Reply to @bee:
No, I haven't seen data in this form, but I've read about it's use. In fact, I read an excellent financial book while on vacation this summer that mentions it, "A Random Walk Down Wall Street" by Burton Malkiel. When I saw it in the book, it was like, "hey, I do that". Kind of reassuring. I recommend the read as have many others who post here.
To take this data a step farther, once you have the low and high probability #'s for each fund, you can multiply each number by the percentage of that holding in your portfolio. Add all those values together and you get an idea of how your portfolio as a whole will "probably" perform. Basically you can say "I'm 90% confident yearly returns for this portfolio will fall between the high and low values in any given year".
Example, if your portfolio consists of 4 funds:
PRPFX has a return range of -8 to +31 x.25 = a range of -2 and +7.8
OAKBX has a return range of -18 to +21 x.25 = a range of -4.5 and +5.3
MAPIX has a return range of -18 to +43 x .25 = a range of -4.5 and +10.8
TGBAX has a return range of 0 to +26 x .25 = a range of 0 and +6.5
(notice the risk return comparison for PRPFX compared to say OAKBX. more potential gain -> reward, less potential loss -> risk)
add the low and high values and you can say "I can be 90% confident this 4 fund portfolio will give returns of between -11% and +30.4% annual returns". If you wanted to be more accurate on the range, say 95% probability, you would use 2x the standard deviation. The range would be larger. 99% probability would be 3x the std. Using 1x std would be 68% probability. If you are able to build spreadsheets in Excel, this is very easy to set up.
Hope that helps. Just another tool to analyze risk/return in a portfolio.

Mindy, what does it say about gold that your plumber is buying it? Here's a rather famous story about the crash of 1929:
"The story of how Joe Kennedy avoided ruin in the 1929 stock market crash is a Wall Street legend. While getting his shoes shined, Kennedy’s shoeshine boy started giving him advice on what stocks to buy. At that very moment Kennedy claims he had an epiphany, realizing that it must be time to sell. After tipping the bootblack, Kennedy reportedly hurried away and sold all of his stock holdings just in time to avoid the carnage of the 1929 stock market crash.
Similarly, Bernard Baruch, the legendary Wall Street trader, famously wrote of the zeitgeist as it manifested in the common man at the height of the 1929 bubble:
“Taxi drivers told you what to buy. The shoeshine boy could give you a summary of the day’s financial news as he worked with rag and polish. An old beggar who regularly patrolled the street in front of my office now gave me tips and, I suppose, spent the money I and others gave him in the market. My cook had a brokerage account and followed the ticker closely. Her paper profits were quickly blown away in the gale of 1929.”
Shoeshine boys (taxi drivers, waiters, etc.) giving stock market advice has become a Wall Street metaphor for prototypical behavior at the top of financial markets bubbles."
I would include plumbers in the group with shoeshine boys.

