All Indexes are Not Created Equal - a three paragraph article showing how large a difference index selection can make. Two small cap value index funds, two different indexes, large recent divergence.
I've included below the 1 year graph from the article, comparing IWN (Russell 2000 Value index ETF) with VBR (CRSP Small Cap Value index ETF). Performance values are for NAV. Over the past year, the performance difference was about 7%.
This shows how much of a difference index selection can make.
The funds themselves outperformed their indexes (NAV) before fees. The Vanguard fund came in 5 basis points below benchmark, but with an ER of 8 basis points (3 basis points above benchmark before fees). The iShares fund did even better: 15 basis points above benchmark before fees of 0.25%.

FYI: U.S. stocks traded lower Friday, with the Dow industrials swinging to a loss following reports that a Chinese warship seized an underwater U.S. Navy drone in international waters off the coast of the Philippines.
Even as the Dow was curtailed from its advance to the psychologically important 20,000 level, the blue-chip average is still on track for its longest weekly winning streak, at six, in more than a year.
Regards,
Ted
Bloomberg:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-15/dollar-solidifies-its-climb-on-fed-outlook-as-japan-futures-rise
Reuters:
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-stocks-idUSKBN1451N9
MarketWatch:
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/dow-set-to-edge-closer-to-20000-even-as-other-markets-take-a-breather-2016-12-16/print
USA Today:
http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/markets/2016/12/16/asian-shares-muted-dollar-climbs-rate-outlook-sinks/95508208/
IBD:
http://www.investors.com/market-trend/stock-market-today/dow-backs-away-from-20000-oil-rises-alexion-gets-a-big-bounce//
CNBC:
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/12/16/stocks-open-higher-as-traders-eye-us-dollar.html
AP:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/F/FINANCIAL_MARKETS?SITE=AP
WSJ Markets At A Glance:
http://markets.wsj.com/us
Sector Tracker:
http://www.sectorspdr.com/sectorspdr/tools/sector-tracker
Bloomberg Sector Performance Pie Chart:
https://www.bloomberg.com/markets/sectors
Current Futures: Negative
http://finviz.com/futures.ashx

LOL. @VintageFreak: PRIJX (TRP) ...A very young fund, going back to Sept, 2015.

Now you are talking. You guessed I asked the question because I wanted a place where I could buy without load and at brokerage. I do have an account with TRP and this seems like a good option to research.
Thanks much.

Let us know what you find!

FYI:
Regards,
Ted
December 15, 2016
Preview Clip:

Dear WEALTHTRACK Subscriber,
The U.S. has been the place to be for investors this year, even more so after the election of Donald Trump as President. Since November 8th, U.S. stock markets have been on a tear, reaching new records and extending their lead over international markets by a substantial margin.
As a recent Wall Street Journal headline put it: “The global dominance of U.S. stocks has been boosted by the post-election rally”, as well as the strength of the U.S. dollar, which has also been appreciating rapidly against other currencies. It hit a 14 year high Thursday against a basket of currencies. The market capitalization of U.S. stocks reached over $25 trillion in December, comprising more than 40% of the world’s stock market value, levels not seen since 2006.
No other country comes even close. Despite rapid gains in China’s stock market size and value, it still has less than a 10% share of global market value.
With low unemployment, corporate profits expected to pick up and stimulus anticipated from infrastructure spending, corporate tax cuts and regulatory roll backs more investors are jumping on the bullish bandwagon. Even the Federal Reserve acknowledges that economic conditions have improved significantly enough to allow it to boost interest rates this week, for only the second time in a decade. The way things are going, Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen expects to raise interest rates another three times next year, in 25 basis points, or a quarter of a percentage point increments.
Improving conditions and this positive outlook are why the message from this week’s guest is such a stunner.
In a WEALTHTRACK exclusive, Wall Street’s top ranked investment strategist is saying it’s time to put on the brakes and get much more defensive!
He is François Trahan, Co-Founder, Partner and head of the Portfolio Strategy team at Cornerstone Macro, an independent macro research, policy and strategy firm he and his partners launched in 2013.
Trahan was recently inducted into the All-America Research Team Hall of Fame by Institutional Investor magazine, having been ranked the number one portfolio strategist for 10 of the past 11 years by institutional investors.
Up until recently Trahan was correctly bullish on the US stock market, as he has been for well over a year.
No more. He is adamantly telling clients that this rally should be sold. He will explain what has changed.
If you’d like to see the show before it airs, it is available to our PREMIUM subscribers right now. We also have an EXTRA interview with Trahan about what he describes as investing’s great mystery. Intrigued?
Plus, WEALTHTRACK is available on a YouTube Channel. So if you are unable to join us for the show on television, you can watch it on our website, WealthTrack.com, or by subscribing to our YouTube Channel.
Thanks for watching! Have a great weekend and make the week ahead a profitable and a productive one.
Best regards,
Consuelo

