Boundary confusion here.
When StockCharts shows a heading of Dec 7, 2018 - Sept 24, 2019, it means the performance on those days, inclusive. So if there were no dividends, one would just take the closing price on Sept. 24 and divide it by the closing price on Dec 6 (and multiply by $10K) to get the final value of a $10K investment.
StockChart graph for VTSMX.
Since the fund had divs, you can use the adjusted prices from Yahoo to verify that this is in fact what StockCharts is showing (correctly). FWIW, I cross checked Yahoo's daily prices with Vanguard's data, incorporated the divs from Vanguard, and came up with $11,370. Clearly some rounding errors by someone, but close enough to validate the StockCharts price.
M*'s handling of the boundary dates is a bit problematic. The chart linked to here will illustrate. It graphs VTSMX from Dec 7, 2018 to Dec 10, 2018. (Weekend days were Dec 8 and Dec 9.)
Notice that there are three prices in the graph, i.e. two changes. Since this spans a weekend, that must mean that it is including the performances of Dec 7 (Friday), and Dec 10 (Mon). But it shows the starting value on Dec 7 as $10K, and a drop (to $9770.83) on Dec 8th, a Saturday. After one day with no price change (for the weekend) it shows a price change on the 10th. But a weekend must have two days with no price changes.
Regardless, it would appear that M*, like StockCharts, plots performance inclusive of the start date. It is just struggling with how to represent the change on the first date. (In fairness, StockCharts doesn't do any better; here's its chart going from Sept 23 to Sept 24, and it shows only one price change.) Or perhaps not ...
Rather than waste time reverse engineering how these tools handle their start points over different time spans, I'll just suggest you look at this M* graph of VTSMX from Dec 8 to Sept 24. Dec 8 was a Saturday, so in theory this should make no difference (but it does). This graph shows a final value of $11,371, within a dollar of my calculation and a couple of bucks or so of StockCharts.

I found this information connected to M*. No date stamp was with this information; so I can only presume this is their correct method as of today.
Growth of 10,000
The Growth of $10,000 graph shows a fund's performance based on how $10,000 invested in the fund would have grown over time with dividends reinvested. The returns used in the graph are not load-adjusted. The growth of $10,000 begins at the fund's inception, or the first year listed on the graph, whichever is appropriate. Located alongside the fund's graph line is a line that represents the growth of $10,000 in either the S&P 500 Index (for stock funds and hybrid funds) or the LB Aggregate Index (for bond funds). Both lines are plotted on a logarithmic scale, so that identical percentage changes in the value of an investment have the same vertical distance on the graph. This provides a more accurate representation of performance than would a simple arithmetic graph. The graphs are scaled so that the full length of the vertical axis represents a tenfold increase in investment value. For securities with returns that have exhibited greater than a tenfold increase over the period shown in the graph, the vertical axis has been compressed accordingly.

fwiw, just checked DODGX for the same ~5k-day period on M* and SC and results look pretty different also

@davidrmoran I don't dismiss what one may discover at M*, just that I use the chart info provided to obtain a "total return" for whatever given period.
Yes, it is not easy to get an exact start date, but I was able to review the chart with a starting date of 4-21-2005; which is close enough over such a long time frame.
I find JABAX and VWELX even at +211%.
The other four for this time period range from +171 to +160%.
ALSO, that as one moves the left side slider to the right to shorten the time frame, more interesting changes may be seen.
Obviously, being active managed funds; their paths vary based upon management choices during the period(s).
FPACX running with high cash positions recently will show in their returns vs the others. Although I don't know what "cash" means in this case.
I can not offer more to this discussion, IMHO.
Take care,
Catch

