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Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.
  • DSENX - another one that was good until it wasn't
    I think the Doubleline website does a good job of explaining how it works, but I wonder how many people did proper research on it.
    Proper research? @fundfun, it is pretty hard to research how a fund may perform in a bear market if it's never been in a bear market. Now we know. A lot of Doublelines info is a sales pitch. Actually the best information I've seen is in past posts here at MFO.
    CAPE is a simple concept. That is explained. The bond-derivative part is not explained well at all, so investors have nothing but performance to go by and a leap of faith. From the start this fund was great. The past couple years when value has underperformed so did this fund. Now we know it won't hold up well when bonds are selling off. Now we know.
    CAPE ytd = -24.5
    DSENX ytd = -31.1
  • Dodge and Cox
    One plausible explanation of the lagging performance of D&C for the last 10 years is the value stocks invested in their funds are out style. Not only D&C, other value-oriented mutual funds companies are also lagging, most notably Oakmark. The growth stocks such as the FANNG stocks dominate and contribute to their out-sized performance in S&P 500 relative to the value-oriented stocks. In contrast, PRWCX is a growth-oriented balanced fund and the top to holdings consist of Microsoft and Google (at one point it held Amazon). David Giroux has also done a good job picking his allocation and stocks well in this environment.
  • When Can America Reopen From Its Coronavirus Shutdown?
    Howdy folks,
    Great article [rono loves to read economists].
    While it is way too soon, getting somethings back up in safe manner is what we need to study. How can we morph our society and economy into one that is safe?
    My son is a county park manager (essential) and had to go pickup a tractor bucket from a vendor. Called first, made an appointment, drove to the back of the building and called again. They opened the door, brought the bucket out and put it on his trailer. They waived and he was gone.
    We have a local farmer that sells starts and plants in the spring. He's always been an Honor System vendor (e.g. put your money in a box and take change if you need it) but he's already come out on his fb page how he's going to be safe, comply and be open for business.
    All that said, right now we all have to stay home. Period. It's going to be an ugly few weeks folks.
    I've been talking with my brother more than we've done in years. He's Associate Dean of Medical Education at a Med School and spent 25 years running an ER Residency program. Huge problem with the lack of testing, PPE gear, ventilators, etc. We had absolutely no surge capacity anywhere in the system. None. We used to have departments and offices at all levels of gov't to deal with pandemics and all. We used to have supplies and inventory. Not any more. All that 'what if' stuff has fallen to the budget axe over many administrations and in the hospitals. Have to cut costs and it's such low hanging fruit. In addition, Just in Time Supply is pervasive in every field including health care and medicine. Oh, and he starts all of this with the fact that Trump's an idiot. He's leaning towards the middle to high side estimates. Sorry.
    BTW, wait until you start seeing layoffs in the health care industry?!? Health care is so specialized these days a LOT of people cannot 'cross over'. There's no elective surgery going on anywhere on the planet. The folks that replaced my hip a few years back will most often receive three choices - furlough with unemployment, taking vacation and sick time, volunteering to 'be reassigned'.
    and so it goes,
    peace and flatten the curve,
    rono
  • Dodge and Cox
    D&C have good funds but many of them are riskier and it shows at market stress such as 2008 and many times when stocks go down and 2020 is no different
    For YTD
    Allocation DODBX -23.4...PRWCX -16.2...JABAX -13.1
    Mostly US LC: DODGX -32.1....SPY -22.4
    Foreign stocks: DODFX -34.5...AFCNX -21.9
    BTW, all the funds above have better long term(1-3-5-10-15 years) risk/reward than D&C funds too.
  • M* Are Bond Funds 'Broken' as Diversifiers?
    Hi @Charles ........not picking on you, as you have placed valuable thoughts with your posts, relative to "bonds".
    Your April 3 post: "On regulation..."