Hi Guys,
Technical Analysis sings a Siren’s song.
I have noticed an uptick from MFOers who are now defecting to technical analysis to inform their mutual fund investment decisions. That decision is likely prompted by a roiling marketplace that has destroyed investment returns.
Unfortunately, expected Technical Analysis (TA) results are more an illusion than a reality; TA methods are mostly a set of ad hoc rules that have no scientific foundation, little, if any, verifiable returns, and a paucity of documented performance studies. Its limited success is mostly asserted by the countless books and seminars that create wealth for their authors and lecturers, but not for their clients. The Internet offers a zillion technical analyses methods and unsupported claims.
The reason for its popularity is obvious; it promises reward without risk; it promises wealth by next Friday; it promises a mechanical system that requires no anxious decision making. These are false promises that are not reliably deliverable. Random successes occur.
I personally know several investors and have been exposed to a host of financial advisors who champion TA; some are True Believers, but others are slippery charlatans. I actually admire the principle-motivated True Believers, but they will learn over time of the discipline’s shortcomings. I did.
I started investing in the mid-1950s. My initial decision making tool was TA-based. My decisions were rooted in the methods proposed by Robert Edwards and John Magee in their classic book “Technical Analysis of Stock Trends”. I applied their methods using arduous, hand-drawn graphs. I still occasionally consult my tattered copy of their tome. My general conclusion is that pattern investing is a wasteful and profitless investment procedure, although graphs are a useful way to summarize huge data sets and it does yield some very generic trend guidelines.
TA proponents like to equate their methods with those of scientific, natural laws. I suspect that ephemeral comparison is made to foster credibility in the mind of investors; numbers have a powerful influence given uncertain outcomes. But investment outcomes are not governed by inviolable physical laws. Natural physical laws are static and do not change with circumstance or time; investment outcomes are dynamic phenomena that are event and people-driven happenings.
Physical laws are controlled by atoms and electrons on a sub-particle level, and by material properties and interactive forces on a macroscopic level. Equivalent investment laws do not exist because the agents (people, institutions, and events) and the characteristics that generate the interactions change constantly to reflect circumstances and human emotions.
Behavioral research has established that humans are pattern seekers. We like to identify and connect the dots. Technical analysis purveyors trade on this predisposition. And these TA purveyors and their techniques have proliferated. There are hundreds of TA procedures readily available for application. But, do they work as advertised?
What all these TA procedures have in common is the lack of a performance track record. This MIA (Missing In Action military jargon) evidence is shouting a loud message. If the success of the methodology is well established, its purveyor would jump at the opportunity to publish those results. He would be instantly famous. He can’t because it does not exist.
Most often, a recommended TA system is endorsed because of a successful back-tested comparison. Of course it was successful; that’s the primary reason that it is being endorsed. All the other procedures that failed in the search for a fruitful correlation have been summarily rejected and tossed into the wastebasket.
The challenge is if the recommended method will produce consistently superior returns in the future. That is the acid test. Be assured that they all have failed that test somewhere along the road. Otherwise, that surviving TA methodology would be the toast of the investment world. It would quickly and universally be adopted by all of us seeking financial security. It is an unfulfilled dream.
I do not know of any billionaire TA wizards. Even starting with a small kiddy, if these TA systems were so superior, they would create a billionaire in a short timeframe. Historically, equity markets annually return 10 % on average, bond markets about half that return. Warren Buffett manages an annual return in the low 20 % range, as does a rare group of other financial wizards. All these wizards fall into the conservative, fundamentally driven class of investors. Does any billionaire advocate a TA approach as the basis for his wealth? If so, has he documented the approach? My answer to both questions is a firm No.
I have discussed TA with John Murphy at the MoneyShow conferences several times. He is a humble, honest, and dedicated TA True Believer. I own several of his numerous books on the subject. But he can not document his methods with hard performance data. He is an emperor without cloths. He works very hard at conferences selling his books; I suspect he makes far more from giving investment advice than from actual investment success.
In almost all forms, TA is simply a momentum strategy, either based on price movement or trading volume dynamics. In the mutual fund world, the FundX family of funds have practiced that discipline for an extended period. Their flagship product is FundX Upgrader, FUNDX. Janet Brown is the president of the DAL Investment Company that assembles and managers the growing FundX family. She is a compelling advocate for their brand of the generic TA approach. It is a pure momentum play that has enjoyed some successes, as well as some recent disappointments.
The issue here is that the deployed methodology is not constant over the reporting timeframe. It is slowly maturing so the record is distorted by that evolutionary process. In its early embodiment, the FundX holdings were more heavily committed to a small number of hot-hands, and diversification was sacrificed. Methodology adjustments have been made.
I subscribe to the WSJ. I wonder why, on a daily basis, the Journal graphically displays a 65-day Index Moving Average, and each Monday, it presents both the 65-day and the 200-day Moving Averages. These are rather arbitrary standards. Why not a 100-day criteria? The perturbations are endless.
Most other TA techniques are similarly vague about their selected data collection logic and criteria timeframes. They seem purely arbitrary, and most likely represent a rule set derived for a specific stock analyzed for a specific time. The operational rule extracted from this restricted study was extrapolated to become a universal rule. That rule has almost zero likelihood of being precisely applicable for the broad array of equities that populate the global marketplace. Its application to a group of ever-changing holdings that compose a mutual fund is even more suspect. Good luck on that extrapolation.
Can anyone explain the rationale or logic that dictated the various data gathering periods that are incorporated into the MACD (Moving Average Convergence/Divergence) statistic developed by Gerald Appel? A 12-day minus a 26-day accumulation period coupled with a 9-day crossing signal indicator seems unduly arbitrary. This unlikely specificity smacks of a data mining operation.
And MACD is just one of scores and scores of TA Indicators that are proposed for investment decision making. If that’s not enough, the TA protagonist also endorses combinations of this infinite array of dubious tools. An equation, or a theory, or a procedure that does not rest on a rock-solid fundamental understanding is literally a crapshoot. Do you want to risk a secure retirement on a dice throw?
In some ways TA is religion-like. True Believers believe because they want to believe.
Let me close by offering a challenge. If you are a TA True Believer and apply that approach to all or a segment of your personal portfolio (not someone else’s unverifiable claims made on the Internet), please submit a posting to this forum. Share your success stories and wisdom with us. I am still searching for a TA practitioner who has achieved market rewards that are a few percentage points above a realistic benchmark for his portfolio. To paraphrase a song, a good TA system is hard to find.
I’m patently waiting. I am always prepared to learn. We humans are hard wired for pattern recognition and are unduly susceptible to false patterns. Anyone for Robert Prechter and his form of the Elliot Wave Theory? How about some Oscillators or some Head and Shoulders necklines? Or a Fibonacci number or two? God, I hope not. All this is glittering junk science.
Best Regards.