Thanks. Takes a steadier mousing hand than I have to get to a particular day easily.
But the results are quite different! (Unless I am making a mistake.)
Stockchart shows performance since 4/25/2005 to date for JABAX of +208% (rounded up) and VWELX of +210% (rounded down). Hmm. Whereas M* shows nothing of the sort: $10k grows over the same period to 32,842 Janus vs 31,297 for Vanguard, a difference of $1500.
wtf??
Again, unless I have done something wrong.
Charles and msf may have thoughts on this discrepancy.
To use the M* legacy graphing for ready (meaning easier than with the new site, to my mind) specifying of dates and periods and more:
https://quotes.morningstar.com/chart/fund/chart.action?t=jabax

@davidrmoran The site wouldn't let me set the below chart for the time frame you mentioned. But, you may slide the left end of the 5210 day slider to the right to obtain your time frame for a better overview of total returns in percentage terms.
Chart of above funds

JABAX outperforms VWELX, OAKBX, FPURX, FPACX, and DODBX if you go back to the day Pinto walked in the Janus door, 14y and 5mos ago. It's a mysterious miracle of added value.
This is per M*; see below.

The very first paragraph I wrote in this thread was:
"I generally suggest caution when evaluating a fund with recent poor performance. That recent performance distorts the longer term figures."
The same applies to funds with recent good performance. One gets a different perspective by disregarding a recent, disproportionately bad (or good) period and looking at longer periods that came before. Now three years (2017-19) is not just a very recent 6 month or one year span that can be lightly disregarded. But there was a significant management change in 2016 that justifies looking at the pre- and post-Smith periods separately.
Your mother and daughter are in fact doing half of that. They're looking at the post-Smith period exclusively (3 years) or the mostly post-Smith period (5 years). You're doing that also, with your 5/4/3/2/1/ytd figures that virtually ignore the Smith period.
Again repeating myself, all of this may suggest that Pinto is a great manager (better alone than with Smith). But it also cuts against your statement that the key to the fund's performance is the way he manages the stock sleeve. If the stock sleeve were the key, one would expect similar relative performance across consecutive multi-year periods, those with and without Smith.
Cherry picking says that the selection of time periods is made by seeking especially good (or bad) periods. That's not what I did. I selected time periods based on management. Which makes sense to do on general principle, let alone to test the hypothesis that "growth a la Pinto" was the key.

I am lost now in your sub-period cherrypicking, but for 5y/4y/3y/2y/1y/ytd and 3mos JABAX has either matched (else very very close) or outperformed both the value-oriented (and excellent) VWELX and the growth-oriented FPURX. I wonder why. Your 'analysis' looks subpar to me.
(VWELX has done gangbusters over the last month, that's true.)
If you are interested in delving further, you might wish to MFOP-compare the two of them, both GO/HR and w/ similar UIs, over 15/12/10 ...-year periods and subperiods. Except for Vanguard having way deeper drawdowns long in the past, it is really remarkable how a fund 6x the size of Janus and moreover with a value tilt has done very close to as well, and sometimes better. It's as though the long-discussed value penalty does not exist for VWELX. It would be interesting to understand that too.

You asked for an analysis, I provided one. That's all. As I wrote before, the fact that JABAX leans consistently toward growth suggests that the pond it fishes in plays a significant role in its performance. Aside from Puritan (more on that below) the fact that you selected for comparison funds that lean toward value calls attention to its growth style.
"Growth, but growth a la Pinto, look to be the key." Are you sure that it's growth a la Pinto that's the key? Prior to the last three years, the fund was still good, but somewhat less so. Smith left three years ago. Coincidence? Pinto took over the responsibility for asset allocation and others took over the bond sleeve.
Before 2017 the fund had some fine years, but not in the top decile. Since Smith left, it's been nothing but. While that data suggests that someone is adding value now, it also suggests that Pinto's stock sleeve management skills are not the key. They haven't changed, have they?
Take the five year period ending when Smith left (3/31/11 - 3/31/16). Your mom and daughter's $10K would have grown to $14,177 with JABAX, and to $14,692 with FPURX.
See M* chart.
Or the three year period 3/31/13 - 3/31/16. There JABAX ended with $12,112 vs. FPURX's $12,722. (One can edit the start date in the M* chart to get these figures.)

