Honestly, I pay no attention. Don't see what gender or sexual orientation has to do with anything.
Have had many excellent female money managers, attorneys, surgeons, etc. over the years. And more than a few males who were real "clunkers."
We're still playing catch-up of course. That's because the stereotypes that existed unfairly many decades ago take time to change. When I was in high school counselors (and parents) were more likely to steer girls into careers in nursing and teaching and men into science, engineering or accounting. Helps explain why even today there are higher proportions of the genders in certain fields. So much has changed for the better. But it will take many more years to overcome the effects of those stereotypes.

Check out this article:

Thanks for the article. If I am reading this chart correctly.

The chart illustrates that a 25 year old has 9x as much human capital as financial assets. A 40 year old has an equal amount of human capital as financial assets and at 60 year old should have financial assets equal about 9X their human capital. This chart seems like a pretty good way to gauge where a worker needs to be in the process of using human capital to accumulate financial assets which I assume is the intent of this chart.
I'll assume we're equating human capital (income producing activities moment by moment) to accumulated financial wealth.
As a simple example, if human capital at 25 years old is say, "$50K", then by 40 years old financial assets should equal "$50K". A 25 year old has 15 years to save some of his/her human capital each year to reach this goal at age 40. This amounts to investing about $2100 / yr with an average return of 4%. Seems very achievable.
If at age 60 your human capital is say "$100K", your financial assets should equal "$900K". A 40 year old has 20 years to invest some of his/her human capital each year to reach this goal at age 60. This would amount to investing about $25,500 / yr with an average return of 4%. This seems a bitt more challenging especially when things like college tuition, weddings, and elderly parents (or unemployed kids) are siphoning off some of your human capital.

Year old article, but relevent.
Getting Into The Unicorn Boom: 10 Mutual Funds With Stakes In Pre-I P O Tech Stars
by Steve Schaefer , FORBES STAFF
Of course, for most investors there’s little need to chase the rich valuations brewing in private markets. Almost every high-profile I P O in recent years has revisited its offering price, including Facebook, Twitter TWTR +21.42% and Alibaba . But for those keen on getting early exposure, mutual funds that allocate a portion of their holdings to the space, without betting the farm that every billion-dollar startup is going to be a long-term success, is a reasonable strategy.
According to Pitchbook’s 2015 Unicorn Report, T. Rowe Price owns stakes in 14 unicorns, outpaced by only Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horiwitz, Kleiner Perkins and SV Angel. Wellington Management has participated in funding for 12 unicorns, while Fidelity has been involved in eight such capital raises.
The table below shows 10 of the funds that own stakes in the tech world’s unicorns, and even though the businesses have lofty valuations, they still represent a small piece of the funds’ overall portfolios

http://www.forbes.com/sites/steveschaefer/2015/10/14/unicorns-funds-fidelity-trowe-uber-dropbox/#76f71c9f57f4
Crony Capitalism for the Private Equity and Investment Banking Set ?
This is listed as an opinion piece,but still worthwhile for further background.
Startup Valuations, Mutual Funds, And The Saga Of Blue Bottle
June 16, 2016 - By Max Cherney
...mutual fund valuations are one of the few hard data points the public has to assess what the company’s shares are worth, or at least what mutual funds think they are. And that’s important—more than it has been historically—because of changes introduced by a 2012 law: the Jumpstart Our Business Startups (JOBS) Act
Sold as a way to make the growing practice of crowdfunding legit, the JOBS Act also contained a provision that has had a profound impact on how companies are funded and at what point they go public: the fed axed the 500 rule—requiring a company to go public after it had more than 500 shareholders—and now only requires a company to I P O after it hits 2,000 accredited investors (though the number remains at 500 if those investors are not accredited).
Without the JOBS Act, Airbnb and Uber would likely have been required to go public (as Facebook was). Hence the number of large, private companies has swelled—why put an enterprise at the mercy of Wall Street’s grueling quarterly expectations if not absolutely necessary?
https://mattermark.com/startup-valuations-mutual-funds-saga-blue-bottle/
The coffee wars of San Francisco are back on!
https://techcrunch.com/2016/09/25/blue-bottle-coffee-is-raising-another-a-big-round-of-funding/?
Silicon Valley is known for plenty unusual investments, anywhere from alternative food products to space exploration, and the coffee industry is certainly no exception. But there’s logic to it: there’s a huge coffee market and a near-perfect comparable in the market, with Starbucks hanging out at an $80 billion valuation. For any coffee company, capturing even a fracture of that market already means the company has hit unicorn status

