Got a note today from a friend who's son is recently changed jobs after 8+ years and is looking at rolling over his 401k to a new employer's 401k plan. He's been given the following recommendation of funds and percentage allocations. I told him that it might be worth sending it through the "MFO carwash".
Any thoughts would be much appreciated from the point of view of fund choices (individually) and from the perspective of overall portfolio construction. Here's the suggestions he received:
JVASX - 21%
MFEIX - 21%
GOGIX - 16%
HFMIX - 8%
JVMIX - 8%
PONPX - 8%
PVSYX - 8%
MLPOX - 5%
HIEMX - 5%
Thanks in advance.

Gosh BobC, am I sensing a little hostility here? You used to say (correctly) that TIAA Traditional (what you called the "traditional bucket") provided "limited options to make changes". But now here you are saying that they always "treat client dollars as TIAA-CREF dollars and put up all kinds of roadblocks to retain them."
That's a rather curious observation in a thread ostensibly addressing retail customers, and discussing nonTIAA funds that one might invest in through them. If I invested in, say, TWEIX through a TIAA DIY brokerage account, how would they treat my client dollars as their own?
When I look at their retail after tax VA (Intelligent Life), I see a product that Kitces praised as being clear and flexible when it came out a decade ago. As far as putting up roadblocks to getting dollars out is concerned, I see TIAA doing just the opposite. With most annuities, at death (if not annuitized), it's possible to keep the money there for years. With this annuity, if it doesn't go to the spouse, the entire annuity must be cashed out immediately.
It is true that the annuity discourages people from leaving (while alive) by dropping the annuity fees to a mere 10 basis points after a decade. If that's the kind of roadblock you were talking about, give me more roadblocks :-)

I'm looking specifically for growth because I believe this bull market has years left to run - perhaps to 2030. After nearly a decade, we're finally transitioning from an interest rate driven market to an earnings driven market, and growth stocks are likely to benefit the most. Earnings will come from the application of new technologies.

Okay. Ask yourself this question. What are the changes of an actively managed mid cap growth fund outperforming VIMSX over the next 13 years?
I don't mean to preach. When I buy an actively managed fund, I'm not trying to mimic/outperform the market. I want to buy it because I want to assume MANAGER RISK. In my retirement accounts, I buy index funds because I am assuming MARKET RISK.
The worst outcome is when you get both MANAGER RISK and MARKET RISK. So if you want to buy an actively managed mid growth fund, maybe you can consider something like VMRGX. Take any of the above suggestions that are "mid growth" and compare against VMRGX. Hopefully that is instructive.

VIEIX, VIMSX would be my recommendations, frankly. Not sure why you want "growth". FMIMX is another option.

I'm looking specifically for growth because I believe this bull market has years left to run - perhaps to 2030. After nearly a decade, we're finally transitioning from an interest rate driven market to an earnings driven market, and growth stocks are likely to benefit the most. Earnings will come from the application of new technologies.

We have used Schwab (almost) exclusively for our client accounts for 20+ years. No company is perfect, but the combination of technology, pricing, and service has been darned good over the years. My view is that Vanguard and Fidelity (to some extent) have been late to the party in terms of services they offer. Vanguard has a brokerage account capability, but it is light years behind TD, Schwab and a handful of others from a technology standpoint.

I would like to d/l price info (price, date/time, etc) for a group of about 10 specific stocks and mutual funds. I've used yahoo.com for several years, but they've changed formats several times w/o warning, forcing me to revise my processing. It's frustrating. I would like to find a good, solid, established, easy-to-use source.
Suggestions?

Thanks for the praise, though rather overstated. Thanks also for the reminder that the biggest problem (at least for me) with the BofA cards has been their simultaneous paranoia on card use (e.g. refusing a $500 car repair charge 15 miles from home) and frequent issuing of new numbers (due to security breaches on their end).
To protect against problems abroad, I try to always carry cards from two different issuers. Capital One is an excellent card for that, with 1.5% and no foreign transaction fee.
Rather surprisingly, Discover Card is also becoming a reasonable alternative (1% and no foreign transaction fee), since it's been working hard at expanding its overseas presence in the last couple of years.. The current Fidelity VISA card's also reasonable (2% rewards reduced by a 1% foreign transaction fee).