A few various notes/theories:
1. Many people are stunned by the difference in returns from gold vs. gold stocks. You are looking at an instance where irrationality is pretty remarkable in terms of gold stock valuations. It just depends how long the irrationality takes to reverse (or if it does?)
2. There were a number of discussions earlier this year about hedge funds shorting gold stocks and going long gold.
3. The Jim Rogers theory: if you want a commodity (whether it be gold or whatever), invest directly in it - stocks (moreso these days) are too carried around by whatever the market is doing and it's too difficult to pick the right play to take the best advantage of a particular commodity.
4. People just wanted the physical, they did not want a miner who could be subject to bad weather, technical problems, higher costs, bad hedging/management, yadda yadda yadda. This is why I continue to recommend Toqueville Gold (TGLDX); certainly voaltile, but John Hathaway is the best manager in the sector.
5. There seemed to be a point where gold started to look like it was taking on a monetary vector a month or two ago (which goes back to the line from JP Morgan: "Gold is money and nothing else."), and that may have added to gains. People who don't want to be in the dollar, but the world can't pile into the Swiss Franc and other currencies have problems, too - so...? This can also be filed under loss of confidence (in the system, currencies, governments ability to handle economies, etc.)
6. Maybe declining production? (I don't know, I haven't really looked at that - all I know is supply is gaining a bit over 1% a year, last I heard.)
7. Something worse than anyone is publicly aware of is brewing under the surface. (see: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/bank-america-cds-hits-escape-velocity)?
Again, I stress diversification in terms of investing in commodity, commodity-related or "real asset"s. The precious metals are fine, but agriculture is also something I'd highly recommend looking at.
Additionally, the Midas fund you have appears both leveraged and aggressive; if things are going well for the sector, it has the potential to outperform. In a situation like this, it can end up at the back of the pack - it was at the bottom of the category in 2008 and was near the top in 2009. Again, I'd recommend the Toqueville fund for a smoother (by comparison) holding.
Also, to add: the article portion of this summarizes my thoughts pretty well (although I don't think this ends with deflation):
http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/gold-rallies-money-flees-leveraged-financial-system-dempsey-182933547.html

I have tried mapping out a "risk shift" strategy rather than a "sell" strategy with respect to the holdings in my portfolio. Would welcome comments.
This "de-risking" has required me to first assign a risk tolerance (that I am comfortable with) to all of my holdings. The categories of risk tolerance are as follows:
cash/cash equivalent...0% -3% downside risk due to currency devaluation and inflation (we'll ignore institutional financial strength...staying solvent)...I am presently using PONDX as my cash position and try to maintain 10-20% allocation with respect to my overall portfolio. This is where I look for cash when I look to buy "things on sale". I also have a small amount (5%) of Gold/Silver using CEF. Just an insurance policy on fat tail risk.
Low...3% - 10% downside risk...I place funds like PRPFX = Permanent Portfolio and TGBAX = Templeton Global Bond Fund as well as a whole host of Total Return / Income Funds like PTTDX, TGMNX, or USAIX. These are the anchors. They are added to when I look at my overall allocation. I try to maintain a 30-50% allocation in these funds
Moderate...10% - 20% downside risk...Many of my balanced/dividend/defensive funds fall into this category...MAPIX = Mathews Income, PRWCX=T Rowe Price Capital Appreciation, and OAKBX = Oakmark Fund. Also, PRHSX, VGHCX, GASFX, and CSRSX are some others I also include in this category. I consider these part of my core holdings that I add to when I have profits. In a downward trending market I try to de-risk my higher risk investments into these moderate risk funds. This keeps me somewhat in the market eliminating some of the market timing issues. I am never very good at spotting the exact bottom or top. So (risk shifting) into these moderate risk investments seems helpful when the market goes against me. This collection of funds could represent 20-40% of my portfolio.
High... 20% - 33% downside risk...These are primarily equity funds that I own to follow a trend, and add some alpha. I have owned CAMAX, HRVIX, MFCFX, USAGX, PRMSX, VWO, VDE, VIT, VHCOX, PRMTX, MATFX, MSMLX, WAEMX, etc. This is the set of investments that I am monitoring and trying to upgrade...improve upon. When they hit the negative 20% level or move upward a positive 10% they become candidates to "de-risk". Some in this category are doing very well such as USAGX and I may consider taking profits some are not and I may reduce my exposure to them temporarily. Cash elsewhere in my portfolio allows me the ability to add to these funds when they are trending upward. When these funds are out of favor they could stay out of favor for sometime. I look to shift some or all of these holdings into a Moderate or low risk investment. I am willing to monitor them from a de-risked position. This category of funds could make up 5-20% of my overall portfolio.
Extreme... 33%- or more downside risk... I have very small speculative position in RIMM (Research in Motion)...I have lost 55% so far this year with RIMM. I own FAIRX and have suffered a 29% loss in value with this fund. I planned on holding both of these 3-5 years but I will continue to monitor them closely and make regular "gut checks". In good times I would like to see 20% plus gains here before I de-risk some profits. These holdings could be represent 0 - 15% of my overall investments. They are small positions that I am willing to be patient with. I also find them to be my biggest learning experiences.
As I said earlier, I am not very good at timing the market at the tops or bottoms so periodic de-risking an investment that is trending above or below your tolerance threshold might be worth considering.
Comments welcome...
bee

