Old_Skeet, your method is good but has lots of moving parts. Just an observation, not criticism :-)
A typical rebalance achieves similar results when stock prices go down and you keep switching from bonds to stocks to keep the same asset allocation. That is a good way until a black swan shows up and every time you buy more stocks on the way down you keep losing more.
The question of timing occupied my brain for many years.
I always want to be fully invested as long as I can. In the last 10-11 years, I was in cash for about 12 weeks, which means I was fully invested 98% of the time.
Until 2008-9, when I was younger with a much smaller portfolio. I just stayed the course because my fund managers (SGENX,OAKBX,FAIRX) played it right. After I lost 25% in 2008 I decided that the only way not to lose is to set up a simple selling %.
From 2009 and for the next several years, I would sell any stock fund I owned if it lost more than 6% and bought a bond fund. I would sell any bond fund that lost over 3% and searched for another more conservative fund. If I could not find any bond fund then I would go to cash.
When stocks bottomed and rebounded, I only increased stocks using a pyramid up. That means that every time I buy more stock mutual fund the price must be higher than the previous one,
In 2018 at retirement, I made my selling criteria stricter. I only trade stocks short term (hours to days) using charts. I used bond funds most times. Any bond fund I own that loses more than 1% I sell and then I look for a better bond fund, if I can't find any I go to cash.
BTW, the above is probably too complicated. Stay fully invested and buy and hold is a good way for most investors :-)

ANBEX is one of the funds I posted about several months ago. See its chart(link) compared to the index.
When I look at Fidelity funds screener ANBEX has the best performance for 1-3 years in the Intermediate Core Bond + Intermediate Core Bond plus categories.
Second to ANBEX are SCCYX+SCPZX from Carillon Reams.

Fund F = Barclays Capital U.S. Aggregate Bond Index.
As expected it did its job as ballast to stocks.
What is going to be its performance in the next 5 years? maybe 2-2.5% annually.
I don't expect inflation to rise beyond Fed expectations. I have seen many predictions by experts to be off in over 10 years.

Mr. Hasenstab is a former star manager. Two of the funds he managed, Templeton Global Bond and Templeton Global Income, consistently generated some of the highest trailing returns in the World Bond¹ category. The funds' performance in recent years has been underwhelming. Perhaps Mr. Hasenstab will get his mojo back someday?
¹now in Morningstar Nontraditional Bond category

How does it hold up over ten years ?
3.99 compound over that time period !
Derf
P.S. That 3.99 % was from 2019- back ten yrs.

TRP has been doing this in most of its asset allocation and retirement funds for a few years now. They're doing more barbelling than timing the market as they give you both long treasuries and short TIPs with mild adjustments in allocation.
PRWCX goes in-and-out, i.e. market times. I've seen them do this twice in the last 10 years, buying with good timing but selling too soon.
Price's fund, TRULX, gets a lot of its money from the allocation/retirement funds. Its AUM is not too different from when I bought it 1-1/2 years ago. I wonder if this stabilizes it from the rush inflow situation.

“It's just I'm surprised that I rarely see it used as an asset class in asset allocation, multi-sector, or unconstrained funds. It seems that they would add value & diversification”
I don’t know if this answer satisfies - but a good house with its own highly competent credit research department can do a lot better playing in the corporate bond sector than it can with Treasuries. But msf induced me to look at a couple multi-asset funds.
Here’s what Price’s Spectrum Income fund (RPSIX) does. Its latest bond holdings (from Yahoo) show 0% in U.S. government bonds, 33% in (other) AAA and an average duration of about 5 years. Since the fund typically invests 15% (more or less) in an equity fund, the percent allocated to AAA is lower than might appear at first glance. https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/RPSIX/holdings/
TRRIX is one of Price’s conservative balanced funds. Normally it targets a 60% bond, 40% equity mix. According to Yahoo the fund is currently underweight bonds by 8% at 52% of portfolio. Like RPSIX, the fund holds 0% U.S. government bonds. And, like RPSIX, they’re holding the duration to just over 5 years. The fund hews to a higher credit quality than RPSIX - with 59% of bonds rated AAA. https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TRRIX/holdings/ ..... T. Rowe is right a lot more often than they’re wrong on the long term outlook. Problem is most of us consider 6 months long term, while they’re looking out several years. Patience pays off.
Just a personal perspective (not applicable to others): I view bond funds as a “speed-brake“ that should reduce volatility during deep stock market downturns. Earning the paltry income available today doesn’t interest me. After one of my sources, Bill Fleckenstein, cautioned his readers to avoid lower credit grades last March, I’ve strived to stay with mostly intermediate-term bond funds that invest primarily in higher credit quality. AAA, AA A, BBB all fall within that zone. Yahoo is a great spot for viewing a fund’s bond credit quality / duration / maturity. I should add that Bill made that call a couple weeks before the Fed announced their intent to buy corporate bonds. So I don’t know if the advice still stands. Suspect so.