As it turns out, what I keep with Merrill Edge is a fund that they won't sell me (they'll only hold it). A good place to drop a fund that I'm just going to let sit for years. Also, while brokerages make money lending securities that can be sold short, generally mutual funds cannot be shorted.
So Merrill, and its parent BofA are stuck servicing an account that they can't make a dime from, that costs them money to maintain, where I won't be trading (so they'll have to send me periodic inactivity notices costing them more money), and servicing a credit card where they're paying me over 2% on everything I charge on their cards (including Costco).
The only way I can see that I'm helping BofA is that they're able to count me as an account holder when they present to shareholders the number of accounts that are held with them. I think I can live with that.
I wouldn't dream of actually banking with them.

I've been with Schwab since 1997 and love it. I had a brief dalliance with VG a few years ago with part of my portfolio, but did not care for them. Among other reasons, you can call Schwab 24/7, not so with VG.
Schwab people on the phone are probably the most polite people you will ever talk to. In the 20 years I've been with them, the only time I've been to one of their offices was last fall. I was encouraged by the local rep to come in so I did, but aside from a good conversation it was a waste of time. Everything I need to do is available on the website, or is a quick phone call away with a very nice person (who speaks English).
Their website and its portfolio tools are pretty good. They have a huge selection of NL funds (they don't have everything, nor does anyone else). ETFs are now $4.95 per trade (not really relevant to me, I'm not a trader).

A well managed index fund can do a little better than the index minus expenses.
It can make some money by lending its securities. (Some funds let the fund management keep some or all of this; in Vanguard funds all of this revenue goes into the fund.)
Depending on the flexibility allowed to the fund, it can trade a little earlier or later than when the index changes, allowing it to take advantage of price movements. DFA advertises this "patient trading" as a specific advantage of its funds.
Virtually all funds even index funds keep some cash around to manage cash flows. Most years (when the market is rising) this "cash drag" pulls the performance of the fund down (toward the performance of the cash, which is now around 0%). But in years when the index drops, this "drag" tends to pull the fund performance up toward zero.

Over the last 15 years, how many *passively* managed domestic large cap funds beat their index? If they are truly tracking their index, don't they all fail each year by at least the amount of their expense ratio?

Hi Ted,
Thanks for the SPIVA reminder. It's a terrific service that deserves more investor attention.
These guys have been doing this mind numbing, numbers crunching job for a good many years now, I agree with your observation that the output is monotonous and easily predictable. A major fraction of Active fund managers have consistently and persistently failed to match their benchmark standards.
There are a few random exceptions for brief periods, but the record is substantial and overall it is very discouraging. It is depressing!
What is even more depressing is the fact that many investors still seek and fail to find the magic criteria that allow a forecast of who these few exceptions might be ahead of time. There's a good reason for that failure too. Those elusive magic criteria simply do not exist. What works now will likely change and fail in the future. The investment world is in constant change.
It took me a long time to learn that lesson. I recommend that MFO regulars consider just how challenging the Active fund management selection task really is. There are multiple thousands of candidate funds and only a handful will succeed for a short period. Given those dire odds, Index choices seem like an attractive alternate portfolio construction approach.
It's not that Active managers are not smart guys. They are very smart, totally committed, with large research staffs. That's just not enough to win. Their costs and competition against one another limits their potential outsized performance, and turns their considerable efforts into a Loser's game.
That's too, too bad, but that's the current ballgame. There will be a few brief exceptions. Good luck on identifying and capturing these exceptions in a timely and a profitable manner.
Best Wishes

FYI: After turning in their worst quarterly performance in years, bond funds were supposed to keep struggling as the calendar flipped to 2017. Managers were busy early this year making sure expectations were properly low for bond funds, even after billions of dollars left them in November and again in December.
Regards,
Ted
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/92c50e91608a43c594dd18ad5f096d37/surprise-despite-dire-forecasts-bond-funds-are-doing-fine