http://www.onwallstreet.com/news/fund-managers-prefer-cash-to-stocks-2674653-1.html?ET=onwallstreet:e3721:2131761a:&st=email&utm_source=editorial&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=OWS_Weekend__081911
smart mf that smokes the market
http://www.forbes.com/sites/lawrencelight/2011/08/19/active-funds-that-smoke-the-market-raspberry-to-yales-guru/
are we headed for another recession
http://moneywatch.bnet.com/economic-news/blog/financial-decoder/are-we-headed-for-another-recession/4892/
us stocks get no rest
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/us-stocks-to-get-no-rest-remain-volatile-2011-08-20
Stock Analysts Dig in Heels When They're Wrong: Study
http://www.onwallstreet.com/news/analysts-opinions-ratings-psychology-of-investing-2674624-1.html?ET=onwallstreet:e3721:2131761a:&st=email&utm_source=editorial&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=OWS_Weekend__081911
It's Time to Buy emerging market - google article title @ barrons
also - what's the smart money up to
http://online.barrons.com/article/SB50001424052702303822904576516842506060226.html?mod=BOL_mp_viewed_week
The Silver Lining for Markets and the U.S. Economy
http://www.usfunds.com/investor-resources/investor-alert/
bulls hangin by a thread ahead of monday bernanke's speech
http://www.schaeffersresearch.com/commentary/content/monday+morning+outlook+bulls+hanging+by+a+thread+ahead+of+bernanke+speech/observations.aspx?click=home&ID=107657
time to sell gold?? [and buy equities] - traders' article - sorry if this is junk but Rono or Scott may love this article
http://www.worldofwallstreet.us/2011/08/trading-gold-thru-the-summer-part-16-time-to-take-profits.html
WHERE'S THE DECOUPLIN?
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/582069/201108191647/India-China-Declines-Are-Piling-Up-Quickly.htm
ot - global depression? [sorry if this is a junk article from 3rd world country but worth a look]
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=199461
kissin or kickin' butt
http://news.yahoo.com/biden-says-united-states-not-default-assures-china-032508353.html
muni still a safe haven
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903639404576520960723088654.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Hi Guys,
Given the current roiling market turmoil it seemed like a good time to revisit the calm and common sense of an old friend and a steady, savvy investment advisor. I am speaking of Harry Browne’s writings.
Harry Browne was a successful financial advisor for over three decades. I had the good fortune of meeting him several times at the Las Vegas MoneyShow in the 2000s. He surely did not fit the conventional profile of the prototypical speaker at that annual conference. Whereas the bulk of presenters had a large supporting staff and impressive presentation visual aids, Harry only came armed with his accumulated financial wisdom and a lonely, single 3 X 5 index card that was completely covered (both sides) with small handwritten notes.
Harry Browne was a rail-thin gangling man who spoke softly, with authority, and with considerable common sense; Harry was forever a no nonsense whatsoever type guy. You may remember him as the founding godfather behind what is now Michael Cuggino’s Permanent Portfolio family of mutual funds. Harry Browne became a trusted financial advisor with only a high school education; he bolted college after a few weeks never to return so, to a large extent, he was self-educated.
You might also recall that he was twice a presidential candidate (1996 and again in 2000) under the Libertarian Party banner. Harry Browne passed away in 2006. I miss his quieting confidence and soothing manner.
Harry published numerous economic and financial books. I own two of them: “Why the Best-Laid Investment Plans Usually Go Wrong” issued in 1986, and “Fail-Safe Investing” published in 1999. The Fail-Safe book is a distillation of his accrued investment learning and philosophy; it is especially succinct and delivers the goods on his subtitle of “Lifetime Financial Security in 30 Minutes”. During this stressful period, I felt compelled to reread his dazzling investment summary.
Fail-Safe Investing does not contain any deep market secrets nor does it delve into complex analysis methods. It surely might disarm a reader with its simplistic approach to investing. I believe that at root, we all realize the wisdom in the rule set that Harry Browne prescribes. I think it might be helpful to re-familiarize ourselves with his, and most likely many of our favorite investment axioms during this volatile market cycle.
Here is a listing of Harry Browne’s 17 investment rules. I have parenthetically added a single sentence comment or observation to each rule. I am positive that each of you could provide many others from your own market experiences and knowledge.
Rule 1: Build your wealth on your career. (Maximize your career longevity and income.)
Rule 2: Don’t assume you can replace your wealth. (Recovery is arduous and uncertain, impossible if you withdraw, so stay in the game.)
Rule 3: Recognize the difference between investing and speculating. (Asset allocate your resources with a portion committed to market reproducing Index holdings and a speculative element committed to Alpha seeking speculative holdings.)
Rule 4: Beware of Fortune-Tellers. (Charlatans are everywhere; no one can forecast the market because no one is in control.)
Rule 5: Don’t expect anyone to make you rich. (An advisor’s primary goal is to make himself rich, and if he succeeds it is mostly due to coincidence or luck.)
Rule 6: Don’t expect a trading system to make you rich. (If it existed, all uncertainty would be removed from investing; out-of-sample testing always defeat these systems.)
Rule 7: Invest only on a cash basis. (Although leverage is a force multiplier, excessive leverage kills.)
Rule 8: Make your own decisions. (You are the best champion for your investment survival.)
Rule 9: Do only what you understand. (Never outrun your core knowledge, skill sets, and competencies.)
Rule 10: Spread the risk. (Diversify, diversify, diversify with negatively correlated holdings.)
Rule 11: Build a bulletproof portfolio for protection. (Browne’s vision was the Permanent Portfolio, PRPFX)
Rule 12: Speculate only with money you can afford to lose. (Any strategy that attempts to outdistance market like returns is a form of speculation.)
Rule 13: Keep some assets outside your own country. (International exposure is mandatory, including some minor foreign exchange component.)
Rule 14: Take advantage of tax-reduction plans. (As Milton Friedman observed: “I am in favor of cutting taxes under any circumstances and for any excuse, for any reason, whenever it’s possible.”}
Rule 15: Ask the right questions. (The questions must be sufficiently detailed to drilldown to identify real risk; superficiality destroys wealth.)
Rule 16: Enjoy yourself with a budget for pleasure. ( Happiness is essential for balance, and Economic Happiness research is developing clues in this arena.)
Rule 17: Whenever you’re in doubt, err on the side of safety. (Always invest deploying Benjamin Graham’s margin of safety concept to modulate unrealistic enthusiasm.)
These are not only fundamental rules for investing, they are also meaningful rules to guide personal worldly ambitions and goals. I suspect, Browne designed them with that objective in mind.
The opening section of Browne’s book that outlines his 17 rules is only 70 pages long. It probably can be absorbed in about 30 minutes. His writing style is easy and very linear. The second part of his book expands on the 17 rules, and in many ways is both challenging and captivating.
I have purposefully limited my commentary to encourage your participation. I welcome your insights. Please contribute.
Don’t panic; stay strong. To help you keep the faith, you might consider securing a copy of Browne’s Fail Save book. As a minimum, it offers comfort in these demanding and stressful times.
Best Regards.

