My take on his commentary:
SEQUX: Just another reason in the long line of reasons for the need to index. Not a popular opinion for stockbrokers or financial advisors or anybody who makes their living advising people. But these are the same people charging 4% commission for a Certificate of Deposit annuity paying 2.5%. I have previously discussed the value of VBINX or similar.
FPACX: I sold it a month ago. Held it for many many years. My reason is different from Mr. Snowball. IMHO, I believe human nature is such that it is difficult to be the best at a profession that requires so much. Eventually your motivation and drive begins to weaken. Asset size doesn't help matters. The funds commentary alerted me to that possibility.
Money Market: Are we saying that Treasury only Money Markets will not break $1.00 NAV? Is there no option left come October that will not break the buck for a brokerage sweep account?

"It's not just what happened lately".
To repeat my point, what happened lately (if there's a sizeable performance difference) distorts comparisons in all time frames. If it's not just what happened lately, let's throw out the past year (4/1/15 - 3/31/16) and run those figures again (e.g. 5 years 4/1/2010 - 3/31/2015):

Cumulative	BIV	MWTRX
1 year		10.69%	10.54%
3 years		11.25%	11.66%
5 years		13.43%	13.52%

Here's the source: 1 year, 3 year, 5 year
"OP had a specific request, and quite a valid one IMO"
Yes, a "bond fund that may act as a substitute for DODIX, which is a TF fund at Fidelity". BIV has transaction fees at Fidelity that are even higher than those for DODIX.
"You need something like BIV in your portfolio, perhaps now more than ever."
What does something "like" BIV mean, and why do you need something like that now more than ever?
In the context of the OP's request (with treasuries first on the list), I took note that BIV is heavily weighted in Treasuries. So if by "something like BIV" you mean something loaded with treasuries, why not a treasury (or more broadly, a government) bond fund? That would at least give one the ability to tweak allocations (by adding/selling some of the fund, especially in the tax-sheltered account).
Why now more than ever, when treasuries have had an extremely long run, and BIV has a longer duration than almost any other intermediate bond fund? (Out of 214 distinct intermediate term bond funds for which M* has duration figures, BIV/VBILX/VBIIX has the fourth longest.)
It is true that BIV (because of its large treasuries weighting) did well in 2008. Sovereign debt (such as treasuries) was virtually the only asset class that gained then. Are there other times where that's been true, or is stocking up on treasuries a Maginot line?

M* really pumped this fund up in the last couple of years. Their mid cap strategy is pretty close to this one, DHPAX. I believe they've got the same manager on board for that.

BIV beats MWTRX ytd, 3 and 5 years. The other recommendations are not what you're looking for (vanilla high quality corporates and treasuries). If you want a higher yielding bond fund with great performance, go for PIMIX. A no brainer and one of my largest holdings. BUT do not expect PIMIX to hedge stock market risk. It won't serve that function.

TIPS are perhaps the worst investment of all time. Sure the interest return rises with inflation, BUT the price will fall with rising rates just like any other bond. Nothing like a "safe" bond fund with an avg return of sub 2% over the past 5 years. Yes, you can make money trading these if you guess right twice (in and out), just like any other trade of a dog. I know many disagree with my sentiments. So be it.

Who knows, the Baby Boomers drove stocks in the 80s and 90s as they were in the accumulation phase. Maybe they will drive bond funds of all sorts and varieties as they are in the retirement income stage.

Very interesting comment Junkster. Most financial pundits see bonds stagnant or losing money over the next 10 years. But your pondering statement makes sense.

