Good point BaluBalu. It's like, why even bother opening this fund if you're already capacity-constrained in other funds. Good boutique fund company, but the apparent overlap in all their funds is concerning to me. It reminds me a little of what Royce funds did 10-15 years ago.
FWIW. I've owned GPGOX since inception and have been very happy with it. For many years it was my only SC investment.
Can anyone with more than a couple Grandeur Peak funds chime in as to why? Maybe it is beneficial to own multiple, but why?

December 16, 2021
Please see below for today’s Press Release announcing the launch of the Grandeur Peak Global Explorer Fund (GPGEX) on Thursday, December 16, 2021.
The Global Explorer Fund will only be available in one share class (Institutional), with a minimum investment of just $1,000 ($100 for minors)* in order to make it broadly accessible to all investors. The Fund should be available through most of our existing channel relationships (Schwab, TD Ameritrade, Pershing, Fidelity, etc.) and it is of course available directly from Grandeur Peak Funds. If you have difficulty purchasing the Fund, please let us know and we will work with you to try to get it listed on your platform.
To learn more about this new fund, call any of us on the client team (contacts below) or our Investor Services team at 1-855-377-7325; Additional information will also be posted to our website: www.grandeurpeakglobal.com.
Best Regards,
Mark Siddoway, CFA, CAIA, MBA
Head of Client Relations
801-384-0010
Todd Matheny, CAIA
Director of Client Relations
801-384-0095
Amy Johnson, MBA, CFP®
Sr. Manager, Client Relations
801-384-0044
*Third-party platforms may impose different minimum requirements.
PRESS RELEASE
Dear Fellow Shareholders,
We are pleased to announce the launch of the Grandeur Peak Global Explorer Fund (GPGEX). The Fund will invest in what the firm believes are the most interesting equity investments around the world. The holdings will primarily be micro to mid-cap companies.
The new fund is a sister fund to the existing Grandeur Peak Global Reach Fund (GPRIX). The two funds share a similar mandate, but they approach portfolio management from a different angle. The Global Reach Fund (launched in 2013) is managed collaboratively by the firm’s five industry teams/portfolio managers, plus a guardian portfolio manager. Similarly, the new Global Explorer Fund will be managed by the firm’s seven geographic region teams/portfolio managers, plus a guardian portfolio manager.
Said Blake Walker, CEO, “In our quest to cover the globe, members of our research team wear multiple hats – some combination of an industry hat, a geography hat, and a fund hat. We long ago divided the world up into industries (5) and geographic regions (7) and gave analysts the charge to find the most interesting companies in their assigned space. The beauty of viewing the world through these two different lenses is that we have at least two people looking at every company, namely the relevant industry analyst and geography analyst. We have found it to be a powerful ‘multiple minds’ tool.”
Juliette Douglas, a geography portfolio manager, and the portfolio manager who will coordinate the Global Explorer team’s efforts, continued, “In hindsight, it could have made sense to launch the Global Explorer at the same time as Global Reach, but candidly we weren’t staffed or ready to do so eight years ago. Today it’s an easy extension for our team and the geographic paper portfolio we have managed for some time. We expect Reach and Explorer will look fairly similar given our collaborative approach, but we also believe there will be a very real benefit in putting our geography PMs at the helm of their own fund. Those benefits will play out in the Global Explorer Fund and also radiate through the rest of the Grandeur Peak Funds. The geography teams are thrilled at this opportunity.”
Grandeur Peak has from day one shown a very strong commitment to managing capacity at a firm level, and closing funds early. With many of the Grandeur Peak Funds currently closed, Todd Matheny, Director of Client Relations, commented on the capacity of the new Fund: “With the Global Explorer Fund focused on our more capacity-constrained micro to mid-cap space, we plan to soft close the Fund around $35M in AUM. We are excited about this Fund, and the strategic value it adds across our entire family of funds, but we intend to close it very small to ensure all of our funds retain the investment flexibility they need to remain focused on delivering performance for our clients.”

