Hank - my only reason for commenting was a roundabout way of saying that most readers here probably do not use/invest in hedge funds. I do however follow a few of the managers of same.

@Mark, I realized that. (And your link was excellent.). But I’m pretty good at digging holes. :) So wanted to avoid any possible “incoming” from the anti-hedgie crowd and make it clear that defending those vehicles (or any others) isn’t my intent.
@Old_Joe, Let me say at the onset that Maurice was the first board member ever to respond when I posted a question (on Fund Alarm, of course) about 15 years ago. His answer was helpful, but more importantly, helped draw me into the FA / MFO circle. I’m eternally grateful.
I miss Maurice as one of the really genuine voices here. Some of the political responses on the board strike me as either “unthinking” (programmed) or not even genuine. But I think Mo firmly believed what he professed. You and I disagreed - but he is someone I at least found it possible to listen to and take seriously.
Your passage is likely be misunderstood by some. Seems to me you’re bemoaning the fact Mo decided to leave rather than deal with some of the flack he encountered. Perhaps he’s landed someplace where he’s more comfortable. I will say that here I’ve learned a lot more about people and getting along in this world over the years than about money. We all take our lumps from time to time. But out of that growth may occur.

@Mark,
Very informative link. To be clear, neither JoJo26 (I think) nor I intended to promote hedge funds. I don’t pretend to be knowledgeable about them. I was going to note that RPGAX has $640.20M in investor assets, 10% of which the fund invests in a hedge fund. But your linked article hits upon this. That would be correctly termed an investment by an institutional investor.
I think the point JoJo was really making, and which I echoed, is that the big investor gains have in recent years been narrowly focused among a few specific hot sectors. So, instead of singling out only hedge funds, one might also wonder: Will value investing, diversification, alternative assets, or emerging markets ever recover?
In researching the topic further I stumbled across this old MFO thread. It’s getting bad when your Google search turns up a piece to which you yourself contributed. (Truly the blind leading the blind) :)
https://mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/40315/rpgax

@JoJo26 - Can’t quarral with anything you say here.
But these whip-saws in investor sentiment appear to be getting more pronounced. Suspect that’s largely due to the ease of accessing stock, bond and index returns, along with 1-year, 3-year etc. fund performance. These numbers serve to reinforce investor perceptions of where the “best” returns can be achieved (classic case of elephant chasing tail).
I’m sure in his/her own mind, 100% of investors chasing returns believe they will be able to “get out in time” when the carousel finally stops. While I know that the odds of everyone exiting equities (or a particular index) all at once is effectively “0”, I’m afraid it would take someone of @msf’s brilliance to explain why 100% of investors can’t all sell at the same time (and thereby save their skins).
Agree that hedge funds usually (but not always) diversify widely and exercise a cautious approach. Neither of those qualities has served investors well in recent years.

Thanks @Old_Skeet, appreciate the kind words. I know the Highlands area having hiked there a few times. But I am up in the the northwest corner of the state around Boone/Banner Elk. All I hold now in addition to money market is IOFIX which I have on a tight leash. With both short and long term rates riding I don’t want to go too far out with CDs hoping for higher yields there further down the road. Also, don’t want to get too tied up there whenever the next market debacle comes along. I am hoping that debacle will be in junk bonds
@Hank, I was advised by most everyone to rent and not buy a vacation home. But I have been renting for many years now during the summers and just don’t enjoy the “feel” of a rental. I want something I can put my own personal touch on and feel more at home. Also, seeing far too many of my friends succumb to this disease or that and figured I better spend some of my money while I can still enjoy it.
@Ted. Since I won’t be around here for awhile, if the S@P does hit 3000 this year let me in advance bow down from afar at your feet. Great call if if comes to pass as we are very close.
Otherwise best of health and good fortune to everyone else. Will be back after the next market debacle however long thst may be before it occurs.

FYI: When I began this column in the spring of 2013, one of my early submissions chided hedge funds. Called "Hedge Fund Follies," the article showed that over the previous seven years--a full market cycle, in that it covered the runup to the financial crisis, the collapse, and the subsequent recovery--every category of target-date mutual fund had outgained hedge funds of funds, or HFOFs.
The underlying hedge funds that are owned by HFOFs fared little better. Over that same seven-year period, most hedge fund categories trailed their mutual fund equivalents. For once, man had bitten the dog; the bottom 99% of investors had bested the top 1%.
Five years later, things look worse rather than better.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.morningstar.com/articles/883298/will-hedge-funds-ever-recover.html