“Though the bottom line is, I don't think I could put 70% of my total portfolio in long-term treasuries and then just forget about it.” +1
Don’t confuse / conflate long-term Treasuries with long-term Treasury funds - or, for that matter, any type of fund investing in bonds. Two different animals. Funds respond much differently to rising / falling rates. That’s because changes rates affect fund flows. If rates fall and prices rise, more investors likely buy in, causing manager to purchase more bonds at higher prices. Prices fall? Investors flee, forcing manager to sell into a weak market at potentially lower prices. Than there’s the matter of fees and operating costs associated with funds that direct bond holders don’t face.
Your question is a good one. I’m but a casual observer of bonds. But in watching multi-asset funds of all stripes over the years, I get the impression that out beyond the 10-15 year duration, you don’t need a lot of those to significantly impact a fund’s volatility and performance. I rarely see any multi-asset fund that exceeds 10-15% in long term Treasury holdings. No doubt, there are some. In essence, a little bit of this asset delivers a big bang in a diversified portfolio. They make a great hedging tool - precisely because they tend to do better in weak equity markets and pack a disproportionate amount of punch.
Not topical - But there’s an even more potent creature called “zero coupon Treasuries”. For additional enlightenment, you might like to read up on those.

Can't find a good page on this now, but there are only two reasons I know of to hold long term treasuries.
One is immunization. If you like the current yield and there's something you're saving for many years down the road, buying a long term treasury or a few to get the right duration blend is a reasonable strategy. Similar to buying a CD for a targeted purpose.
The other is speculation. If you believe interest rates are going down, you would want to own the most interest rate sensitive, i.e. longest term, bonds. This is considered a speculative strategy - a bet on interest rates - because the difference between 10 and 30 year yields otherwise tends not to justify the additional risk.
Right now 10 years are yielding 0.69%, and 30 years are yielding 1.43%. Is it worth it to you to lock in a 1.43% return, a 3/4% difference in yield, for 30 years in order to bet on interest rates going down further?
OTOH intermediate term bonds can still have a place in a portfolio as a backup for cash in one's decumulation phase. For example, one can keep 3 years in cash or "cash like" investments, and another 4-6 years in intermediate term bonds, with the rest in longer term investments. This is effectively using a bond immunization strategy, not for a long term purpose, but for a midrange one.

Whenever a new technology takes off, it almost inevitably requires learning a new language.
Think of how our vocabulary has expanded as the internet has evolved over the last several years. There was a time when “smart phone”, “mobile app” and “opt-in” felt foreign and unfamiliar. Today those words are as much a part of the modern lexicon as “live streaming” or the “Internet of Things (IoT).”
Which brings us to cryptography, a once obscure computer science that is now in the spotlight. The word crypto is derived from the Greek “kryptos”, which translates as “hidden, concealed, or secret”.
Understanding the Language of Digital Assets
Simply put, cryptography is a method of writing code for storing and transmitting data in a form that can be read and processed only by those for whom it is intended. Cryptography has been commonly used for decades in securing government, military, and commercial communication and data centers.
More recently, cryptography has been instrumental in developing what are popularly referred to as “cryptocurrencies”, a new but maturing asset class that represents a significant leap forward for digital technology and for money itself. Thus far cryptography has been used predominately to secure access, creating a private pipe between sender and receiver, such as HTTPS websites. But this technology is far more powerful, and cryptocurrencies combine the technology in new ways.