    From the article:
    “I think you need more transparency where bonds are trading real time, [to aggregate] where the prices are at and find a best bid, best offer [so that] there’s a lot of increased confidence where bonds are trading, just like you have in equities,”
    >>> I continue to try to imagine how the S.E.C. or any other regulatory group can "force" the bond market (which has many various sectors, yes?) to otherwise price to an "exact" in a marketplace (for price and NAV) where it has been noted that a $10 trillion bond market doesn't have a similar amount of daily trading (sells and buys), relative to the equity market.
    Also, from the other April 3 post, "Indexes are one thing."
    Last February, there were $6T in bond funds (about $4.5T in OEFs) and I understand in March, like $250B in redemptions.
    >>> My math indicates a redemption amount of about 4.17%. Doesn't really seem so bad, eh?
    And from where did these redemptions arrive? Corp. and HY bonds? I don't have supporting data.......just my guess.
    ..... the lack of volatility providing (for some funds) false sense of security; therefore, more shocking the surprise when a crisis happens, which makes bond investors not used to drawdown, head for the door.
    ..... I see some bond funds like icebergs now.

    >>> One thing that I am sure of, and hopefully; not writing/sounding like a smart ass, is that over the years here reading questions and comments; is that most folks relative to bonds somewhat understand the difference between AAA bonds and HY/junk bonds. Everything in between is a mystery. I replied too many times in the last several weeks to express why such and such bond fund is "down". I've posted more than once bond rating standards by S&P. A question arises as to why "person X's" bond fund is reacting poorly.
    The answer is to look at the last known holdings and to discover that more than 50% of the "strategic/total or magic" bond fund is invested in BBB (edge of good junk) and lower rated bonds. Investor "x" was overly happy with the higher than normal yield, versus a plain vanilla bond fund that held higher rated bonds with lower yields. The reflection of the high yield is related to risk of the asset, yes?
    My takeaway is that the most common wording related to investing are the words, "the stock market"; with a common question being, "Are you invested in the stock market?' I've mentioned in direct conversation, "Well, yes; but also the bond markets". This always gets the question mark face expression, a "huh". Bond investing awareness is thin.
    Are Bond Funds 'Broken' as Diversifiers? No !!!, depending where the bond monies are parked.
    It is easy to say after the fact, is that not all bond area investing areas are equal and that folks will attempt to continue to educate themselves about bonds. Never before has an unlimited amount of learning been available via the internet. A lack of curiosity and wanting to know are the major limiting factors.
    The watching process begins, relative to COVID-19; and the long thread from Feb. 22, related initially back to Jan. 21. Link here, if you choose to read again.
    I've run my typing mouth enough.
    Be well.
    Catch
  • Bond mutual funds analysis act 2 !!
    I usually do lots of research but this market volatility and unpredictability are extremly high.
    3 good funds for you TGLMX,VFIIX,ANBEX
    TGLMX VS VFIIX
    1) VFIIX bonds rating are higher. Both heavily in MBS.
    2) VFIIX duration=2.3 is much lower than TGLMX duration=5.8
    3) VFIIX SD is lower and especially YTD. TGLMX peak to trough in March was over 6% while VFIIX was about 2.1%.
    4) And why YTD performance is close
    So, for the unknown wild market, VFIIX looks more of a sleep better fund.
    TGLMX VS ANBEX
    1) ANBEX invests mostly in Gov and lower % in Corp and hardly in MBS
    2) ANBEX risk/reward is better for YTD + 1-3 years and since inception 03/2016. See PV(link) since inception
    Portfolio CAGR Stdev Best Year Worst Year Max. Drawdown Sharpe Ratio Sortino Ratio
    ANBEX 4.91% 3.14% 7.84% 0.27% -2.32% 1.12 2.29
    TGLMX 3.72% 3.43% 7.27% -0.52% -3.13% 0.7 1.27
    VFIIX 2.86% 2.18% 5.83% -0.04% -1.95% 0.7 1.1
    3) For YTD (chart) ANBEX performance is better with a lower peak to trough loss too
    4) Of course, I also like ANBEX much smaller AUM and in this market also it's much higher turnover which means the managers' skill is working and they have many years of experience prior to running this fund.