Maybe.
Let us say mom or daughter, not just you or I, graphs M* $10k growth of VWELX, JABAX, and FPURX for 3 and 5 years.
(She did so because she read an article advising always to do that, not shorter terms.)
What does she see? Well, someone sure is adding value somewhere. Clearly. 3y starts in the fall of 2016. Hmm. Notable outperformance by JABAX from then.
She adds FPACX, OAKBX, and DODBX, because of another article she read. Well, forget them.
She goes ahead and, just for kicks, checks 1y and ytd. A hair of underperformance by JABAX wrt to Vanguard. Bond advantage lost? Not seeing it.
Same for 3mos.
You may have it in for Pinto because it was I who posted about JABAX, or something like that. But superior things have always taken place for as long as he has been involved w/ JABAX, to my view. Am I missing something?
Growth, but growth a la Pinto, look to be the key. If growth alone, the question remains for me, Why is FPURX not better?
So I score all this as showing at least some added value for this guy. Maybe Snowball can do an interview with him about outperformance longevity.

Consider retiring overseas. I spent much of my youth in Thailand and hope to retire there someday. $US 405k will allow someone to live a very good retirement in a lower cost country like Thailand.

My apologies. While my inputs to PV were as described, that tool apparently refused to analyze more than a decade. Rather than indicate an input error, it generated returns over roughly ten years: Oct 2010 - Aug 2019. At least that's how it labeled the output.
The general point remains - MPinto may not have added value. The good performance can be explained by the Janus growth style.
(Based on the two sets of figures, what PV output for a decade and what you report from M* over roughly 15 years, we can say that Wellington has done better over the past decade; Janus Balanced was better in the five years preceding that.)
BTW, $10K in Wellington grew by $21,269, not to $21,269. See M* graph here.
Regarding Puritan, like Wellington it outperformed JABAX over the past decade. Which suggests not so much that it should have done better given its growth leanings, but rather that JABAX was the anomaly, as it outperformed by a wide margin in 2007-2008. Which in turn suggests taking a closer look at the other 40% of the portfolio, i.e. the bonds. (For example, treasuries did well around 2008, other types of bonds more poorly.)
If (and I haven't looked into this) bonds are indeed the reason for the outperformance of JABAX between 2005 and 2010, then that advantage was lost in 2016 when Smith left. That's something you might want to take a closer look at.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelfoster/2019/09/24/wall-street-is-wrong-you-can-retire-on-405k-heres-how/#42eae835539c
Wall Street Is Wrong: You CAN Retire On $405K. Here's How
Today I want to show you how you can retire on $405,000—and with just five buys, too! Put together, these five stocks and funds hand you a 7.4%-yielding portfolio that will pay you reliably for decades.
405k maybe too little though... Probably need 1mill to live comfortably... But if you live in other majorities like NY prob need much more than 1mill in portfolio

Greetings, Y'all.
I held FPACX in my portfolio from 2010 - or earlier - until the end of 2018.
My reasons for dumping it were:
1) fund should have been closed long ago. I got in when AUM was approx $8B. How in good conscience can a fund be kept open when the average cash stake was 20% or better most of the time? That much cash means there aren't many good deals out there, so why accept more cash?
2) For an $8B fund with 20-30% of AUM in cash, what justifies an ER >= 1.00%.?Today AUM are 50% greater, so why has the ER increased instead of decreased?
If you look at M* data, you'll see that over 15 years, FPACX is a middle-of-the-road fund. It maybe is in the second quartile on the 4-bar graph, and comes in around 50% in terms of fund rankings.
If I remember correctly, prior to 2010, this fund was hot, and it wasn't large cap performance that made it hot. I thought it might have had good defensive characteristics, which is why I bought in. Sometime around that time, money started to pour in, AUM went way up, and people didn't care that the ER was where it was because the fund was still doing well.
There are plenty of other funds out there - big and small - where I would put my money. I have both VWENX and VWIAX. If I didn't, I'd consider DODBX, ABALX - even if I had to pay the load -, and possibly MAPOX and FOBAX. I sold out my FOBAX two years ago, and have been regretting it ever since. I have not regretting selling FPACX and doubt that I ever will. YMMV.