UNITED STATES SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
Washington, D.C. 20549
FORM D
Notice of Exempt Offering of Securities
Name of Issuer
Blue Bottle Coffee, Inc.
Jurisdiction of Incorporation/Organization
DELAWARE
Year of Incorporation/Organization
Over Five Years Ago
X Within Last Five Years (Specify Year) 2012
Yet to Be Formed
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1560324/000156032415000001/xslFormDX01/primary_doc.xml
https://techcrunch.com/unicorn-leaderboard/
Boy ! Did we miss this one !
https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/theranos#/entiy
SCIENCE
Lesson of Theranos: Fact-Checking Alone Isn't Enough
AUG 8, 2016 10:00 AM EDT
By
Faye Flam @ Bloomberg
Elizabeth Holmes,at just 32, is the founder and chief executive officer of the high-tech diagnostics company Theranos, a startup valued at $9 billion that promised to revolutionize blood testing. Until recently, she was the world’s youngest female self-made billionaire..
Aug 8, 2016 Bloomberg - Lesson of Theranos: Fact-Checking Alone Isn't Enough
https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-08-08/lesson-of-theranos-fact-checking-alone-isn-t-enough
TECHNOLOGY NEWS | Fri Sep 23, 2016 | 6:52pm EDT (Reuters)
Twitter initiates talks with tech companies over sale: sourceA sale of Twitter has been the subject of on-again, off-again rumors for many months as the company grapples with stagnant user growth, soft advertising sales and losses running at hundreds of millions of dollars a year.
The company's business struggles have come even as the 10-year-old service has evolved into a potent global source of news, entertainment and social commentary.
CNBC, citing anonymous sources, reported on Friday that Twitter is in talks with companies including Google (GOOGL.O) and may receive a formal bid soon. A source told Reuters that Salesforce.com (CRM.N) is also in pursuit.
TECHNOLOGY NEWS | Fri Sep 23, 2016 | 4:29pm EDT (Reuters )
Facebook apologizes for overstating key ad metric
Facebook has made a significant strides into video, which has attracted significant advertising interest and has benefited from the shift in advertising spending toward the internet and other mobile platforms.
Revenue from advertising was the biggest driver to company's total revenue in the latest quarter, surging 63 percent to $6.24 billion. "This could pose a serious blow to Facebook's video proposition, which has had so much of momentum over the last two years," said Sarah Wood, co-CEO of ad tech company Unruly, which is owned by News Corp.http://www.reuters.com/news/archive/technologyNews

Hi @MOZART325,
Thank you for your sugestion to look at GSVC and SVVC.
The first screen that I took these to task was a performance screen test.
Here was the results with their respective performance ... ytd ... 2015 ... 2014 ... 2013 ... & 2012.
LPEFX ... 1.65% ... (-0.56%) ... 0.44% ... 41.26% ... 29.70%
GSCV ... (-18.35%) ... 8.57% ... (-28.62%) ... 43.42% ... (-39.57%)
SVVC ... (-14.53) ... (-56.19%) ... 5.78% ... 34.67% ... 21.70%
Negative years are in (-x.xx%)
After review of this analysis I went no further since LPEFX was the better performer and goes to show how tough of space private equity and business development operates with the losses the other two have had. And, it makes me feel better about my pick to invest in this space through LPEFX.
Thanks again for you suggestion to review the subjects.

@MSF, Agreed BlackRock still has a long way to go, but is somewhat ahead of the curve relative to Vanguard in acknowledging that climate change is a material financial risk. This is why of the three big indexers I say State Street is now the best choice for both the environmentally conscious and the cost conscious. For those who are primarily concerned about ESG factors, smaller boutique shops like Pax World and Parnassus are light years ahead of any of these big firms. Perhaps Deutsche Bank's funds might represent an interesting compromise between concern for ESG and cost.

I give more weight to performance 3 years and a few funds I've owned over 10 years.. At age 82 I don't have a alot of time. Other than index funds I only own VWINX-HBLIX, PRBLX, POGRX, PRWCX, VEIPX and GTLLX and 2 bond funds PIMIX and TGEIX.