@hank- I dunno... that's three years out (2021)... lots can happen between now and then.
Edit: I asked this in another post a few days ago, but that post sort of lost interest, I guess. Gonna try again:
General question: If "US consumers will be paying more because of the tariff war, isn't that effectively the same thing as a decrease in their take-home pay"? And if that's correct, won't that eventually have the effect of reducing national consumption, retail purchasing, and business income? Since an increase in prices will effectively reduce the disposable income of consumers, it would seem that this would be so.
Also, wouldn't the increase in prices be tantamount to an increase in inflation? If that's true, wouldn't this eventually also have an effect on interest rates, as the Fed moves to adjust for that inflation?
It seems to me that this whole scenario might have long-term consequences that we haven't really considered. Whether Mr. Trump actually considers and understands the possibilities, I'll leave to your judgement.
@msf- Am I off-base on this? Would appreciate your perspective.

I sold my PKW end of 2016, having made some good profits, saw it starting to lag , and figured i was better off putting the money into VOO, which I have been increasing over the last two years.

Ha !!! @Old_Joe
Who'da thunk, 50 years later from the Haight-Ashbury days and you're taking a profit from the Mary Jane industry and without fear of this being a felony for "dealing".
:) :) :)

@Ted - The fund started in 2014. Did you mean YTD, 1 yr and 3 yr? Or perhaps this fund won't liquidate, but achieve a 100th percentile standing on its 5 year anniversary.
It's not that this fund has been so consistently bad. It's just that over the past 1.7 years this fund has been so spectacularly awful that its recent performance has pulled down its longer term figures.
It returned 19%, versus 21% for its peers in 2016. Not great, but hardly a disaster. And in its first full calendar year, 2015, it blew away its competitors, outperforming it peers by 3½%.
The Steadman funds had ERs pushing double digits. This one costs only 1.25% (investor class).
While this fund looks like it really did work at being bad (90% turnover, 51 stocks), sometimes you don't have to work much at all to look even worse. Berkowitz achieved that feat over at FAIRX by simply standing pat, with virtually no trading (7% turnover) and just 9 stocks. By doing almost nothing, he managed to achieve a perfect 100th percentile rating, not just YTD, 1 year, 3 year, and 5 year, but also 10 year, and probably further out if one can dig up those figures.

@Mfo Members: Actually there's is evidence that investing in the four "B" Booze, Bets, Bombs & Butts has paid off over the years.

Nice to see @Ted still has a sense of humor. Some of us were beginning to wonder. :)
I think investing should be enjoyable. So, except for the “bombs” part in the above, count me in. May I suggest changing one “m“ to an “o“? That would definitely pique my interest (or is it “peak”?). Either way I’m in.

Not to worry- the present administration and Congress is on that.

Ya, let's hollow-out SS. The giant debt we created via the tax cut must be paid for, eh? ;)
The poor must always help the rich to stay rich and get richer.
Hedges, the Nobel (correction: Pulitzer) winner for Journalism, knows a thing or two:
This presentation was given in Canada.
Near the start, he asserts: "You don't have to spend three years in Harvard divinity school to figure out that Jesus didn't come to make us rich." Yup. But this presentation is political, not religious.

@Mfo Members: Actually there's is evidence that investing in the four "B" Booze, Bets, Bombs & Butts has paid off over the years. In fact Dan Ahrens former Vice Fund manager has written a book about investing in sin.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.amazon.com/Investing-Vice-Recession-Proof-Portfolio-Booze-ebook/dp/B003E4CYYO/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1537279123&sr=8-1-fkmr0&keywords=Dan+S.+Ahrens
M* Snapshot VICEX:
https://www.morningstar.com/funds/xnas/vicex/quote.html

@Catch22 - Point taken.
However, as I noted earlier, storing a few years supply of your favorite single-malt or blend is one investment to consider. I think a case can be made that the product, along with associated tariffs and taxes, will appreciate in value more quickly than cash. Heck, it might even do better than a 10-year treasury yielding 3%. In addition, many noted investors (like Peter Lynch and Warren Buffet) emphasize the importance of investing in something you know. Indeed, Buffet has long invested in his favorite beverage, CocaCola. Why should scotch whisky be accorded any less favorable treatment?
The linked article discusses 5 ways in which investors may profit from Scotch Whiskey. And, despite your preference for wine, I’d venture to guess that at least one of your mutual funds has exposure in some form (debt or equity) to Diageo.
Invest in Cask Schemes
Buy and Hold Rare Whisky
Buy Shares of Diageo
Invest in a Whisky Investment Fund
Treasure Hunt for Individual Bottles
“ Brands like Macallan, Glenlivet, and Highland Park are popular, as are lesser produced Scotches such as Mortlach, St. Magdalene, and Glenfarclas. While there is no guarantee it will continue to appreciate, The Rare Whiskey 101 Icon Index increased about 350% between 2008 and 2016.”
https://unusualinvestments.com/5-ways-invest-scotch-whisky/