  • DSENX - another one that was good until it wasn't
    I sold it on 3/26 and split the proceeds on the same day between adding to current position AKREX and opening a new position in YAFFX. I prefer funds that protect the down side. I thought this one might do that but results proved me wrong. Take a look at it's upside/down side capture ratio. Pretty poor looking at the past 3 years. The past 1 year returns are very disappointing too.
    Oh well, when the results were in, it didn't meet my expectations, which may have been more about CAPE sounding like a great idea. And the secret bond sauce, how tantalizing it was. I wanted to think it was a great long term concept versus relying on managers picking stocks and holding cash, but that's not what the data says.
    Glad you started the discussion again. I'm also curious how others see it now.
  • M* Are Bond Funds 'Broken' as Diversifiers?
    Some jumbled thoughts on bonds and portfolio construction:
    I swapped my pure corporate bond funds for a global bond fund about 3 years ago in my Roth account. Since the Roth can sit idle longer than my traditional 401k and therefore has longer to recover, I am comfortable taking more risk in the Roth. The Roth is more of a laboratory for me, to keep me from doing massively stupid stuff in my 401k (which is larger, and where I apply conventional strategies). That said, I retain vanilla corporate coverage (and the usual bond/stock splits) via balanced funds, which are 45% of my Roth.
    The global bond fund I hold (DODLX) in my Roth has dropped more than it's vanilla corporate cousin (DODIX) would have, and has performed worse over it's lifetime. I rebalance quarterly, and would like to think that I have gotten some portfolio gains vis-a-vis a medium duration bond fund given reasonable rebalancing and global's greater volatility. Time will tell.
    Having lived through 2008 early enough in my investment career (when during the early stages of the crashing the correlation between all assets was high), I would not have expected bonds to have done spectacular in our current situation. Indeed, they have largely performed as I would have expected. It makes sense to me that downturns and pullbacks are different than panics.
    I went into 2020 holding about 25% cash in my 401k since everything just seemed completely out of whack. I have been rebalancing into all asset classes (domestic large cap & small cap, international, domestic corporate and global bond). I will be shifting my cash hold to 18% for the foreseable future. I don't think I'll go below 10% cash matter what happens.
    Time will tell, "interesting times", etc.
  • U.S. High-Yield Bond Funds See Record Inflow After Exodus
    ORNAX had a chart that looked like a stock fund for some six years. Now it looks like an inverted hockey stick.
  • M* Are Bond Funds 'Broken' as Diversifiers?
    Indexes are one thing. Ditto large, passive ETFs. Transparent. US Treasuries.
    I read a Dave Nadig interview recently about bond pricing. He likens it to Zillow. Especially precarious with lightly traded assets in an open-ended vehicle that must sell to meet redemption, which we've now seen, with awful results.
    Last February, there were $6T in bond funds (about $4.5T in OEFs) and I understand in March, like $250B in redemptions.
    While the risks in equities are clear and present, rapid 30% fluctuations, the risks in bond funds are not ... the lack of volatility providing (for some funds) false sense of security; therefore, more shocking the surprise when a crisis happens, which makes bond investors not used to drawdown, head for the door.
    I see some bond funds like icebergs now.
    Doesn't help (going forward) that we have had literally 40 years of falling interest rates. Which way will rates go from here? Nowhere I expect for a while. But when rates rise and all those bond funds fall, watch out.
    And, when IG bond fund holding lots of BBB need to unload after downgrades in days/weeks ahead.
    And, what happens when Fed stops buying corporate bonds?
    So, sure, diversifier, but certainly not without their own set of serious risks (especially pricing risk) that probably needs to get more attention, likely more regulation. Glad financial media is talking more about it.
    It's a really important lesson for me and I'm still processing how to reengage and be better for it.
