@ron,@Catch22,
Calling LT treasuries "equity insurance" might have sent this discussion down the wrong path. Maybe a better analogy would be a portfolio shock absorber. LT Treasuries often out perform at times when equities underperform. Personally, an equity investor should expect a certain range of volatility. Bonds can help dampen and absorb some of the bigger equity bumps allowing an investor to stay "fully" invested.
Retirees recently have had to navigate through two market meltdown (catch22's term) over the last 15 years. If an investor held a portfolio consisting mainly of equities he/she would have two very large holes to fill.
To drive this point home visually I created a graph using a backtested portfolio tool which shows the impact these two meltdowns had on a 100% equity portfolio (ron's $500,000) verses two other portfolios that incorporated a mix of LT bonds and equities.

Backtesting Portfolio Tool:
"This online portfolio backtesting tool allows you to construct a portfolio based on the selected asset class allocation to analyze and backtest portfolio returns, risk characteristics (Sharpe ratio, Sortino ratio), standard deviation, annual returns and rolling returns."
portfoliovisualizer.com/backtest-asset-class-allocation#analysisResults

JohnN,
You said something about tsp.....Thrift Savings Plan? Are you a government employee? Reason I ask is that my wife works for the gov't and has been investing in their TSP for years. Thanx in advance.
Pudd

David Sherman and his Cohanzick Team write in their 2nd quarter 2014 commentary that its funds are managed "very conservatively against most fixed-income risk categories."
However, he goes on to write "...a substantial percentage of the holdings in both funds are invested in below investment grade securities. Therefore, arguably the funds have above average credit risk. Our strategy to maneuver in current markets is founded in the belief that by staying small and nimble that we can take advantage of special situations where our perception of credit risk is different than the market or ratings agencies."
Once it gets three years under its belt, I would imagine RSIVX/RSIIX will have excellent standard deviation/return, Sharpe and Sortino ratings.
The only gripe - and it's a big one - is its expense ratio.

I consider myself a decent investor but note that most years I underperform the appropriate target date fund though as compensation my risk is somewhat lower as I use a stable income fund paying 2% rather than a bond fund and I suppose I have more fun..Given the wide availability of target funds it is unlikely a managed account (1% OR MORE EXTRA FEE) is unlikely to be a good purchase

@davidmoran: I agree, only when go out 15 years does SEQUX have superior percentile numbers.
Regards,
Ted
http://performance.morningstar.com/fund/performance-return.action?t=SEQUX&region=usa&culture=en-US

Just a thought. Another consideration is either Vanguard's investment grade short term bond, VFSTX, or the short term bond index, VBIRX. In either case, the expense ratio is ~ 0.1-0.2%. YTD returns this years have been quite good, 1.7 % and 1.0%, respectively. I still like OTSIX and the management team are quite good communicating with their shareholders.
http://osterweis.com/files/Fixed_Income_Outlook_2Q14a.pdf

I try my best to stay away from managed account programs because of the fee that gets taken usually on a quarterly basis from these accounts. Heck, a one percent annual fee adds up over time. On a million dollar account that is $10,000.00 a year in fees and over ten years your are looking at a $100,000.00 paid in fees ... if, the account value were to remain constant at a million dollars.
Most people with a million invested are sharp enough folks to figure this out and a good number I believe stay away from managed accounts. Although I use a broker I opted away from their firms managed account program. However, I believe the firms seem to keep pitching them heavily because of the fees they generate.
Curently, what I indirectly pay to the broker comes in the form of 12b-1 fees which are paid by the fund company. And, I know of some on the board balk at paying a commission to the advisor ... but, once paid generally one can usually move around within that fund company to other funds commission free via nav exchanges. And, generally, the commissions on the income funds are less than those for the equity funds. With this, one buys into a fixed income product and usually after ninty days or so they are free to move to another fund ... commission free ... within that fund family through the nav exchange program. Therefore, if one wishes to be shrewd they can indeed manage the amount of commissions paid by using nav exchange purchase programs.
Just something to think on.
Old Skeet

FYI: There’s a market-stomping mutual fund you’ve probably never heard of. Between 1970 and March 31, 2014, it averaged a 14.67 percent annualized return. That will double your money about every five years. Those investing $10,000 at its inception would have nearly $4 million today. It’s called the Sequoia Fund. It walloped the S&P 500 by nearly 4 percent annually for 44 years.
Regards,
Ted
http://assetbuilder.com/andrew_hallam/you_really_want_to_pick_stocks_think_about_following_these_guys

@Mark "KKR hasn't always been the model of corporate credibility..." Hahahahahahaha!
I just happened by the Tortoise funds website last week and saw they had eliminated two of their CEFs and shuttled their assets to other CEFs they run (which aren't really much like the funds they erased, which would have been more than a little annoying had you been an investor in one of the funds erased). Anyone know what that was about--- assets not growing? Performance didn't seem all that atrocious. Scott, that's your territory, I believe......
).