Maurice,
I know I'm probably asking too much right now :)
I think I'm just feeling very frustrated when I look at my 401K and that it's only earned about 1% annually for the past decade. It's made me really want to take control of my investments and at the very least do the best I can with it, whatever returns I may get. When I started working and obtaining a 401K, and really all I had learned was, put as much as you can in your 401K, IRAs, etc. Then like I said, I literally only earned about 1% over the past 10 years. I never did much with my 401K, never really understood the investments, just knew that money came out of my paycheck every 2 weeks and that it should grow over time. But what I more recently realized is I think I'm one of probably millions of other American workers with 401Ks that don't know anything about investing. I'm part of the post labor-union era I'll call it, who also out of high-school and college, never was given real financial advice regarding retirement or investing. My parents for example both have pensions and health-care taking care of them in their retirement. I asked my father recently if he had a Roth IRA, and he said no, don't know much about those. It's also funny, I just recently picked up a Dave Ramsey book that someone had given me 5-8 years ago, and I caught this section where he talked about don't invest in bonds and investments that only earn 4-8%, and instead investing in a mutual fund (nothing specific, just said mutual fund) that you can expect to earn 12% annually over the next 30 years, like that was normal. And I just chuckled. And out of my curiosity I looked up historical returns for the S & P 500 and I was blown away by what I saw. Other than recently, only in 1974 and pre-1940 did the 10Yr. Avg Return Rate fall below 2%.
http://www.istockanalyst.com/article/viewarticle/articleid/2803347
And really the period between 1979 until 2007 long-term returns were really good, especially 1983 - 2001. So, I think for me, all of this has been a real a wake up call. That I can't just rely on the markets to earn the money I hope to have come retirement without thinking about it.
I have to say though, doing all this research the past few months I feel like has become a new hobby for me. Even though I haven't put all my money to work yet to where I want it, I've found it to be very fascinating. And just watching the markets going nuts lately is actually another lesson I'm learning to try to stay calm :). It's hard to not be distracted by it.
So yea, whether I can actually achieve the high return with low risk is something I'll just shoot for, but at the very least I'd like to keep learning about funds with really good mangers who will make much better decisions than myself could ever make. And that is really all I'm trying to do. Buying into funds with managers who if they are taking risks, know when to move money out of equities when needed and to put back into when the markets are ready to rebound. It really boils down to trust. Finding those funds that help me sleep better at night. And based on what many of you have said, it sounds like MAPIX fits that mold I'm looking for from an Emerging Markets point of view.
I just want to say to this site and to everyone that posts here, I really appreciate the input and the knowledge sharing. It's helped me immensely in trying to get a grip on my investments and I am grateful for it.
By the way, I'm curious. What kind of investors are the majority of people who post/read here and are there any others like me, who don't deal or work in finance and are currently working and just trying to make better choices for their retirement portfolio?