  • The Selling Has Been Merciless ...
    Really brutal. That's what happens after 11 years of bull market returns. Never want to get complacent again! c
  • The Selling Has Been Merciless ...
    @VF - The article mentioned one, "An investor who bought MFA financial five years ago was up 70% as of February 20th. Now they’re down 73%. It went from $8 to $1.28 in 28 days. Unbelievable move."
    Others include NRZ (-68.9%), TWO (-73.9%), LADR (-73.7%), WMC (-77.8%) and ABR (-65.9%). In addition there are several more with YTD losses of between -50 to -60%.
  • FMIJX = OUCHX
    OUCHX squared. Expected this one to hold better.
    Agreed. I've owned this fund for several years and expected much better in a major downturn.
  • Real estate sector is falling
    Speaking of things budgetary, I just found this article in this morning's Chron. Edited for brevity:

    The staggering economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic is expected to create a budget deficit in San Francisco of from $1.1 billion to $1.7 billion over the next two fiscal years, city officials said Tuesday.
    The grim projections accompanied an announcement that San Francisco’s budget-setting process would be delayed for two months to buy the city’s financial experts time to readjust their spending plans in light of stark revenue losses.
    In December, the projected budget shortfall over the next two fiscal years was pegged at around $420 million. That gap between the city’s spending plans and available revenue has roughly quadrupled. Last year’s budget, the largest in the city’s history, was $12.3 billion.
    “The coronavirus pandemic is an immediate threat to our public health, and we’re doing everything we can to slow its spread and save lives, but we know that it is also having a major impact on our economy and our city’s revenue,” Breed said in a statement.
    The city has already sustained substantial losses brought on by the threat of the coronavirus and its attendant impact on the economy. The estimated losses reflect evaporated revenue the city otherwise would have expected to receive.
    Over the next three months, city officials expect a shortfall of from $167 million to $288 million, driven primarily by losses in hotel and real estate-transfer taxes. The 2020-21 fiscal year is shaping up to be worse, according to the projections, with $330 million to $581 million in revenue drained away. Losses in the 2021-22 fiscal year are estimated at between $214 million and $382 million.
  • Real estate sector is falling
    It will be interesting to watch for deterioration in San Francisco's tax base, as in recent years it has been so heavily dependent on ever-increasing amounts of office space, and ever-smaller (and closer together) living spaces. Methinks pride goeth before... etc.
  • Retirement Strategy: New Investing Paradigm May Change Dividend Growth Investing Forever
    Hi Crash,
    Both PREMX and RPIBX were bought years back as part of an overall diversified allocation. I added PRSNX and back around the Ides of November when I was taking a couple of units out of equities. Wife and I are both at Price with our Rollover IRAs with mine being a brokerage account. Between the two accounts I've got bits and pieces here and there. What I'm watching right now is the impact of the virus on most everything. Most of my current play in that regard is in Asia. At Price I added TRAOX and a smidgen of PRLAX for watching. With my brokerage account I'm hitting Matthews with MPACX, MCHFX and MATFX. Otherwise, I'm still heavy on cash and playing the precious metals in various ways - hard, soft, juniors, oh my.
    I'm thinking about taking a nibble in Europe and watching the crisis play out.
    and so it goes,
    peace and flatten the curve,
    rono
  • When to start buying
    Yes, I agree with what @mcmarasco said about the funds "financial" holding being Visa and MasterCard, 2 great long term holdings. If you look up those stocks you will see they are categorized as IT, not financial.
    As far as manager succession John Neff, co-manager, has been mentoring with Aker for 6 years. I've listened to interviews and have been impressed. I don't have a problem with succession. I doubt Aker would walk away totally anyway. I wouldn't be surprised if he retires and still hangs as a consultant.
  • Muni bond fund question

    While two days is not a trend, does this give you any sense that muni money market funds are stabilizing? It seems the answer is it depends on the daily net shareholder cash flows.