As a long term owner of two Primecap funds (at either end of the so-called risk spectrum) I have some concerns. The obvious one is relative performance: all of the Primecap funds seem to have under-performed their benchmarks -- as well as "the market" -- over the past five years, some over the past ten (especially when taxes are taken into account). I regard that as a moderate length of time, sufficient to capture my attention. When it comes to the riskier funds (in my case POAGX), I seem to see some very off-beat names in the top 25 holdings, although I'm certainly not privy to the research resulting in those buy decisions. Of far greater concern to me is the fact that the team at Primecap appears to lack any notion of a "sell" discipline. The concept of a "target price" seems alien to them. On many occasions in the recent past the market has literally gifted stocks in the portfolios with sudden, unwarranted, and ultimately temporary price increases that Primecap rarely takes advantage of. (Examples include BABA, BIIB, NKTR, SGEN, but there are quite a few in addition.) What to do? I decided to take this year's hefty capital gains distributions (attributable to shareholder redemptions) in cash. Based on preliminary information, it looks like most Odyssey fund shareholders did the same thing yesterday. The Vanguard funds haven't made their distributions yet.

PRHSX held 29.3% of its 200 name portfolio in biotech as of 09-30-2021.
I've owned the fund for a long time, and the key to me has been to buy it and forget it. An investment in a health sector fund is definitely a long term (10+ years) prospect.

@JonGaltill: right, BST is a BlackRock closed end science and tech fund, but it does have a global portfolio. Of its 3 managers, 1 also serves on BME, the Health Sciences CEF that has done well previously, although it has done little to merit its M* 5 star rating in recent years.

I own BME and it's been solid in my view. No concerns about that one ... not to go off-topic but I'm fairly impressed with how Blackrock allocates for their CEFs.

@JonGaltill: right, BST is a BlackRock closed end science and tech fund, but it does have a global portfolio. Of its 3 managers, 1 also serves on BME, the Health Sciences CEF that has done well previously, although it has done little to merit its M* 5 star rating in recent years.

@BaluBalu, Several years ago I did exactly what you described above of transferring several TRP funds in-kind and a Fidelity money market fund from Fidelity to T. Rowe Price. But the process was extremely slow on the TRP end - 4 weeks total! Even though every single shares were transferred correctly, the time it took to complete was unacceptable. I also hesitated to transferred additional cash to grow these TRP funds.
A year later, TRP funds became available in major brokerages on no-tranaction fee platforms in Schwab, Fidelity and Vanguard (plus others). I consolidated my TRP funds away from TRP and lived much happier.
Recently. I have considered giving TRP another chance because of what their Summit Program offers. But now I have second thought in light of @msf has gone through.

Both of the lawyers I talked to over several years, told me that 401ks are protected, but did not mention contributory IRAs are more vulnerable.
...

For 401k/403b assets rolled into T-IRA, most of the protections of 401k/403b carryover to T-IRA.
For regular T-IRAs with personal contributions, only state-level protections apply and they range from nil/low to generous. So, check your state rule. Then there are issues such as what if you moved?
So, it is best NOT to mix 401k/403b rollovers with personal contributions - that results in mixed/tainted T-IRA. Some argue that courts may sort out which contributions came from 401k/403b and which from personal contributions and apply protections appropriately. But then the T-IRA in question may be frozen while the court and lawyers sort this out, and who will pay them to sort this out? Probably you. So, why create this mess?
It is also true that the broker may create a Rollover T-IRA when you first transfer 410k/403b funds, but they may not care what happens after that. YOU will have to keep it pure - i.e. put in more funds from other 401k/403b only, but not any personal contributions.