More Jumping In
Money poured into fixed-income ETFs in Q1
Mar 31 2016, 14:56 ET
Fixed-income E T F net inflows of $32.5B in Q1 were nearly triple the average of the prior 12 quarters according to Marketfield Asset Management. A notable beneficiary of the trend was the iShares Core. U.S. Aggregate Bond E T F (NYSEARCA:AGG) with about 10% of that $32.5B. This BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) stalwart has pulled in a "remarkable" 14% of all fixed-income E T F flows over the last three years and now has A U M of $34.8B.
The Vanguard Total Bond Market E T F (NYSEARCA:BND) is growing more slowly, but has the 2nd-fastest 3-year growth rate and A U M of $28.4B.
The cash, says Marketfield's Michael Shaoul, doesn't appear to be coming from other fixed-income ETFs, but instead continues a shift from actively-managed to passive funds. Shaoul also notes that flows weren't limited to those benchmark E T Fs, but also included strong moves into Treasury, investment-grade, and high-yield E T Fs.
http://seekingalpha.com/news/3170768-money-poured-fixed-income-etfs-q1
BND
Vanguard Total Bond Market E T F Experiences Big Inflow
March 29, 2016
Read more: http://www.nasdaq.com/article/vanguard-total-bond-market-etf-experiences-big-inflow-cm598895#ixzz44VbpRLWA
Looking today at week-over-week shares outstanding changes among the universe of E T Fs covered at E T F Channel , one standout is the Vanguard Total Bond Market E T F (Symbol: BND) where we have detected an approximate $172.7 million dollar inflow -- that's a 0.6% increase week over week in outstanding units
Read more: http://www.nasdaq.com/article/vanguard-total-bond-market-etf-experiences-big-inflow-cm598895#ixzz44Va5TjtL
The chart below shows the one year price performance of BND, versus its 200 day moving average:

Read more: http://www.nasdaq.com/article/vanguard-total-bond-market-etf-experiences-big-inflow-cm598895#ixzz44VTWvGFz
VTIP
"A Fed less concerned about [inflation] shifts risk to a price breakout," says F T N Financial's Jim Vogel, quickly summing up the bull case on TIPS.
Yellen's dovish remarks yesterday - especially in the face of core CPI up 2.3% Y/Y in February - sent the five-year T I P S yield lower by 15 basis points. It's off another four bps today to negative 0.33%. TIPS have returned more than 4% Y T D, outperforming most vanilla Treasurys, according to Barclays.
Pimco and BlackRock are among those bullish on the paper, and TIPS E T Fs have raked in a record $2.14B this quarter.
http://seekingalpha.com/news/3170373-tips-stay-popular-yellen
Vanguard Short-Term Inflation-Protected Securities Index Fund Stock Chart
Read more: http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/vtip/stock-chart#ixzz44VYWxf5Z

@BenWP Chuck Akre ran the Hennessy Focus Fund (formerly called FBR) for many years before launching AKREX in 2009, so much of the long-term track record you see is his. Kudos nevertheless to the current managers who continue to deliver great returns. Akre taught them very well. Both are worthy holdings, but holding both may create some overlap.

Hi Derf,
The very best time to buy a fund is right after three or more consecutive years of outperformance during which time assets under management have at least tripled. (If they've quadrupled that's even better.)
What could possibly go wrong?
---
PS - Derf, you're OK as long as you checked the box on your application allowing them to sell your assets should the fund liquidate and redeem proceeds in cash. If you didn't, however, than you could receive assets in kind, meaning you might wake up some morning to find gold bars, stacks of plywood, Swiss Francs and whatever else the fund invests in on your doorstep. :)

Not surprising, since PRPFX has lost $14 billion (or more than 80%) of its assets since 2012. That's bottom 8% for 3 yrs and bottom 5% for 5 yrs. Yeah, this year in top 1%, but that's because of its gold allocation. So nothing changes in this fund's allocation, and there is next to nothing going on from an active management standpoint, but annual expenses have actually increased each of the last three years. Perhaps with sales by commission brokers the fund will gain some assets? But for many advisors who left the fund, the A & C shares are a desperate measure to even stay afloat as a company. The fund company's other three funds have gone nowhere. Even it's Short-Term Treasury fund has lost money every year for the past 7 years. That is pretty hard to do.

Sorry to hear it, Ted. Just imagining what I'd feel like if my best pal of many years & best man had passed ...

@msf: Not having a very good day, just learned that my best friend for over seventy years and best man at my wedding died on Sunday. I feel like 1090 !
Regards,
Ted

FYI: At least one large fund manager is not buying into Argentina's turnaround story and believes the country's first international bond in over 15 years may not offer as much value as local debt in Mexico and Brazil.
Regards,
Ted
http://www.reuters.com/article/latam-bonds-franklin-rsc-idUSL2N16W04W
M* Snapshot TPINX:
http://www.morningstar.com/funds/XNAS/TPINX/quote.html
Lipper Snapshot TPINX:
http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/Fund/TPINX
TPINX Is Ranked #17 In The (WB) Fund Category By U.S. News & World Report:
http://money.usnews.com/funds/mutual-funds/world-bond/templeton-global-bond-fund/tpinx