I suspect this will be a lesson to all to properly frame the subject line.
Technically, @hank and @davidrmoran ; have not violated any thread drift rules; although I sincerely do not tolerate thread drift period.
You two are off the hook with me this time, within the subject line of this post being, "any-buy-ideas".
Lastly, I've had my chances years ago at the best of the best for scotch; and "NO", I'll have a decent wine any day.

1) The author of the linked article wrote
" The only thing that will cash a bond fund’s price to increase is declining interest rates. This means in an extended period of rising rates; bond fund investors will see their principal decline without the possibility of a recovery."
I assume that the 5th word "cash" is a typo for "cause". But even when the typo is corrected the sentence does not square with what I've observed over time. When interest rates rise the bond fund will invest in the higher yielding bonds that appear. The investor in the bond fund gets a higher interest rate on these bonds. While there have been years of loss ("negative return") I have never had my principal decline in a bond fund. For one thing all interest and capital gains are being used to automatically buy more shares in the fund. I invest in bond funds as a counter-balance to investments in stock funds. I'd be wary about using a bond fund to generate income. For that I have bought single bonds through a reliable broker.
2) The title of this post was sufficient for me to get an inkling of what the linked article was about. For me, unattributed replication of the first lines of an article is not more helpful than no blurb at all. Ted copies and pastes the first sentences of the linked articles. As often as not these first sentences have been written to establish a basis for understanding the main thrust of the article. They are not a synopsis of what follows.
3) None of the above should be taken to mean that I have not benefited from some of the articles linked by Ted, John, or others. I have. And I appreciate the public service, and the time & effort . It would be even better if when someone posts a link they write a few words of their own about what the article is about and why they find it worthy of attention.

John, you have been asked before over the years by several on the board, but please try to be like Ted if you are going to post links. Meaning, give a brief synopsis of what the link is about. Otherwise, thanks for your efforts In ferreting out news worthy stories.

Very nice, very nice; standard Dewar's has gotten rather smokier (peatier) over the years, like JW Black.

More single-malts. ;)

Ditto (But in my price range I prefer some of the better blends.)
Loading up on your favorite brand will probably pay-off better over the next few years (due to price inflation) than many investments folks seem to favor. The gain is tax-free (long as you consume it yourself). I can almost guarantee a good cache of scotch will perform better over the next few years than cash yielding 1-2% will.
I’m studying adding to the miners - especially if p/m prices stay low or continue falling.

@jerry, I like your idea of AAPL at 180, but that is a 20% drop from todays price. It would probably take a pretty good market down-turn, but anything is possible, so that would be a great entry point if you can get it. I actually sold my shares at about 140 a couple years ago, dumb, dumb, dumb...
If we are talking individual stocks, sold my remaining BABA, Alibaba shares last week and put a limit order in for DWDP, DowDupont @ 64.9 with the proceeds. I own EVGBX and I regard that funds management very highly. They talked about their recent purchase of this "value" stock in their latest communication to share holders.
Alibaba has probably been the most lucrative stock I've ever owned, but the continued China tariffs have put it in a steady down trend since June. When all this nonsense ends, I may buy back in.

If you click on a members name you will see his/her role either just member or member premium. Premium means that at some point $100 was contributed to MFO.

@Ted. Hate to say you are wrong (again). But you are wrong again. Like many, I’ve made several contributions to MFO since its inception, including the contribution tendered January 18 of this year as documented by the attached cut and paste from my Pay Pal account. Although curious why my member designation didn’t change from “member” to “premium member”, it hardly seemed worth mentioning to anyone (and I didn’t) - until you raised the issue.
-
Paid with
VISA x-****
You'll see "PAYPAL *MUTUALFUNDO" on your card statement.
Category
Donations
Transaction ID
*****************
Seller info
Mutual Fund Observer
309-794-7581
http://www.mutualfundobserver.com
[email protected]
Purchase details
Access to Group: NonRecurring (1 year)$100.00
Item #Temp
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Likely, a great many others have contributed financially to MFO over the years in accordance with their means, needs and situation without receiving special recognition. And it is blatantly inaccurate of you to in any way suggest otherwise.