hmm, M* from start of May 05 to date appears to show small but nontrivial outperformance the other way, $10k growing to $21,269 for VWELX vs $22,978 for JABAX. - ?
Yes, Janus (the company, too, TBailey's penchant, then JCraig) has usually, albeit sometimes intermittently, leaned toward growth, as long as I have been involved with them, going back to Janus Fund. Not like VWELX and Romick and Oakmark. Indeed, you would think that FPURX (similar growth taste as JABAX) would be even better than it is, would you not?
I don't know what it would take for Pinto and Fido (speaking v generally) to ever shift to value.

What pops out immediately from JABAX's portfolio is that its equity sleeve is large cap growth, and has been at least leaning that way for the past five years or longer. See here. We've been in a long period, virtually the whole tenure of MPinto, where growth has outperformed value.
This raises the questions (1) whether its good performance has been due in part simply to this bias, and (2) whether this is where the manager is comfortable investing or whether he would shift to value (and under what conditions)?
It's hard to answer #2. To address #1, I ran a quick analysis using Portfolio Visualizer.
I ran back tests from May 2005 to the present, comparing JABAX with VWELX and with 60/40 mixes of VOOG & VBTLX (to check JABAX value add vs. index funds) and VOOV & VBTLX (for VWELX value add vs. index funds). Rebalanced quarterly.
From best to worst annualized returns:
VOOG/VBTLX: 10.43% (growth mix)
VWELX: 9.74%
JABAX: 9.32%
VOOV/VBTLX: 8.36% (value mix)

Has anyone ever read profiles / analyses / interviews w MPinto, who has been doing really good things at JABAX for like 15y ?

Yeah - Checking M* I get figures (for OSDAX) at or close to msf & Carew388. (1.78 @3 years and 1.33 @5). Sorry for the misstatement. Now, if somebody can explain to me how Lipper could screw up those numbers, I’d feel better. Have used the MW / Lipper data for years and never encountered a problem like that.
As far as Invesco closing, I’m new there, having transferred in thru the merger with Oppenheimer. I’ve been critical of Oppenheimer for years, due to higher fees and their horrible ‘07-‘09 performance. But, as I said earlier, I’ve had a relatively small % of assets with them since around ‘95. I’ve always invested directly with the houses rather than thru a brokerage. Old school I guess. So yes, I’d miss them if they closed completely. I like and use 3 of their specialty funds. With those types of funds, the ability to move in and out nearly at will is helpful. That said, as I simplify things and move monies to TRP (a process already in progress) $$ will be coming out of Invesco.

Legacy M* OSDAX purchase page (just Vanguard and JP Morgan carry the A shares)
http://financials.morningstar.com/fund/purchase-info.html?t=OSDAX&region=usa&culture=en-US
Legacy M* OSDAX performance page. Click on "Monthly" tab to get performance figures as of 8/31/19 (confirming carew388's numbers).
http://performance.morningstar.com/fund/performance-return.action?t=OSDAX&region=usa&culture=en-US
That latter page can be used to compare OSDAX with other funds. I input TRBUX and it gave 3 and 5 year annual returns of 2.37% and 1.78% also as of 8/31/19.
Flipping back to the Daily tab, the TRBUX figures are 2.33% and 1.80%, confirming hank's figures for that fund (give or take a day).
One can tell that Marketwatch (with Lipper data) has the wrong figures for OSDAX by checking the figures for OSDYX (the ERs are comparable, 0.25% for Y vs 0.33% for A). For the Y shares, Marketwatch reports 3 and 5 year annual returns of 1.85% and 1.4% respectively.