David, Love the commentary as always, super appreciate your time and wisdom, but I wonder if, in the future, when you speculate on the overall market, you might want to cite a few reputable sources (Ned Davis, for one) who think we're actually in a secular bull? It's far from unanimous that the U.S. market is overpriced and ripe for a fall.
FWIW, I recently spoke to the top hedge fund manager here in Brazil (29% / year since fund started in 1997, only one down year ever, 2008, down only 6%, and this is Brazil!) who thinks EMs in general (not just Brazil) are broken and developed country equity markets are currently priced for 5-7% real returns (i.e. post inflation) in the coming years. He's also betting that the dollar will keep rising against most world currencies.
Who knows if he's right, and maybe it's just a question of seeing the warts better when you're close up, but your general vision, that we should be shifting equity allocations from the US to EMs, is by no means a consensus.

Usually my son and I drive back for the week between Christmas and New Years. He rampages with his cousins, I wander through the Strip and anxiously peck out the New Years issue.

That's not you? Damn. And here I thought we could go clubbing together.
Nuts. Well, maybe an after Christmas coffee in the Strip? With luck I'll be raiding Prestogeorge's some time just before New Years.

Would appreciate opinions on the future of I-bonds
when interest rates rise. All of ours are over 5 years
old and about 25% of our savings. they took a small hit in September,
I am 82 yrs of age and wife is 79 years young
highest regards to all
BILL circa33

So we are suppose to buy commodities based on some gold bug whose flagship fund (PSPFX) has lost money over the past 1,3, 5, and 10 years?? One of my luckier moves in my trading/investing lifetime was staying as far away from commodities as possible. That and making my own decisions and *never* listening to the so-called experts here, there, or anywhere. The market has a way of making fools of experts and more so those who act on their advice.

I have to agree RPHYX and RSIVX are "hold" for me. I'm not going to add any more money at least for a couple of years, assuming I will still hold until then.

I’ve a different take on the Riverpark commentary. I’ve had an unwanted degree of familiarity for some time, with Verso, Newpage and the now-merged entity, due to my ‘day-job’. (and please excuse me, a lot of this is based on recollection). Riverpark’s explanation of the problems at Verso are incongruous with my perception/experience with them.
(Old-) Verso and the merged Verso have been bleeding cash perpetually. Without the merger, Verso would probably likely have had a “corporate event” already. Newpage itself, had entered, then emerged from BK a few years ago. Its trip through BK, allowed Newpage to de-lever somewhat. So along comes Verso, somewhat like a parasitic organism to extract Newpage’s cash to prolong its own existence.
Riverpark’s commentary states that Verso has “exceeded expectations with respect to achieving synergies (of the merger)”. I can tell you with certainty that is a (Verso-) management talking point they put out when their horrific Q2-2015 results came out. – Trying to seduce investors to have faith in a management team, DESPITE the poor results. Riverpark is just parroting Verso’s earnings release/presentation materials, presumably taking it at face value. I viewed the “exceeding expectations” comment from Verso as an indictment --- if they were ahead of the curve in terms of slashing costs, and STILL their reported results were so poor, then they must REALLY be in trouble – and presumably the low-hanging fruit of the synergies has been done. (So not much more to be done to help them.)
As part of the merger (which, I believe closed in January) they did some type of bond exchange. Seem to recall the effect of it was to cram down a principal haircut on some bondholders. In return, the bondholders got a token lump-sum cash-out payment (further draining the merged entity of needed liquidity!!), and higher interest rates on the “new” bonds, some/much of it PIK, not cash. Possibly also a lightening of covenants. Why would you want to lend to a borrower who is doing a principal haircut of its debt? Isn’t that a major red-flag?
A key problem is ownership – Verso is controlled by private-equity firm Apollo. If memory serves, Apollo had large (likely controlling) stakes in both Newpage and Verso. Apollo has a particularly ugly history of asset-stripping companies which it controls, leaving them debt-hobbled to such a degree that servicing the debts eventually becomes impossible. The (predictable-) outcome occurs frequently enough with Apollo, that I view it as a standard Apollo business model. I’ve seen them play this game time and again. Verso, like Apollo’s prior ‘projects’ need not face bankruptcy – all that needs to happen is for Apollo to a)buy a substantial amount of Verso’s bonds at the steep discount provided by Mr. Market, then b) surrender it to Verso in return for equity. In this way, Verso could de-lever. It’s remaining bonds would no doubt substantially rebound in price, lowering its cost of capital.
But doing so, is not in Apollo’s playbook. They extract cash, they don’t contribute cash. I could readily cite other ‘red flags’ over the past year on Verso, but am running long. Attributing Verso’s problems to the regulators is diverting blame. By the way, why didn’t Riverpark mention Apollo, its control of Verso, and its sordid history with other investments?
I’ve a small ‘stub’ holding in RPHYX, having sold most of it earlier in the year as junk spreads kept widening. At that time, also sold a ‘starter position’ in RSIVX which was doing nothing. I was contemplating adding to my RPHYX position shortly, as I suspect junk may continue to be buoyed. Frankly, I’d no idea Verso was a significant holding of Riverpark’s. That it was (is ?) is troubling to me, given my familiarity with Verso -- Verso was never (in the past 3 years) a credit that a prudent portfolio manager would own – at least not without hedging it (possibly by shorting the equity).
After reading the Riverpark commentary, I am rather dis-inclined to add to my Riverpark position at this time. Their explanation of Verso is absent some critical understanding of what they invested my money in. Verso should have been a VERY EASY problem to keep out of the portfolio.

