One has to be comfortable with a large amount of hi-yield fare in RPHIX. I ended up with CBUDX instead. Information on the composition of the funds is near the bottom of the links. Two funds near their range of M* standard deviation would be JPST and FLOT.
This is what makes AAA CLOs so interesting. We've seen that no matter how an investment is structured (AAAs being first in line from a whole pool of debt) nothing will protect you if the whole house of cards comes tumbling down. That's what happened with CDOs in 2008.

What’s especially notable is that slight differences between CLOs and CDOs have given CLOs more resistance to economic downturns. In fact, a [White & Case] report notes that CLOs were minimally affected by the same troubles as CDOs during the Great Recession. A shift toward CLOs and away from CDOs could benefit traders, investors and lenders without forming a bubble that would inevitably burst.

https://www.businessnewsdaily.com/10353-cdo-financial-derivatives-economic-crisis.html
I'm not ready to pull the trigger on AAA CLOs just yet. Let's see what happens over the next few months. Even then, I'd look at just the best of the best - the most "pure" AAA CLO fund. That seems to be PAAA. Though JAAA serves as a good reference for how AAA CLOs have behaved over a few years. And JBBB serves as a good comparison for seeing how the quality of the tranche (AAA vs BBB) matters.
An ETF I haven't seen mentioned that's somewhat in FLOT's space is VRIG. FLOT and FLRN hold about 2/3 of their assets in corporate bonds (the rest in gov bonds) and track each other closely. VRIG takes a different path, splitting its non-gov bonds evenly between corporate and securitized. This seems to result in slightly more risk but with commensurate rewards.
VRIG has a longer (but still miniscule) effective duration (0.23 years vs. 0.01 years); lower credit quality (A+ vs. AA-), worse 3 year std dev (0.99 vs 0.57) resulting in a lower Sharpe ratio (1.34 vs 1.81). On the plus side, VRIG comes with better long term performance.
It also seems to do better with short term jolts:
Feb-March 2020: both dropped around 13% (daily data);
March 2023: both dropped around 1½% through March 13 but FLOT continued dropping another ¾% over the next few days;
April 2025: VRIG dropped ¾% while FLOT dropped twice that.
Some have used the word "gamble". I'm still looking for how best to spread my bets.

Will this cut of 15% cause the value of the stock to drop by 15% or more?!

Normally it should have some adverse effect, but stocks only go up these days. If this extortion scheme works, what other U.S. companies may need to pay-up? In normal markets that overhanging threat might affect many other exporters who are potential targets (aircraft, auto, Ag, etc.) But due to the ever-higher stock market … no worry. However, tomorrow might be an interesting market day as the ramifications sink in. Investors might say - - ”Duck!”
I did not realize export taxes were prohibited until @msf noted that. Looks like maybe another case headed for the courts …

The 5% cap is frequently misrepresented (not by you yogi) in the media and sometimes very clearly it is intentional.
Here is some insight
- 5% is the floor, not the ceiling. Managers have discretion to go over
- The most important thing to know is that if your redemption request is made in a window where total redemption requests are less than 5% of Fund AUM, you will be fully redeemed (the manager is legally obligated to).

It may also be considered as an export tax.

Yes. If it walks like a duck and squaks like a duck …

Then it's an unconstitutional duck.

Article I, Section 9, Clause 5:
No Tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any State.

https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artI-S9-C5-1/ALDE_00013596/

Scope of the Prohibition
The Export Clause is an absolute prohibition on taxing exports by the federal government. ...
The Clause prohibits any federal tax or duty that is imposed on goods during “the course of exportation” or targeted at exports, as well as those imposed on services and activities “closely related” to the export process. ...
Importantly, the Clause does not prohibit a generally applicable tax from being imposed on goods prior to export.

https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/R42780.pdf
For a nice summary of the historical background and compromise behind this clause of the Constitution, the first part of this SC case is an easy read:
https://www.taxnotes.com/research/federal/court-documents/court-opinions-and-orders/fifth-circuit-affirms-crude-oil-export-tax-violates-constitution/7d9x0

Will this cut of 15% cause the value of the stock to drop by 15% or more?!