I owned a Tortoise Fund (forget the name of it) 2-3 years ago that eventually became CorSite Infrastructure (CORR). I thought the significant discount of the Tortoise fund would go away as the fund became CorSite. However, I had no interest in owning it after that happened. I sold and CORR has done ... not particularly well.
I think Kayne Anderson is probably doing better than Tortoise.

I think that the bucket system is quite different from the sleeve approach being used by Old_Skeet and Old-Joe. As JohnChisum states, there are usually at least three different time buckets and the investments in each bucket are selected based on what the contents of the bucket are going to be used for. Morningstar uses Bucket 1 to cover two years of retirement expenses and that consists of cash, CD's, & safe ST bond funds. Bucket 2 for years 3 - 10 consists of mostly stable bond funds, including some TIP's, and possibly a conservative allocation fund like Vanguard Wellesley. Bucket 3 for years 11 -25 consists of mostly equity investments along with riskier bond funds like Loomis Sayles Bond and possibly a commodity fund. Bucket 2 is used to replenish Bucket 1 when needed and Bucket 3 is used to replenish Bucket 2 when needed. The bucket system seems more geared to the fact that withdrawals are occurring during retirement although I guess it could also be used during the accumulation phase in a slightly modified form.

John, if you are interested in what the ownership of MLP's might have done for you should you have ventured to buy them I encourage you to read through the attached M* thread. I have owned them for a number of years with beyond my expectations results.
http://socialize.morningstar.com/NewSocialize/forums/p/340492/3564556.aspx

Is this a buying opportunity for VTMSX or the start of a retracement? Seems to me it's running above its longer term channel. One could argue it maybe reestablishing the original channel so by extending the 10 year channel out 15 years VTMSX would have some room to move.
Acknowledment: Charts sometimes fart (don't always work). I just thought this mutual fund made a nice picture!
On the topic of gas...love GASFX 15 year chart!
Thanks for link Ted.
Here's my take:

This has very little to do with Vanguard, in any way. The nature of the REIT market. The fund is almost matched by its index (now, that's impressive), but beaten slightly by FRESX, significantly by FREAX, and pounded by CGMRX. I myself am in FREAX instead.
It is almost as though this article is a strong case for active management, if you hang in.
When you graph the last 6 years --- now there's a ride --- you see it has been beaten by Nuveen, matched by Fido, and beaten Heebner. With a smidgen of dip protection for those ~60% dips. Still, back to breakeven in a bit over 2y, except for CGMRX.

Hey there Skeet- well, as you can see I don't break it down to the degree of granularity that you do- I just grouped the whole mess into those four general areas. I'm thinking that if I break it down even further I'll spend more time than it's worth worrying about the whole thing.
As life turned out, with both of us retired for some ten years now our combined pension and SS income is more than enough to meet our needs. We have a very large cash "reserve" of about 50% of our NW, which is in addition to the portfolio given above. The portfolio constitutes about 25% of our NW, and is structured so as to provide enough income/appreciation to offset the inflation which is eating away at the non-invested cash. Also, the portfolio is designed to provide approximately half of the volatility of the S&P, limiting both it's potential upside and downside swings.
The remaining 25% of our NW is the conservative resale value of our weekend home. The value of our home in SF is not included in any of these calculations. Both properties are mortgage free, and we have no debt of any kind. Very conservative, but we have no problem sleeping at night.
OJ