Hi, guys.
In a slightly-grumbly post last week, in which I described the current market as "senseless" and allowed that I was reluctant to judge sensible managers for their failure to thrive in its midst, I made the observation that the February bear low was still higher than most bull market highs. Setting aside the question of whether it's reasonable to disregard what might be several years of underperformance (it works for me as long as the full cycle performance is what I signed up for, but I recognize that other folks have shorter time horizons and more intricate sell disciplines), there was also a question about whether the "higher than bear lows" claim was correct.
Several fund managers I'd spoken to last week made that observation in passing. Here's the Leuthold description of current valuations, from their March 2016 Perception for the Professional:

While the past several month's reversion in [valuation] measures has certainly wrung some of the risk out of the market ... the potential downside risks remain substantial. We compared current readings on all four valuation measures [p/e on TTM earnings, p/e on 5-yr normalized earnings, p/cash flow, median price-to-book, all for S&P 500 stocks] to the average recorded at the last four bull market highs, and found that - despite the setback of the last nine months - the median stock still trades at a valuation about 1% above the levels seen at the typical cyclical bull market high. If the bear market reasserts itself ... potential downside is estimated at -29%.

The Total Stock Market is up about 2% since then.
To be clear: I'm not apocalyptic, I'm just wired to be cautious. More importantly, I detest making factual claims (as I did in my original post) without being able to point to the specific evidence behind the claim.
For what that's worth,
David

I use a timing model found within my portfolio itself that keys me when to load value over growth and when to switch and to load growth. I only do this with a small amount of the portfolio due to the many strategies that I may have engaged from time-to-time. I have found through the years this to be one of the better strategies and a most effective one. Just this past month, most of the large cap value funds which I own and are found in my domestic equity sleeve located in the growth and income area of the portfolio out performed it's growth counter part (large/mid cap sleeve) which is found in the growth area of the portfolio by about 10%.
During the recent selling stampede which took place during the first couple months of 2016 I bought in the value area of the portfolio and once equities recovered I then rebalanced and reduced my equity weighting in the growth area by selling two positions that were held in the ballast/spiff sleeve thus keeping my overall equity allocation at it's target weighting of about 50%.
Again, for those that have had their doubts about my sleeve system, I have found my portfolio fund management sleeve system to be beneficial in making investment and strategy adjustments within my portfolio. However, I respect your right to continue to voice your doubts as I feel my system is geered for the more accomplished investor and might not be right for everyone. In addition, to use the system effectively one needs to be somewhat a student of the capital markets and follow their movement as well as that of the portfolio itself. Please note I am not a professional investor, or trader, but simply a retail investor that sought out ways to improve my returns over both the near term as well as the long term that would come through better positioning with a moving asset allocation of sorts.
For those that might not be familiar with my system I have provided a blurb about it below along with the portfolio's current configuration as of March 22, 2016.
Old_Skeet's Fund Sleeve Management System (03/22/2016)
Here is a brief description of my sleeve system which I organized to help better manage the investments that were held in five accounts along with my current positioning. The accounts consist of a taxable account, a self directed ira account, a 401k account, a profit sharing account and a health savings account plus two bank accounts. With this I came up with four investment areas. They are a cash area which consist of two sleeves … an investment cash sleeve and a demand cash sleeve. The next area is the income area which consists of two sleeves. … a fixed income sleeve and a hybrid income sleeve. Then there is the growth & income area which has more risk associated with it than the income area and it consist of four sleeves … a global equity sleeve, a global hybrid sleeve, a domestic equity sleeve and a domestic hybrid sleeve. An finally there is the growth area, where the most risk in the portfolio is found and it consist of five sleeves … a global sleeve, a large/mid cap sleeve, a small/mid cap sleeve, a specialty & theme sleeve and a ballast & spiff investment sleeve. Each sleeve consists of three to six funds (in most cases) with the size and the weight of each sleeve can easily be adjusted, from time-to-time, by adjusting the number of funds and amounts held. By using the sleeve system one can get a better picture of their overall investment picture and weightings by sleeve and area. In addition, I have found it beneficial to xray each fund, each sleeve, each investment area, and the portfolio as a whole quarterly. Again, weightings can be adjusted form time-to-time as to how I might be reading the markets and wish to weight accordingly. All funds pay their distributions to the cash area of the portfolio with the exception being those in my 401k, profit sharing, and health savings accounts where reinvestment occurs. With the other accounts paying to the cash area builds the cash area of the portfolio to meet the portfolio’s monthly cash disbursement amount with the residual being left for new investment opportunity. In addition, most all buy/sell trades settle from or to the cash area with some nav exchanges between funds taking place.
Here is how I have my asset allocation broken out in percent ranges, by area. My current target allocations are cash 20%, income 30%, growth & income 35%, and growth 15%. I do an Instant Xray analysis on the portfolio quarterly (sometimes monthly) and make asset weighting adjustments as I feel warranted based upon my assessment of the market, my risk tolerance, cash needs, etc. Presently, I am about 20% in the cash area, 30% in the income area, 35% in the growth & income area and 15% in the growth area.
Cash Area (Weighting Range 15% to 25% with target being 20%)
Demand Cash Sleeve… (Cash Distribution Accrual & Future Investment Accrual)
Investment Cash Sleeve … (Savings & Time Deposits)
Income Area (Weighting Range 25% to 35% with target being 30%)
Fixed Income Sleeve: GIFAX, LALDX, THIFX, LBNDX, NEFZX & TSIAX
Hybrid Income Sleeve: CAPAX, CTFAX, FKINX, ISFAX, JNBAX & PGBAX
Growth & Income Area (Weighting Range 30% to 40% with target being 35%)
Global Equity Sleeve: CWGIX, DEQAX & EADIX
Global Hybrid Sleeve: BAICX, CAIBX & TIBAX
Domestic Equity Sleeve: ANCFX, FDSAX, INUTX, NBHAX, SPQAX & SVAAX
Domestic Hybrid Sleeve: ABALX, AMECX, DDIAX, FRINX, HWIAX & LABFX
Growth Area (Weighting Range 10% to 20% with target being 15%)
Global Sleeve: ANWPX, PGROX & THOAX
Large/Mid Cap Sleeve: AGTHX, IACLX & SPECX
Small/Mid Cap Sleeve: AJVAX, PCVAX & PMDAX
Specialty & Theme Sleeve: LPEFX, PGUAX, TOLLX, NEWFX & THDAX
Ballast & Spiffs: FISCX
Total Number of Mutual Fund Positions = 45