SCFAX is the retail version. It'll turn three years old this week. Good performance, seems steady. Looks like Schwab might be the only way around the front load, unless TD knows of a different path?
David

Hi Bee,
From my posts you likely recognize that I love simple plans.
Consequently, my concept for a mutual fund ladder is far less nuanced than yours. In fact, I perceive my ladder as having only two rungs.
My ladder has a short term rung that has sufficient resources to withstand a major disaster or market drawdown, like 3 years worth of possible needs. A low cost short term government and/or corporate bond fund satisfies that requirement, like from Vanguard.
My other rung contains all my other mutual fund holdings. I contemplate holding them for at least one total market cycle to test their robustness against a bull and bear experience. I suppose that translates to a planned minimum holding period of 7 to 10 years, situationally dependent.
I'm a very patient investor.
Best Wishes.

MFO summarized the highlights of the conference call when RNDLX reopened at the end of August 2013: http://www.mutualfundobserver.com/2013/10/october-1-2013/
Since reopening, assets have about doubled ($2 billion now, according to Morningstar). Performance has been good overall, but its 1-year and YTD returns are noticeably lagging, say, DoubleLine's massive DLTNX. It is making a strong comeback over the past month, though.
For what its worth, I had about half of my bond allocation in the fund for several years until about a month ago (with my luck, it was most likely before it made its comeback). I lowered my bond allocation and consolidated it all with PIMIX.

Let me echo Lewis's bewilderment. As a practical matter, most funds will toil in anonymity for 3-5 years regardless of how good they are. Advisor screens routinely, I'm told, exclude folks who don't yet have a three year record. So "not much traction" should have been written into the business plan.
The firm was underwriting the fund's operation to the tune of 0.4% - about a quarter million a year - but part of that cost is likely mystery money. That is, there are some management expenses (e.g., attorney fees) that are already born by William Blair, a fraction of which are allocated to each fund. The prospect that liquidating the fund will materially reduce expenses, especially if its assets don't stay in-house, are limited.
I'll ask.
David

2.5 years and couldn't really get much traction... Only ~$60 million. Probably felt there wasn't enough money going into global small cap strategies and the $ that is...... Well, we all know where that has been going.

If life expectancy is currently at 83 for women, that means 50% will live beyond age 83, and a good portion of those will live way beyond 83. As we tell folks all the time, "Tell me when you are going to die, and we will tell you exactly the path to take."

I would venture a guess that life expectancy of 83 year old women who are wealthy enough to seek out the services of a financial planners is higher than 50%.
Wealth and health (life expectancy) often are highly correlated. Check out a quick search result on the topic of:
"A wealthy man, born in 1920 who retired at age 65, could expect to draw Social Security for 19 years. His son, born in 1940 and retired at age 67, could expect to draw benefits for 24 years. Yes, he retired later, but he’s living longer.
This would not be true for men and women at the bottom. They would draw Social Security for fewer years, if the retirement age rises, and their longevity does not."
The Richer You Are the Older You’ll Get

and,
this chart highlights the change in life expectancy for each subgroup (men and women):

@JohnChisum You are welcome. M* pigeon holes ALNNX as a multialternative fund. The article highlighted MASNX which M* also categorizes as a multialternative fund. I have owned MASNX since shortly after it became available in 2011. The only thing that has frustrated me about it has been the 1.74% expense ratio. But, I guess having all those managers costs money. Its return has averaged 4% per year over the past 3 years. I have held MASNX in the "ballast pot" portion of my portfolio.

If today's college graduates live to age 105 or 110, I don't see working to age 75 as a bad thing, assuming health continues to improve as it has over the last 50 years. There have always been a percentage of people who must work past what they would like to be their retirement age because of financial issues. That is not going to change.

There are two aspects missing - 1. will there be jobs for under 75 y/o and 2. if there is a job will an employer higher them? I don't think there will be, especially when you take into account automation, artificial intelligence and outsourcing of jobs. I'm sure there are many 63 y/o today who would like a job but can't get one.

Life expectancy when Social Security was started was about 58 for men and 62 for women. The government figured they would not have to provide many folks with benefits, since most were expected to die before age 65. Now it is 76 and 81. And that is the average, which means many are expected to live much longer. We run our lifetime income projections to age 100 and are considering using longer numbers for our younger clients. Very few of our clients stop their lives and sit in a rocking chair at age 65. Many work because they want to...they like what they do, they own a business. Many retire from their main job and take a part-time job, often what they call a 'fun' job. There are a lot of folks who are unable to retire financially because of various circumstances. The definition of retirement is vastly different from today than it was for our grandparents. If today's college graduates live to age 105 or 110, I don't see working to age 75 as a bad thing, assuming health continues to improve as it has over the last 50 years. There have always been a percentage of people who must work past what they would like to be their retirement age because of financial issues. That is not going to change.

I suppose, if one lived long enough, and these stealth money grabs continued unabated, it could get to the point where one would just not file a return for a couple of years to buck-up one's margins, so to speak, to make ends meet. And then hope the call didn't come for awhile, for the reckoning, whereupon one might end up like Peter's Schiff's father:
http://www.schiffradio.com/death-of-a-patriot/
(caution: if you're having a bummer of a day, you should probably put off reading this until you're having a better one)

"If it looks like there's a lot of grumbling about no SS increases"
It would be really interesting to know what percentage of the SS grumblers also vote for politicians who promise "smaller government and absolutely no tax increases".

Most people vote for their for their self interest. At my age I'm voting for SS increases,
and kicking the can down the road ... about 25 years down the road.

It's been a fine fund through four sets of manager changes. It's made good money this year through its e-tail investments. And Price doesn't encourage silly risk-taking.
One quick reminder, though: based on Charles's inception-to-date data, it took the fund a little more than 10 years to recover from the tech crash that bottomed in 2002. That's comparatively good but still sobering.
David