I am providing more on the “Sleeve System” to investing. Seems others have found good value in a sleeve type management system besides myself.
bee who has been a long time poster on the board and made me feel welcome when I first arrived (as some were rude) many years ago (back in the Fund Alarm days) recently sent me some information, she found, from FMD Capital about their using a sleeve type management system for income investing. My system is geared towards income plus capital appreciation as my system contains an additional growth area. In this way, capital gains (if needed) can be taken in addition to income generation to help supplement the portfolio's monthly distribution. Currently, I draw form three to five percent annualy form the portfolio and have been able to grow principal over time at these distribution rates.
The FMD Capital system is definitely worth the read and it is linked below for your reading enjoyment. It is titled, "The Strategic Approach to Income Investing" and is written by Michael Fabian. http://fmdcapital.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/FMD_Income-Investing.pdf
Thanks again bee ... It is most appreciated.
I have also posted below how I have my sleeve system organized by area and by sleeve with current holdings.
Sleeve System
Here is a brief description of my sleeve system which I organized to help better manage the investments that were held in five accounts. 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 areas. They are a cash area which consist of two sleeves … an investment cash sleeve and a demand cash sleeve. The next area is an income area which consists of two sleeves. … a fixed income sleeve and a hybrid income sleeve. Then there is the growth & income area which 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 which consist of four sleeves … a global sleeve, a large/mid cap sleeve, a small/mid cap sleeve and a specialty 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 the 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, sleeve, an area and the portfolio as a whole. Again, weightings can be adjusted form time-to-time as to how I might be reading the markets and wish to weight accordingly. In addition, all fund distributions are taken in cash and are diverted to the cash area of the portfolio.
Below is how I have it broken out with current holdings.
Cash Area
Demand Cash Sleeve… (Cash Awaiting Investment Deployment)
Investment Cash Sleeve … (Savings & Time Deposits)
Income Area
Fixed Income Sleeve: ITAAX, LALDX, THIFX, LBNDX, NEFZX & TSIAX
Hybrid Income Sleeve: AZNAX, CAPAX, FKINX, ISFAX, PASAX & PGBAX
Growth & Income Area
Global Equity Sleeve: CWGIX, DEQAX & EADIX
Global Hybrid Sleeve: CAIBX, IGPAX & TIBAX
Domestic Equity Sleeve: ANCFX, FDSAX, INUTX, NBHAX, SPQAX & SVAAX
Domestic Hybrid Sleeve: ABALX, AMECX, CFIAX, DDIAX, FRINX, HWIAX & LABFX
Growth Area
Global Sleeve: ANWPX, PGROX, THOAX, DEMAX, NEWFX & THDAX
Large/Mid Cap Sleeve: AGTHX, SPECX, IACLX, VADAX, HWAAX & BWLAX
Small/Mid Cap Sleeve: IIVAX, PCVAX & PMDAX
Specialty Sleeve: CCMAX, LPEFX & TOLLX
I wish all ... "Good Investing."
Old_Skeet

Fidelity lists AUM for the fund class - for 10 years or so to the best of my knowledge - under the "Performance and Risk" tab on the fund's page.

Check out fundmojo.com. Not perfect, but not bad for a free web site.
I've attached a link for PTTRX.
http://www.fundmojo.com/mutualfund/fund_netasset_report/mutualfund/PTTRX

Check out fundmojo.com. Not perfect, but not bad for a free web site.
I've attached a link for PTTRX.
http://www.fundmojo.com/mutualfund/fund_netasset_report/mutualfund/PTTRX

MOZART325, that's not a bad website at all. Glad you pointed that out. Has some interesting information. I'll be visiting that website more often.
AUM data was very good but limited to about one year.

Thanks very much mrdarcey and rjb112. These seem to be the easiest to get some information about historical aum, with fundmojo having the advantage of showing it for one fund symbol across all share classes. But in a case of drastic asset bleed which one wants to avoid it would most likely show in the individual shareclass (as on the fidelity site) also.

My handful of US small cap funds spent most of last year leading all my funds. This year they're all at the bottom, and amazingly the best one, in the top 15% of small growth funds, has lost money this year. Ugh! I can't complain based on the longer term record, but its one of those difficult years so far for small caps.

David: As one who has made over 41,000 links for hundreds of news sources my understanding of copyright law comes down to the intention. If their is no profit motive involved when the article is published then it is fair game in the arena of public domain. In over 18 years of linking article, I've never had any author complain about my links till the other day. The question of copy & pasting an article which normally would not be able to be linked because of subscription is a gray area.
Regards,
Ted

FYI & Vote: The yield on the 10-year US Treasury hit a 52-week low today for the first time in more than two years, as moves in interest rates continue to confound the bulk of investors.
Regards,
Ted
http://www.bespokeinvest.com/thinkbig/2014/8/7/which-way-for-the-10-year-yield.html?printerFriendly=true

FYI: The average small-cap fund has clobbered its large-cap counterpart and the S&P 500 in the past 15 years, but it's failed to keep its lead in the stock market this year.
Regards,
Ted
http://license.icopyright.net/user/viewFreeUse.act?fuid=MTgzNTkwNTA=
Enlarged Graphic: http://news.investors.com/photopopup.aspx?path=WEBlv080814.gif&docId=712324&xmpSource=&width=1000&height=1062&caption=&id=712327