Annualized - take a cumulative figure over any time period, and scale it to one year.
Investopedia's got this right:
http://www.investopedia.com/terms/a/annualized-total-return.asp
Note that I cite Invesopedia here not as an authoritative source, but as a readable one, in case my writing/typing/formulae below are unclear.
For example, if you have a cumulative return of 21% for two years, you scale it to one year by taking the square root (1/2 power): sqrt (1 + 21%) - 1 = (1.1) - 1 = 10%
In general, given a cumulative return over a period of Y years,
annualized return = (1 + cumulative return) ^ (1/Y) - 1
You'll notice a striking resemblance to geometric average:
1 + cumulative return = (1 + first year return) x (1 + second year return) x ...
Unfortunately, figures under a year are often "annualized" without compounding, e.g. a six month return of 5% is "annualized" to 10%, not to (1.05 * 1.05) - 1 = 10.25%.

Somewhere I've still got M-W's 2nd unabridged, on onion skin (from my parents). The last edition before they started including slang. If I can find it (not likely), I'll see what it says.
If one insists that average means (no pun intended) arithmetic mean: What was the average annual return of a fund that produced 50% and -50% returns over the past two years? 0% or -13%? Sure it's still a mean, but it's not the "usual" mean.
As for me, I'm still bothered by flammable. I get inflamed whenever I hear it :-)

I hate when people us the term "average annual return" in place of "annualized return." The two are nowhere near synonymous.

Defined pensions are a thing of the past. Only about 5% of workers have them and 50% of those work for gov't.

Speaking of fuzzy statistics, this number sounds way off. Pensions are declining, but not nearly that fast. As of 2011, 18% of private sector workers had traditional pensions, and 78% of government workers had pensions. (I've no doubt the figures have dropped in the past five years, but not by 3/4).

You are correct. I was thinking of union members.

Somewhere I've still got M-W's 2nd unabridged, on onion skin (from my parents). The last edition before they started including slang. If I can find it (not likely), I'll see what it says.
If one insists that average means (no pun intended) arithmetic mean: What was the average annual return of a fund that produced 50% and -50% returns over the past two years? 0% or -13%? Sure it's still a mean, but it's not the "usual" mean.
As for me, I'm still bothered by flammable. I get inflamed whenever I hear it :-)

Defined pensions are a thing of the past. Only about 5% of workers have them and 50% of those work for gov't.

Speaking of fuzzy statistics, this number sounds way off. Pensions are declining, but not nearly that fast. As of 2011, 18% of private sector workers had traditional pensions, and 78% of government workers had pensions. (I've no doubt the figures have dropped in the past five years, but not by 3/4).
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2012/12/art1full.pdf

The only way I see people surviving with such small net worth is,social security, food stamps etc and living hand to mouth. 46 million use food stamps.
This should give those of us with substantial net worth, SS and pensions pause to appreciate what we have.

That's a more accurate statistic. It's even worse that it looks when you consider that several millions of those people need food stamps while working. I agree with the sentiment - though IMHO it is better to try to give a hand up (however one feels that is best done) than to simply be thankful for one's own situation.

Hi Ted,
Many thanks for the SPIVA reference. It was a reminder of days past.
Not many years ago I eagerly awaited the SPIVA reports. Not so much so these days. I became weary of the same old, same old performance persistency registered by the active mutual fund manager community. The percentages changed a little and the categories morphed a little, but the basic story was always consistent.
Active fund managers find their benchmark Index just too great a challenge to beat. That's the persistent statistical story over decades. The current SPIVA releases document that seemingly never ending storyline. Typically 80% to 90% of active fund managers stumble below their benchmark targets.
As a result of the consistency of the SPIVA findings, I stopped reading their reports. They seemed redundant and almost interchangeable. Your reference documents that the active fund manager performance has not changed much over time. It remains in the dismal class with few exceptions.
Thanks again for this reference and the countless others that you graciously provide. You are the glue that holds this discussion board together.
Best Wishes

If the figure above is representative of US general population, we are in trouble unless the they have a healthy social security and generous pension. Over the past 20 years define pension plans have largely been replaced by define contribution plan, i.e. 401(k) and 403(b).
I work for a company that offer both a pension plan and 401(k), but the pension plan grows slowly (invest conservatively and I have no control) and the company's contribution is too many (1% of my salary). The bulk of the company's contribution goes into my 401(k) and that I am grateful.