https://fidelitydigitalassets.com/overview

Hello @Art & @Puddnhead,
Thanks for stopping by and making comment.
I should explain a little about the yield metric. Years back investors did not have all the fancy dancy ways to measure the market. One metric that my late father used was he followed the yield on the stocks he owned. When the yields got thin it was usually that the stocks he owned were at, or towards, their 52 weeks highs ... if not setting new highs. With this, he would trim the position and await a pullback where the yield would again rise as the stock price fell usually through a seasonal trend pattern.
In looking back through my data that I keep on the S&P 500 Index the recent high yield on the Index took place on (week ending) March 20th at 2.53% with a reading of 2305 and the recent low on February 21st at 1.79% with a reading of 3338. With this week's close the yield on the Index is at 1.9% with a reading of 3130. With this, and from a yield perspective, the Index is becoming pricey. In addition, TTM earnings are reported to be falling ... not rising. Based upon the blended earnings approach that the barometer uses puts the P/E Ratio for the Index at around 24. With this, This the earnings yield computes to about 4.16%. In comparing the 4.16% earnings yield to the yield of some of my multi sector bond funds ... Well, the advantage is now with some of the multi sector income funds from this yield perspective. Take the widely held PONAX (Pimco Income) is producing an income yield of 5.67%. With this, the yield advantage now goes to some bond funds ... from, my perspective.
Should the Index reach a near term yield of 1.8% Old_Skeet will most likely trim his equity allocation back to it's baseline allocation of 40% equity from the current 45% equity. Not long ago, I trimmed from around 50% equity back to 45%. Remember, I bought the downdraft and when the updraft came this put me equity heavy from the upward price movement as the rebound progressed.
Take care ... and, again ... thanks for stopping by and making comment.

There's always the option of filing Form 2210 Schedule AI with your tax return. This lets you pay estimates based on the income you actually made each "quarter", rather than paying the same amount on each estimate.
Regardless, you never have to get ahead of yourself and pay higher estimates YTD than you would have had you paid 1/4 of your taxes on each estimate.
Using this form entails keeping pretty good records about what income (including investment income) you received when. I did this for a few years. But I haven't since interest rates on cash dropped so low that it's no longer worth the effort just to defer paying a few bucks for some months.
Nevertheless, this method is available as a backup in case you get hit with a lot of 4th quarter income.

https://www.schwab.com/resource-center/insights/content/stock-market-performance-presidential-election-years?cmp=em-WHY
Stock Market Performance in Presidential Election Years
By Michael T Townsend
Interest in the next presidential election and its potential impact on the market increases exponentially as we approach Election Day. While the outcome is uncertain, history does reveal some interesting trends
Don't think article is posted
Sorry if its repost

For me, this is not the type of bond fund that counts as bonds in a typical "60/40" portfolio. To make room for this fund, I sold some equity. That was in part to many bond managers saying equities were overpriced, but some bond segments still looked attractive. Volatility has not been big YET and it held up very well in March, but still, this is obviously an aggressive fund that goes into an aggressive part of a portfolio, long term money.
I prefer some exposure in segments of illiquid positions to exploit the inefficiencies. That's largely due to many years of following Howard Marks. I was in the DoubleLine LP for many years. That only had quarterly redemptions, which could be denied. I like closed end funds and interval funds. Most of my portfolio is in liquid stocks and bonds, but I do allocate a section for illiquid things just because that's the only place left to fund value sometimes.
FPA's closed end fund, SOR, recently changed their fund to allow it to invest in more illiquid fixed income in private credit. Just because it's illiquid doesn't necessarily mean its junk. It might be small or of an alternative structure that prevents others from wading in.
With MWFSX, for now the managers are by far the largest owners. Redemptions would not affect liquidity, especially with their 23% cash position. As AUM grows, that could be a concern, but they would most likely move to more liquid positions over time.