IMHO this is good news, since it means we can expect less bloat, less of a headache for managers having to deal with hot money, and more good funds reopening.
The object is to do well over time, not each and every year. In this article, they looked at how many funds outperformed (defined as being in the top 25%) annually over the past year, and a year ago, and two years ago, etc. Surprise, surprise, no funds outperform every year. From this they concluded that that funds don't outperform for more than three years or so. Wrong.
I ran a similar screen - except instead of using years ending Jan 31, I used years ending Dec. 31. Similar (and useless) results. After 2 years (2016 and 2015) I found 1026 share classes (vs. the 1098 that the article reported using Jan 31 ending dates). After three years I came up with 455 share classes, that amounted to about 183 different funds.
After six years of this (2016-2011), I got 41 share classes amounting to a tad over a dozen funds. Over eight calendar years (as opposed to years ending Jan 31), I found 18 share classes (9 funds). That's nine more funds than the article reported for years ending Jan 31. FWIW: UTAHX, RSGYX, GMCDX, LLDYX, NCSPX, PFORX, PISIX, PIFZX, and VMPYX.
But it's an absurd exercise. Backing up to five years (since there's data on five year performance), there are only 72 share classes that outperformed each of the past five calendar years (34 funds). Yet obviously 1/4 of the funds that have existed for five years have outperformed their peers (defined at being in the top 25%). Over 1700 funds.
Even if we add in the requirements that the funds must also have performed in the top 25% over the past three and one years, we still get around 600 funds. Roughly 20 times the number of funds that this article suggests.
This is why one should be skeptical of anyone saying that a fund consistently outperforms. Just as one should be skeptical of articles using consistency (over relatively small periods like a year at a time) as a metric for long term performance.
How many index funds outperformed 75% of their peers year in, year out, for five, six, seven years? Hint: The only index fund that managed this feat for even five years is VSCSX.

Many brokerages have improved significantly in the past decade or so. These days it seems to be (with a few exceptions) a choice between adequate, good, and really good. I put Schwab in that latter category.
Though I don't use Schwab much, I have been with them for many years - I even have an old "No annual fee - free for life" IRA there. (When's the last time you saw an IRA account with an annual fee?)
As others have said, they've got good execution, don't bother you (maybe that's because I don't have enough invested with them), a good selection of NTF funds. They seem pretty fast in making newly load-waived funds available NTF.
For me, the biggest plus, outside of the high quality service, is the rebate ATM card that expatsp mentioned. What wasn't mentioned was that not only does Schwab rebate the ATM fees, but it also eats the 1% foreign exchange fee imposed by the network (VISA/MC) when you use the card abroad.
A small plus is that Schwab bank is a real bank. That matters in a few situations where other financial institutions only allow EFT linking to a real bank. (Sometimes you can't link a third party to a Fidelity account, since Fidelity doesn't run a bank.) Be aware though that virtually no Schwab branches are Schwab bank branches. I don't know if this list is accurate, but it shows just 11 bank branches:
https://www.branchspot.com/charles-schwab-bank/
The biggest minus for me is that Schwab doesn't seem to have a backdoor like Fidelity where you can buy shares of a TF without paying a large fee (here, $76) per purchase.
Finally, since Vanguard Brokerage Services was mentioned - it's true that they offer fewer funds, but they seem to sometimes offer institutional class shares with lower mins than Schwab or Fidelity. Notably PIMCo ($25K vs. $100K at Schwab/Fidelity.)

Have not been finding zaggers to counter ziggs for a great many years now.
Have placed a modest portion of total nut into RE funds including FRIFX and VNQI, and have left it alone. Not much diversification there, really.
Otherwise am watching DSENX balanced w/ PONDX/PDI for the much larger remainder.

To be honest, I don't have a comparison to reference. When I left my employer of 40 years, I pulled a good portion of my 401k proceeds (not all) and put them in a Schwab IRA. The 401k is with T. Rowe Price who I like very much, but no brick and mortar presence. I already knew Schwab had a good reputation. I could see they had a boat load of NTF funds plus their own brand of ETFs with zero trade cost. I didn't need it then or now to be honest, but they have plenty of other banking options too. But the most important criteria for me was they had a local branch. I prefer 1 on 1 contact when talking to someone about my investments. Screw the phone and email conversations. I like to sit across from a human and explain my thoughts and listen to theirs. I welcome a second opinion as a sanity check. If you are into seminars and work shops, which I am, they have plenty.
After I had already transferred assets to Schwab, they came out with their robo-portfolios. This may not be a plus for you, but I did like the idea. I acknowledge I have made plenty of fund buying and portfolio management mistakes. I wanted a side by side, disciplined approach to compare. I put 1/2 my money into the Intelligent Portfolio and it has worked out well.
I would suggest you go to 1 or 2 of the branches in your area just to talk with them. See if there is a connection or not. Yes, their prime goal is for you to move your money to them, but knowing that you can still get a comfort level and gain knowledge to see if they are a good fit. Reading through your criteria, I think Schwab would be a good choice for you.
Good luck with your choice Mark.