Great article. Many of the investments in the endowment are quite complex and very difficult for smaller investors to own (assuming they would want them). Minimums tend to be high and there's lots of legal restrictions imposed by IRS or SEC which impede liquidity and add tax liabilities for small investors.
If (for the above reasons) these investments are not in a financial assets manager's basket of offerings to begin with, it's difficult for the manager to add them to a target date fund.
Article suggests that a target fund dated 30 years in the future is comperable to a college endowment in investment horizon. I'm not sure that's true. However, assuming it is ... what percentage of small investors in that age group (say 20-35 years of age) actually elect to invest through target date funds? Is there a sizable market there to make such a diversified offering profitable for the financial services provider?
---
More thoughts after sleeping on this one: A big difference (which I think the M* article largely ignores) is that humans age - and that this life-long transition must be taken into account over one's ever changing investment horizon. That's where target date glide-slopes come into play. Most rational advisors wouldn't allocate an individual's money as aggressively at age 60 as the would at age 30-40. However, with a university endowment there would seem to be no need for such a glide-slope. Assuming the university continues to grow and prosper, it's endowment investment horizon should remain constant - allowing an aggressive broadly diversified approach for many decades - even centuries. Do I have it right? Or am I missing something in highlighting this difference?

I say investors should try to stick with it ... as hard as that may be to do. " I think as a former dedicated value investor that it is just too hard. Buying what is performing doing well and switching when its not is probably a better strategy for most investors. the difficult of sticking with value funds which have under performed like in the last 5-7 years is just too difficult for most investors. They wind up selling out before the trends change and most the rebound.

Thanks MJG. Been thinking about this very situation. Lots of "value" managers under-performing vs SP500 last 5-7 years. Hard to know exactly why. Some of them blame ZIRP. Others acknowledging that the value premium is something you can only count on over the long run, the length of which is also hard to specify. Ten years certainly seems like "the long run" ... indeed it is compared to holding time of most individual and even institutional investors! But, not so sure it is for any one strategy or another. Some value managers are actually pointing to the under-performance as evidence that they are on the right track! And, it's hard to knock them. And I've heard others say that some value metrics have actually performed OK. In any case, like JoJo26, I too believe the value premium will ultimately persistent. If a manager is consistently executing a startegy, and you agree with that stratetgy, I say investors should try to stick with it ... as hard as that may be to do. Hope all is well. c

Most active managers do not outperform their index. Why any more research is needed? Maybe we will also see research paper on other performance metrics that will reach similar conclusions.
I should have spent couple more years and got a PhD. Searching once is nothing. Searching twice is "Re"search.

FYI: Burton Malkiel has been saying the same thing about investing for more than 40 years. What’s new is that a big chunk of the financial industry now admits he was right all along.
In 1973, Malkiel, a Princeton professor, published the first version of his investment guide, A Random Walk Down Wall Street. He wrote that “a blindfolded monkey throwing darts at the stock listings could select a portfolio that would do just as well as one selected by the experts.” Since most investors can’t beat the market average over time, he argued, they’d be better off in some kind of low-fee fund that simply held all of the stocks on a widely followed index. Problem was, no such retail fund existed.
Regards,
Ted
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-22/the-professor-who-was-right-about-index-funds-all-along

This is a not-uncommon occurrence, and realistically, there's little one can do but approve the new contract.
Mutual funds legally do not "belong" to fund families. They are "independent" companies ("registered investment companies") that "hire" the management company (fund family) to manage them. The contract between the fund and the management company automatically terminates when the management company is sold.
What usually happens is that the new owners of the management company (here, People's United Bank) offers a new management contract, where the same people continue on as managers. The contract usually says that for some period of time, nothing will change.
Your choices are to accept the contract, in which case little will change in the short term, and possibly nothing or a lot in the long term, or to reject the contract. Reject it, and the fund is left with no managers. It will either have to try again to get approval for that contract, find another management company (and new fund managers), or dissolve the fund. Rock and hard place.
There's a current ER limit in place (1%) through March 2017. The new agreement seems to be promising to keep this in place for two years. On a quick skim of the proxy, I didn't see anything said about whether the managers committed to staying on with the new company, and if so for how long.
Edit: forgot to add - it looks like People's United Bank offers free coin counting (for account holders). Nice to know since TDBank got rid of their machines.

So I an not interested in FPRAX, since FPACX gives me global exposure. However I have been wanting to pull the trigger on FPPFX for a while. Problem is where as Value Funds have been having a field day, this sucker is stinking up the place. I thought may be new manager, but this chap's been with FPA for over a dozen years.
Anyone own either of FPRAX or FPPFX?