Agreed. The retail vs. institution data is so dirty that IMHO it's not even worth trying.
The link above gives the share classes of funds targeted at institutions. These include institutional class shares and institutional only funds. I believe the former end with "institutional" (vs. Admiral), while the latter start with "institutional", e.g. VINIX.
Though technically even these funds are open to retail investors. You only need pony up $5M (or whatever the min is). Also, these funds may be available to retail investors through 401(k) plans. Just to muddy the waters some more.

Current status: $40M and still being litigated.
https://www.ropesgray.com/en/insights/alerts/2025/07/district-court-strikes-down-40-million-settlement-agreement-in-target-date-funds-case-based
In Jan 2025, Vanguard reached a settlement agreement with the SEC for $40M. As a result, the court rejected a $40M proposed settlement in a parallel suit between the class of injured investors and Vanguard.
The court agreed with one of the class members that:
- The SEC settlement made the class settlement superfluous, and
- By rejecting the class action settlement, the $40M would not be reduced by legal fees

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/nvidia-and-amd-reportedly-will-give-u-s-government-15-of-its-china-chip-revenues-a31ade78?mod=home_lead

Nvidia Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. will give 15% of their chip revenue from sales in China to the U.S. government as a condition of receiving new export licenses, according to a report Sunday.
The Financial Times reported that Nvidia Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. obtained U.S. export licenses for the Chinese market last week for its H20 and MI308 artificial-intelligence chips, respectively, on the condition of an unprecedented revenue-sharing agreement.
The FT said no U.S. company has ever agreed to split revenue with the government as a condition of obtaining an export license.

The new bond sleeve of OAKBX may be attractive to some.
Chicago-based Harris is basically a boutique equity shop. It didn't have much analytical capability in bonds. But the old OAKBX with about 60% stocks and 40% in Treasuries/Agencies and investment-grade corporates worked great (by luck) during down-trend in rates.
But now, Harris has hired more bond analysts to manages bond sleeve better when rate outlook uncertain - possibly downward move short-term, upward move long-term.

Thanks for the information. There was a third factor in my reluctance to hang on to OAKBX beyond the two reasons I noted.
Extended Excerpt Morningstar Analysis (OAKBX)
”On Jan. 21, 2025, Natixis IM and Generali announced their intention to establish a joint venture between their respective asset-management operations. Under the announced terms, Generali Investments Holding and Natixis Investment Managers would each own 50% of the combined business and have equal voting rights. Woody Bradford, the current CEO of Generali Investment Holding, is slated to serve as CEO of the combined entity, and Philippe Setbon, the current CEO of Natixis IM, as deputy CEO.
“While the deal is not expected to close until 2026, a merger of this size and complexity is challenging on many fronts. Natixis IM and Generali cited an effort to build critical scale, but other large asset-manager mergers have pursued that objective by fully integrating their investment teams and rationalizing their products to avoid duplication.
“Such large-scale integration seems improbable here. Natixis had historically afforded its subsidiaries almost complete autonomy in terms of investment processes, hiring decisions, and operations. This has allowed the distinctive investment culture of each affiliate to shine: Stalwarts like Loomis Sayles and Harris Associates (which manages the Oakmark Funds), for example, are true gems in Natixis IM’s lineup. At other times, this hands-off structure was less successful—for example, it proved insufficient to detect or prevent the significant failings that took place at affiliate H2O … “
Who needs it?

Is the sky falling? No. But things are very cloudy.

Thanks @sma3. The CPI data will release next week.

The CPI for July is expected to have climbed 2.8% on an annual basis, according to a Reuters poll of economists. Investors will be watching to see if Trump's tariffs on imports are translating into higher prices after the June CPI report suggested levies were impacting the prices of some goods.

https://fidelity.com/news/article/top-news/202508080606RTRSNEWSCOMBINED_KBN3JU0N4-OUSBS_1
How would Trump react to this now? In the meantime, I still see grocery bills including eggs are rising.

