got to make sure I keep delivering for my clients and my family. And we’re going to continue to work as hard as we possibly can as a team to continue to do that."

GMO released a research note today, arguing in favor of (a) Japan equities and (b) value investing therein. Here's their bottom line:

• Investors have been chronically underweight Japan for the past three decades, and rightly so given Japan’s weaker relative fundamentals and underwhelming commitment to corporate reform through much of the 1990s and 2000s.
• But conditions on the ground have changed meaningfully. Improving fundamentals and governance reforms are increasingly evident to investors speaking directly with companies and policymakers in Japan, as our Usonian Japan Equity team does. EPS growth has been relatively strong in Japan for years, distributions of excess capital have increased, and policymakers continue to push for more competitive and capital-efficient companies.
• Nonetheless, most international equity strategies remain materially underweight Japanese equities. Of 225 actively managed strategies in the eVestment database that list the MSCI EAFE index as their preferred benchmark, 84% are underweight Japan by an average of 7.5%. (GMO, "Japan Equities Are Compelling…" 10/4/2023)

GMO runs a couple Japan-value strategies.
Japan is rockin' this year. The New York Times agrees that changes in corporate governance are driving the strong returns ("

Investors Are Putting Big Money Into Japan Again. Here’s Why," 6/14/2023). The counterargument, at least according to my newsfeed, to GMO is that the gains are all driven by currency fluctuations. (Not my argument, and I haven't looked at the evidence behind it. I'm just reporting a headline I read yesterday). That said, the top three Japan-oriented funds over the past 10 are all ETFs, all hedged and all doing fine this year. Per MFO Premium:

1. WisdomTree Japan Hedged SmallCap: 14.4% APR for 10 years, 26% YTD, five star, Bronze analyst rating, highest Sharpe ratio, smallest drawdown,
2. WisdomTree Japan Hedged: 11.1% APR, 33% YTD, Great Owl, five star, Bronze analyst rating, tied for #2 in Sharpe
3. Xtrackers MSCI Japan Hedged Equity ETF: 10.3% APR, Great Owl, four star, Silver analyst rating, tied for #2 in Sharpe

Hennessy Japan Small Cap is the first actively managed fund on the 10-year list, at #4.
For what interest it holds, David

Have a heart, Your Honor!
Perhaps the judge did and may have offered parole in say just under 10,000 years :-)
Several countries have introduced CBDCs. The Fed is still evaluating digital-dollar.
Cryptocurrencies and central bank digital currencies may share much of the same technology, but they are substantially different entities with different characteristics and objectives.
From the IMF:

Central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) are digital versions of cash that are issued and regulated by central banks. As such, they are more secure and inherently not volatile, unlike crypto assets. ...
In 1993, the Bank of Finland launched the Avant smart card, an electronic form of cash. ... it can be considered the world’s first CBDC.

https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd/issues/2022/09/Picture-this-The-ascent-of-CBDCs
The main objectives I've seen put forth for CBDCs are: (1) to serve the unbanked and under-banked, and (2) to facilitate secure, speedy transactions.
(Here's the full White House list of objectives.)
Those are fine objectives. Though I don't see what CBDC could offer that banks could not if they offered a form of "universal service" (with outreach programs) and perhaps made some technological upgrades. For example some transit systems now accept bank cards in addition to their own payment cards. Does it really matter whether the form of payment is a digital bank card or a government issued digital currency card?
Most of the benefits arise from "digital" not from "central bank". Much as securities transactions have become easier and faster with (digital) book entry instead of physical paper stock certificates.
Cryptocurrency is different and was promulgated on the objective of decentralization (no controlling authority). While the cryptocurrencies are not controlled by governments (clearly differentiating them from CBDCs), they have still tended toward centralized control.

[Decentralization] was the premise of the initial Bitcoin white paper, which offered a cryptographic solution intended to allow payments to be sent without involving any financial institution or other trusted intermediary. However, Bitcoin became centralized very quickly and now depends on a small group of software developers and mining pools to function. As internet pioneer and publisher Tim O’Reilly observed, “Blockchain turned out to be the most rapid recentralization of a decentralized technology that I’ve seen in my lifetime.”

https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd/issues/2022/09/Point-of-View-the-superficial-allure-of-crypto-Hilary-Allen
So, there is something there that may not be obvious to all.
Sizzle?
Or as Clara Peller put it, where's the beef?

@MikeM : Main point , after many years in the wrong category it went from 1* to 3* !
I'm not complaining as I do own a small slice of RPHYX.
I see Buffalo kicked the snot out of Miami ! Maybe , just maybe it's their year to take the Lombardi trophy home ?!
A star is just a star, Derf

@BenWP, prosecutors had asked for 40,562 years. That is about 20 years per victim, and there were 2,027+ known.
Judge showed leniency and REDUCED that to 11,196 years.
Turkish judges have become wild with sentences after the death penalty was eliminated.

I can see a sentence of 11,000 years, but the 196/7 years tacked on seems really excessive. Have a heart, Your Honor!

The Wall Street Journal (10/03/2023) reports:

While the generation born in the 1980s and 1990s has lagged behind prior generations when it comes to homeownership and earnings, new data suggests they are saving more for retirement. By the time older millennials now earning a median salary reach retirement, Vanguard estimates, they will be able to replace almost 60% of their preretirement income with Social Security and savings from sources including their 401(k)s and individual retirement accounts.
Gen Xers and the youngest baby boomers with median earnings are, by contrast, likely to replace about half of their paychecks in retirement. ("Millennials on Better Track for Retirement Than Boomers and Gen X")

The reason they give is at employers now automatically enroll new employees in a 401(k) with a default target-date fund. The plans are often crappy and overpriced, but a mile better than the previous plan: let them figure it out on their own.
Three quick notes:
1. "better" is still not "good" - the same Vanguard study estimates at the median income should target replacing 83% of their pre-retirement income with investments + Social Security.
2. relatively few can anticipate the life path that we or our parents had: home ownership is out of reach in and around the megacities, though remarkably affordable in likely "climate havens" in the Upper Midwest, around the Great Lakes ex-Chicago, and parts of New England, and half of young folks in their 20s are living at home with their parents.

I grew up in a multi-generational home - nine of us, representing three generations, shared the same 900 square foot, 1890s brick house for a long time - so "living with family" isn't something I see as automatically negative.

3. if anyone cared to notice, this might go down in Augustana history as "Snowball's good deed." Ten or 15 years ago I was called upon to help rebuild the college's retirement plan, which had a generous employer contribution (10% of base salary) but almost no employee contributions. We also had over 1200 fund and annuity options. Depending on the department (faculty, facilities, admin, food services ...), participation was in the low teens as a percentage of eligible folks contributing and the average contribution was around 3% a year.
I helped engineer four moves: a far smaller array of fund choices, automatic enrollment in the plan, automatic escalation of the employee's contribution from 6% (year one) to 10% (year five and beyond, unless the opted out) and a shift in the college's contribution from a straight percentage to a 5% guaranteed contribution plus up to 6% more in a matching contribution.
When I last checked, we had something like 94% participation and an average contribution around 9%.
Which no one but you knows.
Cheers!