Thanks for the suggestion. Certainly the CMBS portion of the portfolio is one of the most likely candidates.
Almost all the CMBS holdings are derivatives and I really didn't want to get into estimating their yields. So I started with the assumption that within CMBSs, yields would tend to be similar. Thus I looked at the more basic securities.
My source of prices was the annual report that valued the securities as of March 31, ISTM any bargain basement purchases in March were already priced in. For example, there's a non-agency CMBS, BBCMS Mort. Trust, Series 2020-C6, Class F5TB 3.69%. (In the BBCMS Mort. Trust prospectus, it's Class F5T-B.) With principal of $75K, its current value (March 31) is given as $46,675.
Fund Annual Report
BBCMS Mort. Trust Prospectus
This security represents a mortgage on a single property, F5 Tower in Seattle (built 2019, 100% occupied), with an anticipated repayment date of January 6, 2030 (final maturity in 2033).

The prospectus gives the average weighted life as 9.91 years (about 119 months). The security was issued in mid February. That's close enough to the March 31 date of the fund's annual statement not to worry about the difference in dates.
The annual statement gives the principal amount as $75K and the current value as $46,675. With this information (and the info in the SEC filing) I could approximate the yield going forward.
To figure out the monthly payments received (principal and interest) I used an amortization calculator, and 119 months. (Outstanding principal doesn't change enough in the month from Feb to the March annual report date to worry about adjusting this.)
$75K principal, 3.69% average weighted rate (per SEC filing) gives monthly payments of about $754.
Since the fund valued the holding at $46,675, the question becomes: what would the rate be on a $46,675 mortgage (119 months) to require payments of $754? The answer is about 15%.
That's in line with the fund's yield. Good, but not enough to compensate for the lower yielding securities held by the fund, let alone its large cash position. The bottom line is that I still agree that the CMBS derivatives are a good place to search for the higher yielding securities.

I still hold all three; however, I sold WAEMX, WAIGX, and OBIOX after holding the initial fund for many years, the second and third for several years as well as one other laggard. Bought LLSCX with the proceeds. The four I sold are performing about as well as LLSCX so it appeared to be a wash based on performance.

During the down turn, I didn't really sell equity funds but I did rearrange my International holding back in early April. I always hold my breath when I swap funds but this time it paid off. Wondering if anyone else did the same.
I held SFGIX as my EM fund and FMIJX as my International holding for many years. I don't like to hold to many funds in a category so I decided to swap all or some of both funds for one fund that recently became available after being closed for a while, ARTYX. I sold all my SFGIX and put it into ARTYX. I held SFGIX from the start and I think became married to it. But, with a historically better performing fund available I made the switch. I sold all of SFGIX and put it into ARTYX. As I watched this new fund perform I decided to sell most but not all of my FMIJX and add that money to ARTYX. Sooooo happy so far. I held out a long time expecting better results from SFGIX and FMIJX that never came.
Anyone else make adjustments fund-for-fund like this. Again, I held SFGIX and FMIJX for so long and defended their poor performance the past few years. But I bit the bullet and divorced them.
since April 1st:
ARTYX +38%
FMIJX +14%
SFGIX +19%
Anybody else trade like-funds?

BigTom, I do see this fund as aggressive for a bond holding, but I think there is room for aggressive bond funds within an overall portfolio, especially when managers like Scott Minerd are saying stocks are priced for perfection but there is still value in certain sectors of fixed income.

That's correct. It depends on your style, age and goals. I use mostly bond funds and doing pretty good.
In the biggest meltdown in the last 10 years, MWFSX peak to trough was about 6%, VCIF was about 13%, BND (US bond index) all investment grade was about 6.5%. It shows that MWFSX managers did a great job. Is it a guarantee? of course not.
BTW, the Portfolio Composition(Characteristics,Sector Weight,Credit Quality,Duration Maturity) for MWFSX is as of 5/31/2020 based on real data. See (link).
Another observation, the monthly yield keeps getting smaller in the last 5 months.
So, only you can make this decision after gathering all the information.

M* and 'dying' has been synonymous with me for several years now ... which is why I am no longer a member of the premium site, a newsletter subscriber, and left their forum last year.

You should have patented your face mask!

M* and 'dying' has been synonymous with me for several years now ... which is why I am no longer a member of the premium site, a newsletter subscriber, and left their forum last year.