    Certainly that's a part of it. However, ⅔ of these funds are in cash or paper that will mature or can be redeemed within five business days (weekly liquid assets). So it's hard to see such a stampede moving the shadow price (mark-to-market NAV) four times what we've just seen (i.e. to below 99.5¢). These funds have enough "cash" to handle a run on the bank, and the remainder of the assets will make its way through the fund over a few months.
    The government, as the WSJ put it, recently "backstopped" these MMFs. With all due respect, I think most MMF investors just see this as a "government guarantee". It's not quite that, but perception is reality and it should have a calming effect.
    That doesn't mean that the muni bond market won't again go wacko. This only addresses the question of cash flow of muni MMFs.
    Given that "Individual, or 'retail,' investors are the largest holders of municipal securities", a herd mentality reaction could make a real impact on the muni bond market. That in turn could depress the value of a fund's holdings. (Quote is from ICI's FAQ About Municipal Bonds.)
    ISTM that the government MMF loan program lets MMFs prop up their shadow price by swapping undervalued paper for cash. For example, a MMF might have a muni bond that will mature and be redeemed at par in 11 months, while the market is currently pricing it at $0.98. This loan program allows the MMF to borrow against the bond as if it were worth $1 (amortized cost).
    But that program doesn't come without a cost of its own. There's an interest charge equal to the primary credit rate (currently 0.25%) + 0.25% for muni MMFs. Will sponsors go for this?
    If past is prologue, the answer is largely yes.
    at least twenty-nine MMFs had losses large enough to cause them to break the buck in September and October 2008 despite significant government intervention and support of the sector. Five funds or more experienced losses exceeding the 3 percent reported by Reserve, and one fund reported a loss of nearly 10 percent. Among the twenty-nine funds that would have broken the buck without sponsor support, the average loss was 2.2 percent."
    https://libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org/2013/10/twenty-eight-money-market-funds-that-could-have-broken-the-buck-new-data-on-losses-during-the-2008-c.html
    Aside from the Reserve Fund that broke a buck, that's 28 other funds where their sponsors propped up their funds. They did this not at a rate of 50 basis points for a few months, but by infusing 200 basis points give or take up front. The loan program is a fantastic deal for the MMFs. From a psychological perspective, the expectation is that they won't have to use it. And should they need to, it is dirt cheap.
    Then again, what do I know? As Will Rogers said, all I know is what I read in the papers. I didn't go to a seventh-rated MMF sponsor (Schwab, according to Crane Data) to ask about this new development.
    Though I did speak with the big kahuna (Fidelity dominates money-market industry) a few years ago after the liquidity regs were finalized. At that time Fidelity was very courteous, confirming that I was reading the regs correctly, but declining to provide any information about how Fidelity would implement them in practice. As expected, and no different from Schwab's response - just boilerplate.
  • Global funds still recommend bonds over stocks: Reuters poll
    Global fund managers tilted towards bonds in March and don't hold much near term hope for a sustained stock market rebound....
    Global fund managers are convinced the world economy is already in recession, and recommended increasing bond holdings in March to the highest level in at least seven years while buffering up on cash at the expense of equities, a Reuters poll showed.
    “The recent fall in equities reflects the wrongdoings over the past decade such as share buy-backs at a time when investment growth was warranted."
    “The monumental scale of stimulus announced by central banks can only bring bond yields lower."
    Asset managers reduced recommendations to equity exposure to the lowest since September, to 45.9% of the model global portfolio from 49.1%. Cash holdings were increased to the highest since October, to 5.2% from 3.8%. Asked on the outlook for equities over the next three months, nearly 90% of respondents said stocks would fall further or stay around current levels.
    U.S. funds suggested a cut to equity exposure to the lowest in Reuters poll records for that country going back to early 2011 and an increase to bond holdings to the highest since then.
    https://reuters.com/article/us-funds-global-poll/global-funds-still-recommend-bonds-over-stocks-reuters-poll-idUSKBN21I1PO