Jardine Matheson is one of a number of similar conglomerates in Asia, some of which have been around for many decades (such as Jardine.) Swire and Hutchison Whampoa are other examples. Swire is interesting (in that it owns Cathay Pacific and a Coca-Cola Bottler that covers a good portion of Asia and some of the US). Genting Berhad is also of interest, with its resort properties in Singapore and soon the US. Given its holdings though, Genting is particularly tied to the swings of local economies.
Jardine has a pretty fascinating history and (I thought) appealing mixture of businesses - there is both Jardine and Jardine Strategic, and Jardine Strategic owns a 20% stake in Rothschilds Continuation Holdings, which is the financial holding company of the Rothschilds.
"Until 2008, the only non-family interest was Jardine Matheson, a hong which holds the other 20% of Rothschild Continuation Holdings. The stake was acquired in 2005 from Royal & Sun Alliance through the Jardine Strategic subsidiary, which specializes in leveraging stakes to protect family owners.[7] Jardines acted as Rothschilds' China agent from 1838 onwards" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N_M_Rothschild_&_Sons)
longer Bloomberg article on the relationship between the two companies -
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=apHai5xmbq9s
Jardine Strategic owns the majority of Jardine Matheson and Jardine Strategic is part of Jardine Matheson. As noted, "It (Strategic) in effect owns its own corporate parent, enabling the Keswick family to control the group without providing a majority of the capital. This expertise in protecting family owners was shared in 2005 when it took a 20% stake in Rothschild Continuation Holdings, a major merchant bank." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jardine_Strategic_Holdings)
Jardine chair Sir Henry Keswick is also listed as a director of Rothschilds Continuation Holdings. Jardines is really a dynasty - I think - in the old-fashioned sense, which I found appealing.
The two biggest parts of Jardine are majority-owned subsidiary Dairy Farm (a massive group of retail operations, ranging from 7-11's to hypermarkets to restaurants to a few IKEA stores and Hong Kong Land (50% owned by Jardine). There's also Mandarin Oriental hotels, among other subsidiaries. If one digs in the reports, Strategic also holds some small investments in other companies, such as Tata Power (to use an example from last I looked, things may have changed.) Jardine Pacific is another interesting part, containing all non-listed businesses, such as various operations at Hong Kong airport.
Additionally, the whole thing rests on whether one believes in the continued rise of Asia over the next decade or two (and as I've said, I believe that, although I do believe there will be problems along the way.) If not, then something like Jardine would be of no interest.
Again, this is a stock, so it is certainly a risk and one *MUST DO THEIR OWN RESEARCH*. I wanted to own an EM stock or two for the long-term (5-10 years+) and Jardine was the most appealing that I found.
In terms of Asian-centric funds that would be comfortable holdings for the long-term, the search - I think - starts and ends w/Matthews Asian Growth/Income (MACSX) and Matthews Asia Dividend (MAPIX.) I'd recommend the great majority of people - especially more conservative investors or those nearing retirement - interested in EM stick with funds instead of specific stocks, and particularly the Matthews funds listed above.
The Pimco EM Multi-Asset fund has not released holdings yet, but my guess is that it looks like an EM-focused version of fund-of-funds (and some other stuff) Pimco Global Multi-Asset.

In terms of "real assets", I added more earlier today to the Salient MLP Energy and Infra fund (SMF), a closed-end MLP fund that can actually hedge.
From the prospectus:
"HEDGING AND OTHER STRATEGIES
We currently expect to utilize hedging techniques such as interest rate swaps to mitigate potential
interest rate risk on a portion of our Financial Leverage. Such interest rate swaps would principally be
used to protect us against higher costs on our Financial Leverage resulting from increases in both shortterm and long-term interest rates. We anticipate that the majority of our interest rate hedges will be
interest rate swap contracts with financial institutions.
We also may use various hedging and other risk management strategies to seek to manage various risks
including market, credit and tail risks. Such hedging strategies would be utilized to seek to protect the
value of our portfolio, for example, against possible adverse changes in the market value of securities
held in our portfolio. We may execute our hedging and risk management strategy by engaging in a variety
of transactions, including buying or selling options or futures contracts on indexes and entering into total
return swap contracts. See “Risk Factors—Risks Related to Our Investments and Investment
Techniques—Derivatives Risk.”
We may use arbitrage and other strategies to try to generate additional return and protect the downside
risk of the portfolio. As part of such strategies, we may purchase call options or put options and enter into
total return swap contracts. A total return swap is a contract between two parties designed to replicate the
economics of directly owning or shorting a security. We may enter into total return swaps with financial
institutions related to equity investments in certain Master Limited Partnerships and Canadian Income
Trusts (as defined in the SAI).
In addition, we may engage in paired long-short trades to arbitrage pricing disparities in securities held
in our portfolio or sell securities short. Paired trading consists of taking a long position in one security
and concurrently taking a short position in another security within the same or an affiliated issuer.
With a
long position, we purchase a stock outright; whereas with a short position, we would sell a security that
we do not own and must borrow to meet our settlement obligations. We will realize a profit or incur a loss
from a short position depending on whether the value of the underlying stock decreases or increases,
respectively, between the time the stock is sold and when we replace the borrowed security. See “Risk
Factors—Risks Related to Our Investments and Investment Techniques—Short Sales Risk.” We do not
presently intend to short securities in the portfolio, and do not intend in the future, to the extent short sale
transactions occur, to have a net short position that exceeds 30% of our total assets.
To a lesser extent, we currently expect to write call options for the purpose of generating realized gains
or reducing our ownership of certain securities. We typically will only write call options on securities that
we hold in our portfolio (i.e., covered calls). A call option on a security is a contract that gives the holder
of such call option the right to buy the security underlying the call option from the writer of such call
option at a specified price at any time during the term of the option. At the time the call option is sold, the
writer of a call option receives a premium (or call premium) from the buyer of such call option. If we
write a call option on a security, we have the obligation upon exercise of such call option to deliver the
underlying security upon payment of the exercise price. When we write a call option, an amount equal to
the premium received by us will be recorded as a liability and will be subsequently adjusted to the current
fair value of the option written. Premiums received from writing options that expire unexercised are
treated by us as realized gains from investments on the expiration date. If we repurchase a written call
option prior to its exercise, the difference between the premium received and the amount paid to
repurchase the option is treated as a realized gain or realized loss. If a call option is exercised, the
premium is added to the proceeds from the sale of the underlying security in determining whether we
have realized a gain or loss. We, as the writer of the option, bear the market risk of an unfavorable change
in the price of the security underlying the written option.
4"

