Stash your cash in bond ETFs
(1) ... but we don’t even talk about recent buys or sells anymore.... “
(2) “... can’t we play in the sandbox a little nicer?”
Thanks for the comments
@Graust. I won’t even try to defend the politics that seeps in. It’s indefensible - but also hard to avoid in the current political climate.
(1) As to
fewer trades, I’ve noticed it too. Couple thoughts: The group of perhaps 2
5-3
5 regulars who post often are growing older and more conservative. Heck, I can think of 2 or 3 who’ve gotten out of the market completely in the past six months. They still have a great deal to offer here - but trading funds isn’t where they are anymore. Other oldsters like myself are still investing in the market, but trading a lot less as a means of reducing risk. My most aggressive holdings nowadays tend to be balanced funds (the more boring the better). And I’ve stopped making speculative bets on beaten-up sectors because there’s a very real chance I wouldn’t live long enough to see them come to fruition.
Another factor - We’ve just experienced a 10-20% stock market correction (depending on the index). That experience has, I think, dulled the
“animal spirits” a bit. Folks after something like that become more risk averse for a while afterwards. That may be another reason why there’s less talk about buying / selling than 6 months or a year ago. There are some nice exceptions.
@Puddenhead posts occasionally about trading for quick profits. I always enjoy his “longneck” ramblings. And
@Old_Skeet does a real nice job weekly dissecting his approach and telling you which sectors he likes or dislikes and why. Lest I forget,
@MikeM too is always looking for an edge and mentions his buys / sells from time to time. No doubt there are others I’m omitting. Apologies to them.
(2) Re
the sandbox - Unfortunately, it just takes one child peeing in it and throwing sand to ruin it for everyone.
MFAIX -- anyone kicked the tires? Was curious if anyone had done some due diligence on this fund. I've been running the numbers on MFO Premium and its risk adjusted performance is impressive over the 1, 3, and 5 year time frames. Also held up well in the October-December selloff. It looks like a winner to me. Top performer in International Growth category and available for no load at Schwab. Looking to add this fund as well as ARTJX as my new international holdings.
S&P 500? More Like The S&P 50 I've also never heard of buying a mutual fund at a discount unless like
@JoJo26 implied, you are saying you don't have to pay loads on A-shares for certain families. If so, that is not unique. A share loads are waved at many brokerages like Schwab, probably Fidelity and probably others.
Yep, Fidelity too. Just from my experience, frequently looking up A shares there, I'd rough-guesstimate something like 3/4 of commonly held/traded A shares are load waived. As far as ETFs go, there's a long list that don't even charge the usual $4.95 commission on exchange-traded products.
OS's note that "under certain circumstance load funds can be purchased at discounts; and, in some cases at nav" apparently refers to partial to fully waived loads on load shares. Unless there are some very rare outliers, there's no such thing as a partial load waiver on A shares at Fidelity, and I assume Schwab.
Whatever broker Skeet's working with now, it sounds like a migration to Fidelity or Schwab would do him a world of good. That's the takeaway I get from this thread.
We're just looking out for you
@Old_Skeet. It seriously sounds like you're paying a lot of fees that are not necessary whether it be wraps, loads, advisory, etc. IMO, if you can't simply determine what you're paying in total fees, then you're likely paying too much.
S&P 500? More Like The S&P 50 I've also never heard of buying a mutual fund at a discount unless like
@JoJo26 implied, you are saying you don't have to pay loads on A-shares for certain families. If so, that is not unique. A share loads are waved at many brokerages like Schwab, probably Fidelity and probably others.
Yep, Fidelity too. Just from my experience, frequently looking up A shares there, I'd rough-guesstimate something like 3/4 of commonly held/traded A shares are load waived. As far as ETFs go, there's a long list that don't even charge the usual $4.9
5 commission on exchange-traded products.
OS's note that "under certain circumstance load funds can be purchased at discounts; and, in some cases at nav" apparently refers to partial to fully waived loads on load shares. Unless there are some very rare outliers, there's no such thing as a partial load waiver on A shares at Fidelity, and I assume Schwab.
Whatever broker Skeet's working with now, it sounds like a migration to Fidelity or Schwab would do him a world of good. That's the takeaway I get from this thread.
. Sorry dupp
Will never understand why you need to call people out,
@Ted. At least the many others that share links share relevant, quality ones versus bombarding the board with garbage.
. Sorry dupp
Only Five T. Rowe Price U.S. Mutual Funds Saw Positive Returns In 2018 Lots of T. Rowe Price funds made money last year (2018). In addition to the five listed were several bond and allocation funds (and a couple more domestic equity funds). That goes to
@Derf 's point that cash and fixed income did better than equity last year.
This is just another column tossing out junk statistics and not even doing its homework. The two other Price equity funds (albeit institutional funds) that had positive returns were: TRLGX (you can get the same manager via HNASX), and TPLGX (likely a clone of TRBCX).
I resemble that remark. Can’t recall seeing my TRBUX (ultra-short bond fund) on that list of
5. Failure to take note of that omission may signal how gravely concerned I am about all this. :)
Thanks
@msf for lifting some of the curtain (err ...
shroud?) here.
Only Five T. Rowe Price U.S. Mutual Funds Saw Positive Returns In 2018 Lots of T. Rowe Price funds made money last year (2018). In addition to the five listed were several bond and allocation funds (and a couple more domestic equity funds). That goes to
@Derf 's point that cash and fixed income did better than equity last year.
This is just another column tossing out junk statistics and not even doing its homework. The two other Price equity funds (albeit institutional funds) that had positive returns were: TRLGX (you can get the same manager via HNASX), and TPLGX (likely a clone of TRBCX).
What's the point in saying that fewer than half the managers who beat the S&P
500 did so by more than 4.38% (i.e. had positive returns)? When your manager beats his (or her) benchmark, do you complain that the fund outperformed by only 3%? Do you expect, in a good year or bad year for the market, half the managers who outperform to do so by over 4%? This is silly.
Only Five T. Rowe Price U.S. Mutual Funds Saw Positive Returns In 2018 (1) Value investing had a poor year in ‘18, following a long period of underperformance. Beginning to look as though that may have been the “blow off” stage of the value cycle as they’re hot so far this year. To some extent in ‘18 you were better off putting on a blindfold and buying indexes than in evaluating companies. To the extent Price favors a value approach and does a lot of due diligence, having done their homework may have hurt their numbers in ‘18.
(2) Another factor - Price tends to be more aggressive with their significant number of allocation funds than others. RPSIX, for example, can hold around 10% in PRFDX (a stock fund). If you compare RPSIX to less aggressive “income” funds during a down year for equities it will lag. Their retirement funds are also known for having glide slopes that keep investors in equities further out than many others. More equities in a down year spells lower return.
(3) Price includes a bit of PRAFX (real assets) in many allocation funds. In fact, PRAFX was first developed for in-house use in their allocation funds and than later offered to the public. Commodities, energy, & real estate were poor places to be in ‘18. However, if this year’s trend continues it will pay investors in real assets for their patience.
At first I couldn’t see commenting on this one. A single year says very little about the quality of a firm. Since some have found it worthwhile, I wanted to add my 2-cents. All that being said, I do like to diversify management risk. As now stands, Price has about 50% with the other 50% divided up among Dodge & Cox, Oppenheimer, and Permenant Portfolio. I’m much more accustomed to fending off criticism of the latter two (especially PRPFX) than I am of T. Rowe. Some day I may have 100% with Price for ease of managing my assets and because of their great customer service.