@davidmoran: I retired three years ago and I have to agree that foreign, EM, and SC have done nothing for me for several years now. I was on the verge of getting out of my Grandeur Peak and Matthews, long-term but reduced holdings, when all of a sudden EM recovered. Can one have exquisite timing when one only sits around and holds?

Years ago, I worked for a large company with major locations on the east coast and in Illinois. It considered Lincoln's birthday a regional holiday, so it only gave the day off in some locations - the ones outside the Land of Lincoln.
While federally chartered banks are open, some state charted banks may be closed, as Good Friday is a state holiday in Conn., Del., Guam, Hawaii, Ind., Ky. (half day), La., N.J., N.C., N.D., P.R., Tenn.
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0002069.html
Don't ask for rhyme or reason here. It just makes a great workday to run errands with so many people off the road.

Does anyone own Jensen Quality Growth fund, JENSX?
Fund Mojo describe this A+ fund (Mojo ranking system) this way:
"Jensen Quality Growth J Fund seeks long-term capital appreciation. Jensen Quality Growth J Fund primarily invests in equity securities of approximately 20 to 30 companies. Generally, each company in which the Fund invests must have consistently achieved strong earnings and have a trend of increasing free cash flow over the prior ten years; be in excellent financial condition and be capable of sustaining outstanding business performance. The Fund may invest in securities when they are priced below their intrinsic values as determined by the adviser."
Others receiving notable scores from Mojo:
PARWX - A+
FUNYX (I like the ticker) - Master
SBLYX - Master
fundmojo.com/mutualfund/bestmanager.php?category=Large+Growth

Over the last 10 years T. Rowe Price's Global Technology fund, PRGTX, seems to have edged out NASDX:

Charted Over the last 15 years:

I appear the only person incapable of posting an image to the discussion board. I keep trying and keep getting the broken-image icon. The best I can do is a link to a composite valuation graph. Grantham argues that the two standard deviation line is the threshold for major reversals. Market values exceeded that only once (and housing values once) in 100 years.