@fred495
Congrats & thanks for sharing. Have you tried dissecting the fund’s holdings / positioning to determine where the outsized gains have come from? Things like opportunistic short positions, high yield bonds, exposure to gold … big tech or non-dollar denominated stuff? I know that kind of analysis takes a lot of time and perseverance. M* doesn’t seem to list QDSNX’s top investments in any specificity.
What I can glean from M* the top sector “exposure” is 17% in technology, followed by 16% in financial.
These numbers from M* (Classic View) appear a bit off-the-wall. I have owned L/S funds before, but can’t recall numbers as high as these.
Long equity 135% / Short Equity 127%
Long fixed income 291% / Short fixed income 278%
Short cash 174% / Long cash 204%
In defense of those large numbers, it does appear the bond duration is largely on the short end with approximately 50% under 1 year out. Bond quality looks good with about 70-80% investment grade.

Interesting comment by poster keppelbay on the QLENX thread of BigBang regarding QDSNX:
"Somewhat to my surprise, PV shows that a 50:50 mix of QLENX with PIMIX did a tad better with just a tad more volatility. Since most of us also use bond funds, perhaps the allocation fund is adding complexity without lowering volatility overall. If its performance was better, maybe.
If your goal is to diversify risk away from traditional equity, while keeping some potential to do better than bond funds, this might have a place."

Absolutely fascinating (and common-sensical). Thanks @rforno.
I recently bought TRTY which diversifies broadly across global equity and fixed income markets. Claims to have 35% in a momentum based strategy. Ummm … call me Dufus!
Fund lost only 3.3% in 2022. Hasn’t made much lately either. Somehow, M* has seen fit to elevate it to “gold” status, despite their uneasiness with Cambria. Am well diversified, so the actual trend-following component works out to .35% X 14% / or about 5% of my portfolio.
Worth noting that trend-following works in down-markets also. So we may indeed see the markets “turn on a dime” one of these days. Is it possible that TF was an element in the Liberation Day(s) market fiasco? Perhaps a larger player than we assumed at the time?
Remember October 1987?
A word from Franklin: “Experience keeps a dear school. But a fool will learn in no other.”

excellent discussion of BLS firing on TIPs
https://tipswatch.com/2025/08/10/tips-investors-face-a-sky-is-falling-moment/

A few observations about this FoF, and replicating it on your own:
Unlike Vanguard that uses expensive share classes of underlying funds, AQR uses its cheapest (R-6) share class for acquired funds. In replicating this FoF, one would only have access to N class shares - adding 0.35% to the cost. That's still less than the 0.44% that QDSNX charges, but it is close.
Shorting is not cheap. One can see this in the underlying fund QMNRX. Its offical ER is 4.55%. When M* backs out the cost of shorting, it comes up with an "adjusted" ER of 1.23%.
M* says that the managers add value by tactically varying the weights of the underlying funds. I'm not so sure.
I took what appears to be the nominal weights by rounding the current weights. Over the past five years (nearly the whole lifetime of the fund), from end of July 2020 to end of July 2025 (60 months), M* says QDSNX returned 11.76% annualized. Portfolio Visualizer concurs exactly. But the DIY portfolio (annual rebalancing) returned 11.95%.
Portfolio Visualizer five year comparison
Unfortunately, after subtracting 0.35%/year to use the more costly retail shares, one falls a little short of the QDSNX return.
To address @hank's concern about this fund being too new, you can take the PV model, and set it for max timeframe (PV is limited to ten years). The static mix I used to approximate QDSNX did not distinguish itself over the ten year span. Perhaps the actual QDSNX would have done better with its managers resetting weights than with this static mix.
I also added a second portfolio, a blend of Wellington and cash, that gave similar performance over the past decade.
Portfolio Visualizer ten year performance

iav publishes a benchmark based on actual vanguard retail holder returns. (avg vanguard investor)
even if one has significant assets in brokerages, its insightful to compare what one may gain with less effort\complexity based on peers.
-------------------------------------------
AVII’s performance vs stocks (500 Index), bonds (Total Bond Index (VBTLX)), cash (Federal MM (VMFXX)) and a global balanced fund (LifeStrategy Moderate Growth) since the end of 1990.
Stocks: 3,295% (10.8% per year)
Global Balanced: 1,177% (7.7%)
AVII: 1,138% (7.6%)
Bonds: 387% (4.7%)
Cash: 143% (2.6%)