Both of the lawyers I talked to over several years, told me that 401ks are protected, but did not mention contributory IRAs are more vulnerable.
An Umbrella policy increases the liability limit on your current homeowner's and auto insurance. Good to have but read the fine print on what is covered. Medical bills unless from a car accident or injury on property are not.
As I understand it anyone obtaining a judgement against your LLC assets cannot demand distributions from it, other than the distributions that the LLC makes anyway. Thus you the manger are not required to pay off such a creditor, but I think that creditor can share in any distributions that are made. It does make it more complicated and expensive for someone to try to attach your assets.
It is pretty easy to set up and costs around $1000 but I would use a competent lawyer, not do it yourself. Another advantage to an LLC holding your investments is that the LLC can deduct expenses like investment expenses. You should not use it to pay any expenses that are not directly related to the investments, and you do have to file a separate partnership tax return on March 15 that is hard, but not impossible to do with TurboTax Business. If you use a CPA it will cost several hundred dollars.
Many states require an LLC to file an annual report and some require a fairly high annual fee ( up to $500), so check carefully.
There are other entities I have heard of ( Delaware companies, offshore companies) that are even more protective but much more expensive to maintain.

It’s very likely most here have thru our investments achieved rates of return that far exceeded the rate of inflation for at least the past decade. So I, for one, don’t feel compelled to take extra risk now just because the rate of inflation has bumped higher. But I agree that over longer periods it’s important to stay ahead of inflation.
Used to listen to Ramsey years ago. Enjoy a variety of perspectives and his is one worth considering (although don’t recall his mentioning ELP). 12% a year? Ambitious in today’s environment. As always, risk assumed should be commensurate with one’s tolerance level, situation, time horizon, etc.

My wife and I own....a lot, for a long time. Over 10+years it compares very favorably to the VG large growth ETF (VOOG)but in the last 4yrs it HAS gotten slammed. At the same time is BEAT a mid-cap growth ETFs since LARGE has beaten the snot out of everything else. The COVID Bear seems to have been a turning point, getting left in the dust since late winter/Early spring 2020. MFO Premium has VOOG as a lower risk 4/5 compared to VG Capital Opp. Both are 5/5 overall. VOOG is 38% Tech,11% Healthcare so...no way Cap Opps can compete with that.

@rono’s post of the video is timeless and welcome. A great tradition in our household ended a few years back when David Letterman did his last Christmas show featuring Darlene Love’s 28th appearance singing this Phil Spector classic:

I could and have been for the last 50 years. The distributions from my investments more than meet my needs.

Howdy folks,
@Derf is right about proper posting. I am guilty as charged. As for 15 years? Hell, I don't know. I've been posting here as long as this board has existed because it sort of evolved out of at least two previous boards devoted to mutual fund investing [the debt we all owe to Roy and Salil is enormous]. Salil and his predecessor evolved out of the UseNetNews group - Mutualfundinvesting. Oh, and for the history buffs, the newsgroup was unmoderated and could get very nasty with trolls and flame wars. That was before the world wide web (WWW) was invented and the internet was pretty wild west.
and all y'all have some great holidays and wear the damn mask,
rono

@hank : Okay I'll pick up the flag. 15 years ? My how time flys !

I'll play the Grinch ! Why wasn't this posted in OT?

I vote … Coal for @Derf / Gold for @rono
Similar to a blocking foul being called in BB, if the defender was already in position when the ball carrier arrived at that spot, there’s no foul. Rono’s been posting this Merry XMas video for the enjoyment of MFO readers (and earlier FA readers) in the investing section for at least 15 years. He already had position.
So, in this case … No foul
(PS - Just a reminder everyone that the December Commentary is posted at the top of the board.)

VHCOX is a Primecap SubAdvised fund and I have been a fan of the Primecap funds for a long time. It was a top performing Mid/Large Cap offering 2012-16 but the last 4 years have not been kind. Slumps and out of style for the current cycle are nothing new and all investments go through this naturally. What's making me question the product is the Style Drift over the past 5-7 years and has that helped/hurt the product. It was a Growth fund, focused on mid caps, and naturally evolved into a large cap fund. Now, it's a large blend as per M*. Primecap has Aggressive Growth and Core offrings but as far as I know, this was a ' clone' (not the correct terminology) of the Aggressive product.
Also, they are heavily allocated to Tech and Health so you would think they'd at least catch some of that momentum. I think their tech exposre was higher than the current 28%...Anyone else own this fund and have similar questions?