Hi johnN,
Thanks for posting The Mutual Fund Merry-Go-Round article. If most folks did not know ... the average investor form my perspective has been buying high and selling out low for years. They seem to buy in during the good times when things are doing well and the markets are towards its peak ... and, they trend to sell out during times of strife when the markets are in decline. This to me classifies them as fair weather investors.
To be successful, one should do the opposite by buying during strife and selling at the pinnacle. Are financial advisors to blame? From my perspective, perhaps not. It is more of an issue about the human nature of the fair weather investor.
My father, years ago, would buy a good quality stock at it's 52 week low and then sell it when it reached a 52 week high. My mother on the other hand could not understand this. Her thoughts were why sell something when it is doing so good? Go figure.
Thanks again for posting this article.
Good Investing,
Skeeter

CNBC reporting European regulators looking to possibly ban short selling in markets or specifically financial stocks. So...not like 2008 or anything.

If your mom's "financial planner" is a registered rep, then it is likely that she has "C" share class funds that have no front-end sales load, no back-end load and pay out a share of the expense ratio (12b-1 marketing expense portion of the ER) to the rep of record.
Fee-only financial planners and RIA's are usually not paid by fund companies and will normally use an administrative or institutional share class. Everyone deserves to be paid for value added. It should just be all on top of the table.

Bank of America (BAC) has problems specific to them that are not shared by similar financial institutions. Specifically, they have inherited the questionable loan portfolio from Countrywide Credit and are now being sued by AIG for fraud and deception regarding the mortgage products BAC/Countrywide sold to AIG. The suit appears to have substantial merit and, if successful, may well result in the collapse of BAC.
That said, a problem that has NOT been addressed is that all of these financial institutions still hold hundreds of billions of dollars of worthless financial products and this has been conveniently ignored. TARP and all of the other alphabet-soup rescue programs simply kicked the can down the road and have permitted these zombie institutions to blithely continue on their merry way. All the pundits that have insisted that "we are not Japan" may be whistling in the dark. This is precisely what Japan has done (or not done, I should say) and they have never permitted any of their bankrupt financial banks and institutions to go under, resulting in nearly three decades of denial and stagnation. We may well be embarking upon the same troubled path.
Dr. John Hussman has made these points repeatedly from Day One and he eloquently explains why all of these bogus programs (TARP, QE1, QE@, etc). are doomed to fail and have achieved nothing aside from increasing our debt load to dangerous levels. Until the worthless debt and financial sausage the Masters of the Universe on Wall St. still hold are restructed and their bondholders take a severe haircut instead of receiving taxpayer money to make them whole, this problem will not disappear.

They also get paid by 12b-1 fees that SEC allows fund management companies to attach to the funds.
Update: Can you give a couple of fund tickers your mom is investing in? It is easy to look up and find out what sort of fund they are. @BRBond mentioned C class shares. They look like no-load but they are actually level loaded (similar to 12b-1). Your mom's advisor is saying no-load but perhaps he got your mom into these C shares and getting his commission. How is your mom's financial planner compensated? Is your mom paying any direct fees for services rendered? (S)he should disclose this in his/her ADV part II which should be provided to your mom.

Do financial planners receive any fees or commissions from funds they recommend to clients? My mom has several no-load First Eagle funds (5-star ratings from M* so excellent long-term performers), but their expense ratios are huge -- nearly 2 percent. Or maybe it doesn't matter if these funds continue to be strong performers, though others in her portfolio with high ERs have not done so well. Thanks.

My mother's financial planner has her in several funds that M* summary says the benchmark index is the M* moderate target risk. Which index fund would mimick that category? Thanks.