I also looked. Rainer hasn't even posted its 2015 dividends. See, e.g.
http://rainierfunds.com/Strategies/SmallMidCapPortfolio/Pages/DistributionHistoryOriginal.aspx
They'll know at closing today because they distribute on or about the 15th. Again, see link above for historical distribution dates, except for the 12/15/2015 distribution, which Morningstar gives you here.
The figures Rainer is talking about won't be estimates but exact numbers after the funds close on their record date.

FYI: Is active management poised to make a comeback?
Increasingly shunned by investors in favor of so-called passive strategies, active management—where the holdings of a portfolio are chosen by an individual, rather than being pegged to a benchmark, as with passive—seems to be having a shining moment, if not increased usage.
According to a survey by Natixis Global Asset Management released this week, a majority of institutional investors said they favored active management over passive in the current environment, with 73% saying the market environment would likely be favorable to the strategy. This matches other recent forecasts. Earlier this month, Candace Browning, the head of B.of A. Merrill Lynch Global Research, wrote that “2017 could be the year of the active investor.”
Regards,
Ted
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/investors-see-renaissance-for-active-stock-managers-2016-12-15/print

Of course Vanguard plays games. They all do, the question is which games and how well they play them. For example, Vanguard lends securities. A few, not all. And I believe that Vanguard plows all the earnings from that practice back into the funds, as opposed to some other managers who take a cut.
https://advisors.vanguard.com/iwe/pdf/Sec_lending.pdf (Vanguard practices)
https://personal.vanguard.com/pdf/icrsl.pdf (variations with risks and benefits)
Then there's sampling. Usually full replication is used for S&P 500, but sampling is often used for funds that include smaller cap stocks. Both POMIX and VTSMX use sampling. Different managers, different samples.
Then there's the question of which index they track. Even if over time two indexes for the same market segment do about the same, there can be a fair amount of difference from year to year. POMIX and VTSMX track different indexes.
Then there's the question of timing. Some families have rigid rules about when they must add/drop securities from their portfolios. Others are a bit more flexible, which allows for slightly better (or worse, if poorly executed) performance, but at the expense of slightly greater tracking errors. (This is a feature I checked years ago; I don't know if some funds still allow greater leeway.)
Then there are quirky attributes. Most funds immediately put the cash they receive from portfolio dividends to work. But SPY is prohibited from doing this because it is a unit investment trust. The fund must hold the cash; it's only when the cash dividends are distributed and you buy more shares through your broker's reinvestment program that this money gets put to work (quarterly).
I vaguely recall an S&P 500 fund many years ago (Safeco? Transamerica? X??) that said it tracked 499 stocks, excluding its own. Index funds are not necessarily the simple vehicles people expect.
Lots of reasons why the performance of index funds diverge - from each other and from their theoretical returns (index return less expenses).

JohnChisum is correct...we do not invest in index funds to beat the market. True index funds are designed to mirror the returns of their benchmark, minus their expense ratios. Some funds will, by design, employ some special sauce to enhance their returns compared to their benchmark. A quick look at true S&P 500 index funds gives me these numbers YTD:
S&P 500 12.60
SPY 12.44
SWPPX 12.45
VFINX 12.46
VOO 12.56
Darned close to what we would expect from pure index funds.