BaluBalu
Being curious was the main adventure of my post. Having observed "alternative" funds over the years has not caused me to need/want to travel that path, as our mix has provided. The chart allows for an observation for whomever to reflect for their own needs as to portfolio construction.
You stated:

Your comments: "My expectation for MFO members is that alternative funds are not necessarily a bright spot for money over the years."
If you meant the above for the future, please share your thoughts on why.
"AND if one doesn't hold at least 10% of a portfolio in an alternative fund, any gain or loss is noise; and of little benefit to the portfolio."
I am deducing from your statement that you do not expect JHQAX's historic 10% per year (not compounded) return (somewhat lower return, pre-Covid) to continue. But do you expect it to perform worse than a good HY fund, say, ARTFX? I am not one to quibble about predictions about the future but it would be helpful to know your thoughts.

I, as with you, are not able to offer any forward/future prediction about how any fund will perform in a given market; from effects of the market and/or management skills and decisions. So, I don't have a clue as to JHQAX and its future ability to sail a smooth path for the next 1, 3 or 5 years; and be able to provide a positive ballast for a portfolio. Many here have discovered, over the years; that there are times when the big money houses and the economic educated and enlightened one's have been off course with their observations into the near term and future.
A tangent:
As with my prior chart, I was curious about matching other investments with JHQAX to discover return relationships. The below numbers are real world from a 529 educational account started 15 years ago, and for the heck of it; compared to JHQAX. The two initial holdings in the 529 have not been changed, being 50/50. The two funds are: VITPX and VBMPX. NOTE: A mandatory requirement of this 529 is that the 50/50 (equity/bond) balance is reset every September. So, neither holding has outrun the other, percentage wise; over the years.
The return numbers are annualized where appropriate, with the 529 numbers being a combination of the two holdings returns.

YTD 1YR 3YR 5YR 10YR 15 YR
529 +10.9 +12.8 +14.3 +10.7 +9.7 +7.4
JHQAX +12.9 +13.8 +13.3 +10.2 (partial year)

The above is not an attempt to provide anything more meaningful than a simple portfolio may provide, regardless of ones choices over the long term. A two fund portfolio being QQQ and AGG would provide, IMHO.
We've (household) attempted, over many years; to maintain a low number of investment vehicles. As with every investor, we all have our choices; based upon whatever moves us in a particular direction to hopefully provide the most benefit to a portfolio. We are fortuitous that our career paths were directed towards technology and healthcare; which helped us focus our investments based upon our understanding and insight of these areas.
Our equity holdings today are directed towards technology and healthcare.
Bonds? Don't have a clue at this moment, as the large support of high rates is now missing, which is where the "running" room used to be to have advantage of falling rates and obtain the profits from pricing; versus the prior 40 years.
I wandered a bit........, eh?
Remain curious,
Catch

We (wife and I) have been with TRP for over twenty years and regularly use the brokerage.
I agree it is not as accomplished as some other offerings, but you do get used to the quirks. On the "Tools" menu you can search for funds which have NTF, and combine that with a choice of sectors, minimum investment requirement, expense ratio, fund family, and so on. From that list of results you can sort by past performance, volatility, income characteristics, and so forth.
I have noticed in the last twelve months there are a lot more funds which used to have a $35 transaction fee but are now free to trade. And some funds which were previously unavailable are now on offer. Nine times out of ten I have been able to acquire the specific fund I wanted.
Whenever I have had a question I have always used the messaging facility. I have never had to make a phone call. All my questions have been answered in a timely and professional manner.
We won't be changing brokerages because we have most of our money tied up in TRP funds themselves.

Even worse, I deactivated another account that I had previously linked the "Schwab Bank Investor C".
Still CC-501 error with "Schwab & Co" and as with the other account I can link it to "Investor -C" but the account is not listed in the "link to existing account" drop down.
Why do I think Quicken has done nothing to fix this in a week?
I can't imagine anyone signing up for renewal ( mine is due in February) unless this is fixed quickly.
Just think, being a loyal Quicken customer for almost 30 years get me what???
A big fat ZERO!!