Hi Guys,
The controversial President’s Plunge Protection Team (the PPT) is Missing-In-Action (MIA). That’s a tongue in cheek opening since I am not a true believer in the tooth fairy.
The PPT is not an urban myth; it is a Washington myth. Its purported market action charter is an illusion. The PPT will not mount its white horse, nor will it ride to rescue our current dysfunctional equity marketplace.
Recall that the basis for the PPT legion was initiated when Ronald Reagan assembled the President’s Working Group several months after the infamous October, 1987 crash. The key players in that group are the Secretary of the Treasury and the Chairman of the Federal Reserve. The dominant characteristic of the group is that its meetings are held in tight secrecy, hence the speculation that their franchise includes indirect and direct equity market interventions. There is no evidence that this myth is grounded in hard data. It makes a great, and comforting story. It is false.
How to explain and understand yesterday’s equity market disarray that was global in scope? That’s not an easy question since its causes are multi-dimensional; it is a complex interactive problem with many root causes. Here is my quick, and incomplete answer.
My assertions (that’s all they are) are based on the Technology Adoption Life Cycle (TALC) model that was reported in 1998 book titled “The Gorilla Game”, with Geoffrey Moore as the primary author. That book established rules on how to choose winners in the high technology world. That same model has application in the entire equity marketplace.
The book states that most progress is continuous, but game changing innovations are discontinuous (like exogenous market shocks), and take time to penetrate the marketplace in totality. The TALC is divided into 5 reaction regimes: (1) Enthusiasts (true believers) (2) Visionaries (first to jump, often wrongly), (3) Pragmatists (the Herd), (4) Conservatives (the late towel throwers), and Skeptics (the real market contrarians).
The Gorilla Game argues that a chasm (a time gap) exists between when there is some small market acceptance by Visionaries and when the bulk of prospective customers (the Pragmatic and Conservative segments) are prepared to change their habits. The Herd likes the status quo and requires some special motivation. The chasm is jumped when small subsets ( a micro minority within the macro Pragmatic group) are provoked (perhaps panic and/or fear tilts the decision) into action.
The market reaction gains momentum as the basic instinct of the herd takes hold. The Gorilla Game calls this phase the Tornado, a phase that is dominated by rapid rates of change, a panicked herd, a real stampede. Dies this seem familiar?
What prompted the stampede? That’s difficult because it has many moving parts. Certainly the proximate global crisis crystallized with the Italian announcement. Within the United States, the proximate cause could be ascribed to the poor GDP growth rate that seems to be constantly revised downward, the stagnant unemployment numbers, and uncertainty over government inaction and regulations. We also had a perfect storm scenario in that the S&P 500 Index 200-day moving average was about to be penetrated in conjunction with these other real world events. So automatic technical indicator signals were penetrated and reinforced world happenings. These were all triggering events.
On a longer time scale, several disturbing patterns are evolving and make recovery more challenging.
Our acceptance of excessive debt financing needs to be controlled, both public and private. If you believe our public debt is enormous and dangerous, you should explore just how much our private debt has mushroomed. It puts great downward pressure on spending which is 70 % of the US economy.
In his 2008 book “Bad Money”, Kevin Phillips notes that our Financial industries contribution to the GDP is now larger than the percentage generated by our Industrial segment (like 20 % to 12 %). Phillips observes that our dominant and growing dependence upon financial invention does not speak well for our National’s retention of world leadership. Historically, when money matters dominated economic policies, the wealth of the nation deteriorated. The fall of great superpowers like Spain in the 16th century, like Holland n the 17th century, and like Great Britain in the 20th century can be traced to an oversized commitment to financial matters. The good news is that the United States has many more resources (especially its size and its persistent, resourceful, and innovative people) at its disposal.
In his classic book “The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers”, Paul Kennedy identifies military expenditures used at first to expand empire, and later to defend that empire, as a major component in the declining years of a superpowers lifecycle. The same players that Phillips mentioned are highlighted in Kennedy’s tome. The good news here is that the US is not an expansionary nation, and the GDP fraction that it expends on our military institutions is shrinking. My belief is that we should not necessarily diminish its size, but should reallocate its global presence.
So, what to do? As a cohort, those participating on this forum are not market timers, we are not day traders. That is clearly established since we basically own mutual funds, and were prohibited from acting during the panic. When Thursday ended, we had already absorbed a 3 % to a 5 % decrease in our equity holdings wealth. That’s gone. Might the marketplace suffer more losses? Probably a little more, since momentum persists. But will the market totally meltdown?
My answer is a loud NO.
Our real resources remain intact. We have suffered no wars, no destroyed homes or even boken windows caused by natural disasters. Our losses are more mental than real. We will recover, and we will recover smartly. Market prices are a bargain. Price to earnings ratios are attractive. Our corporate cohort has strong financial balance sheets and has money to invest. On a global basis, our relative strength is improving. Foreigners have already recognized our relative stability and are investing in government bonds.
I will stay the course. I can do this since I have plenty of reserve cash. I hope you all are in a similar position. Be brave. The PPT is MIA, but we're OK.
I prepared this posting very quickly without checking facts and without even proofreading this submittal. I hope my errors are minimal, and that the posting makes some small sense.
Best Regards.

Another possible problem is that as of late some financial institutions have begun charging a fee for every POS (point of sale transaction) which seems to run about 25 cents each time you use their debit card for a purchase, but could be higher. Not saying these do, but check out the fine print before leaping as it appears most on that list require some POS transactions to receive the interest rate.

With respect, I don't see the point in buying an active fund manager, who in my case eats his own cooking and then handicap/dismiss him by the volatility (sic) of his fund. If I own funds that are not volatile it is more because the fund manager worries about permanent loss of capital, equating THAT with risk. There is a difference between cause and effect.
Anyone worried about beta should be buying index funds. After all beta is a relative and not absolute measure. A lot of people - myself included - lost money because they didn't know what the F they were doing. They were letting those peddling financial pron influence their decisions. And they continue to do so. Beta, Theta, Omega. This used to be a joke - there are three kinds of lies : lies, damned lies and Statistics. I don't consider that a joke anymore. Here's another one - Statistics is like a Bikini; what it reveals is interesting, but what it conceals is vital. I don't laugh when I hear that anymore either.
Buying an active fund means assuming manager risk first and foremost. Market risk is secondary. Buying a sector fund is obviously more risky than buying a more diversified fund since one is putting more of ones eggs in a more narrowly scoped basket obviously more susceptible to changes in like securities. I can buy that THIS is risky. If sector funds are ALSO more volatile than ANY benchmark one wants to compare against, that's incidental.
Again, Beta is Elementary. Homework is Fundamental.