It all depends on your gastric acidity and if you need the money. Excluding the Great depression, if you believe James Clooney of AAII regardless of the downturn if you can hang on for four years and not sell you will be OK.
While I cannot really counter this argument intellectually, I know myself emotionally and having experienced October 2008, I know that I will not be able to hang on if I lost 30% of my retirement savings, even if I do not need the money tomorrow.
So I am willing to accept lower returns as the price of not buying all the Prilosec at CVS.
It is critical to look at what you could loose to know how far out on a limb you are.
BUT the bond market is a lot different now than 2008. I hope we get fair warning of recurrent "stagflation" where bonds crash as do equities.

I have used Schwab for three decades and have been pretty well satisfied. I also use Fido and Vanguard.
I think their customer service is better than Vanguard, at least there are fewer restrictions on accounts at Schwab so less maneuvering. Fido is pretty good too but we have less money there.
the account executives at Schwab leave you alone unless you ask for help. When asked they are knowledgeable and professional and it is nice to talk to the same person. Having said that there is a lot of turnover. I have been thru three in ten years.
Statements are better than Vanguard which consolidates all the accounts in one statement, including retirement non retirement etc
The only problem I have ever had with execution ( I mostly use market orders and MFs) was a mutual fund changed the NAV two days later after I sold it. Both Schwab and Vanguard said it was not their responsibility. The Mutual fund refused to answer. I went to the SEC and they were interested but as it was only a few bucks I decided I had better things to do. I posted on this earlier so you can reference it if you want
My major complaint about Vanguard is the limited selection of funds. Schwab and Fido have much better lists, and usually have A shares without a load and lots of funds with huge minimums available for a song. I haven't compared Fido and Schwab but I think they are close.
Schwab wants $75 a mutual fund buy vs $35 at Fido. ( Vanguard Flagship is only $8), but when I asked, in the guise of a "500 free stock trades for two years from Fido" my Schwab rep immediately said they would drop the $75 to $30. If you have a large account I would ask before you move.
The website is a little irritating as you get this drop down menu that hangs there unless you move off of it. I find Fido's clearer and easier to maneuver around. Both beat Vanguard hands down.. There you have to click thru three screens to find the cost basis and can hardly ever find daily return. I guess they want investors who only are in it for the long term, not daily.
All in all I think Fido is a little better ( cheaper, cleaner web) but it is slight.
One thing to keep in mind if you are truly paranoid like I am, Schwab as a public company has to disclose it's quarterly results, so if it were ever to get over leveraged or make an insanely bad acquisition, you would know.
At Fido, you are at the mercy of the Johnsons. While Abigail seems like a nice gal, with her cute bob haircut and horn rims, you are not picking her up in a bar( well if you live in Boston and get a chance, go for it) . You are giving her your hard earned money and it makes me a little nervous you really can't tell and will never be able to tell what is going on behind the scenes.
I have the same general concern about Vanguard with all their propaganda about the "funds" owning the company. Maybe, but try to find out who really makes decisions there and what they get paid. Notice shareholders do not get much say.
Hope this helps. Bottom line... don't put your eggs all in one basket, unless you really do meet Abby in a bar and she seems to like you.. but get it in writing.

@DavidV,
Under bankruptcy protection laws, Puerto Rico will not have to pay their monthly dividend while it is being restructured. As debt holders, you will experience smaller dividend paid to OPCAX until a restructured plan is approved. NAV will not reflect the SEC yield until the payout date. This mess can linger for a while until restructure plan is approved by the court. Usually that means that the bond holders may received a lesser amount of payout as dividend.
Actually PR problem stemmed back several years when they have issue of not able to meet their obligation. Oppenheimer muni bond funds offer higher yield while carry with sizable PR bonds exposure, so does the risk. On the flip side, Vanguard being a conservative house, have less than 1% of PR bond in the national or CA muni bond funds.