Thanks @yogibearbull. Most of the articles I’ve seen on TIPS are positive. This one is an outlier (which I was searching for). Yes, it’s somewhat dated - referencing the 2020-2022 period. I think it says more about the herd mentality of retail investors than anything else. Many buy what’s been going up and sell when it turns south.
You are correct that TIPs funds bear little resemblance to TIPs held individually / laddered. Fair criticism. There has been some recent discussion here of a short-term TIPS fund. These are safer than the intermediate / long term funds the article likely references.
One more article I’ve dug up takes a more neutral stance on TIPS, pointing out the benefits and potential risks. All of this side-steps the issue of how accurate the BLS CPI data is / or will be going forward - a hot topic now days. Worth considering as the TIPs inflation adjustment incorporates that data.
I’ve posted these articles merely to show that investing in TIPS (especially thru funds) will not necessarily protect against inflation under all circumstances. There are no free lunches.

Somewhat related. From an interview with Jack Ablin, chief investment strategist of Cresset in this week’s Barron’s:
“Ablin considers the S&P 500 index about 27% overvalued today, based on the divergence between corporate earnings and dividend growth and S&P 500 returns over time. But (he says) that doesn’t mean stocks can’t keep climbing … ”
Isn’t that like saying, “I know I’m already drunk, but I don’t think another drink will hurt any …..” ?
Article: ”There’s $7 Trillion in Money-Market Funds. That’s Bullish for Stocks, Says This Investment Pro.” Published in Barron’s - August 11, 2025

Nothing new per se, but the charts are interesting. Also probably means that any moves up or down will quickly become rather exaggerated once computers catch up to discresionary traders ... which also probably explains some of the completely INSANE daily price moves on single stocks in recent weeks/months, too. (It was annoying but bearable - if not predictable at times - when trading before/during the GFC when algos were first taking off, but nowdays the dial is turned to 15 on these things!)
Computer-guided traders haven’t been this bullish on stocks compared to their human counterparts since early 2020, before the depths of the Covid pandemic, according to Parag Thatte, a strategist at Deutsche Bank AG.
The two groups look at different cues to form their opinions, so it’s not a shock that they see the market differently. While computer-driven fast-money quants use systematic strategies based on momentum and volatility signals, discretionary money managers are individuals looking at economic and earnings trends to guide their moves.

< - >
Free link https://archive.ph/X5mf6

Yugo first mentioned Sallie Mae (nice find)

Thanks, @msf - thought I'd also mention a couple of 4.25%+ APY savings options:
1. Citibank has been offering a rolling 3-month bonus rate on their savings account.
The rate has been dropping lately but trended consistently 0.25% to 0.75% above comparable promotions or HYS accounts at other banks. Current offer is 4.25% nominal (~ 4.33% APY).
The promotion has been renewable at/near expiration, YMMV, though the exact procedure seems to change from quarter to quarter.
Requires $25K+ in new money. Available only in states with Citi branches.
2. SoFi Bank is offering a 6-month 0.70% APY Boost on their HY savings account.
SoFi HYS account rate - though not guaranteed - has been holding at 3.80% APY since the beginning of the year, so the current boosted rate offer is 4.50% APY.
Additional $50 or $300 account bonus with $1K+ or $5K+ direct deposit within 25 days (paid within 7 days thereafter).
Requires SoFi Plus, which comes with direct deposit or $10/month subscription.
APY Boost offer expires 09/03/25.