T. Rowe Price index mutual funds verses a comparable Vanguard index mutual fund with the closest minimum investment required as of 12/12/16.
Expense Ratios:
POMIX=.33% vs VTSMX=.16% Total Market
PREIX=.27% vs VFINX=.16% S&P 500
PEXMX=.38% vs VEXMX=.22% Extended Market
POMIX vs VTSMX
YTD
13.59 - 13.43
1Y
15.39 - 15.28
3Y
10.13 - 10.11
5Y
15.16 - 15.06
10Y
7.17 - 7.24
15Y
7.28 - 7.37
PREIX vs VFINX
YTD
12.50 - 12.62
1Y
14.35 - 14.48
3Y
10.35 - 10.47
5Y
14.94 - 15.07
10Y
6.83 - 6.96
15Y
6.55 - 6.69
PEXMX vs VEXMX
YTD
17.17 - 17.18
1Y
18.87 - 18.93
3Y
8.58 - 8.50
5Y
15.22 - 14.99
10Y
7.96 - 7.86
15Y
9.52 - 9.45
The difference in expense ratios does make a bit of a difference, but surprisingly, not in all cases. The TRP index funds tend to hold more cash than VG index funds and their expense ratios are higher, but still manage to outperform their comparable VG index fund during certain time periods...especially the total market and extended market funds.
Any thoughts as to why?

Dow 20,000
Posted on December 12, 2016 by Bob Fleming
Acropolis Investment Management Insights
...part of the reason that it’s doing so well this year (16.4 percent, vs. 12.9 percent for the S&P 500) is that it is heavy in industrial and financial stocks, and underweight in technology stocks – a near perfect combination for the Trump bump.
I’m not making a prediction, but if the DJIA grows by 7.7 percent over the next ten years (which is how much it grew over the last 10 years), we’ll be looking at Dow 43,000.
http://acrinv.com/dow-20000/

Interesting observation about "Total". Seems to be correct, though there are only four EM funds with "Total" in their name.
Of the 85 non-index funds of any type with "Total" in their name, only 15 are in a broad sense balanced (at least 10% bond and at least 10% US or 10% foreign stock). Four are the EM funds, one is a large cap fund (DHDIX), six are "true" domestic allocation funds, one (MFSRX) is a "true" world allocation fund, and three are multi-alternative funds.
What is distinctive about the Blackrock fund (BEEIX) is not so much that it's balanced, as its use of derivatives. 111% long in equity (net 54%), 62% bond, and 38% long in cash (net -17%). Not your typical "Total" fund. More like the multi-alternative funds that just happen to include bonds in their toolbox.

Yep ... that's what big money does. Runs the market up and then cashes out!
They buy low ... drive the markets upward ... and, then sell on disapointing interest rate increase news. And, then they repeat the process again. Why was this not expected? What did you think they were going to do, bet the come line and then bid the Index higher on 2017 Forward Earnings Estimates of $133.00? That is 33% higher than where the Index will most likely finish 2016 with a TTM P/E Ratio of about $100.00.
Folks, the market (S&P 500 Index) is currently very expensive with a TTM P/E Ratio of about 25 as reported in the WSJ. With this, I'm thinking it's going to drop further.
Perhaps, in the nearterm, at about 2135 I'll put my buying britches on.
Skeet

FYI: (Interest sensitive sectors, Utilities & Real Estate down over 1%) Ted
U.S. stocks fell in volatile trading on Wednesday after the Federal Reserve raised interest rates by a quarter point and signaled hikes could come next year at a faster pace than some expected.
Regards,
Ted
Bloomberg:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-13/asian-futures-tip-more-gains-as-fed-day-dawns-with-dollar-steady
Reuters:
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-stocks-idUSKBN1431G1
MarketWatch:
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/dow-set-to-hang-tight-just-under-20000-as-fed-decision-looms-2016-12-14/print
USA Today:
http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/markets/2016/12/14/dow-20000-quest-stocks-wall-street/95415458/
IBD:
http://www.investors.com/market-trend/stock-market-today/fed-rate-hike-oil-slide-hits-stocks-hospitals-hit-by-senate-scrutiny/
CNBC
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/12/14/us-stocks-open-slightly-lower-as-fed-announcement-approaches.html:
AP:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/F/FINANCIAL_MARKETS?SITE=AP
WSJ Markets At A Glance:
http://markets.wsj.com/us
Sector Tracker:
http://www.sectorspdr.com/sectorspdr/tools/sector-tracker
Bloomberg Sector Performance Pie Chart:
https://www.bloomberg.com/markets/sectors
Current Futures: Negative
http://finviz.com/futures.ashx

Thanks David. I'll have to cross check with Lipper. It's interesting to see what does and doesn't show up depending on who's doing the classifying and how "value" is defined.
That's what makes playing with screeners fun. You get a better feel for the differences between funds around the edges when forced to dig into these details.
I see that the Segall Bryant & Hamill fund (SBEMX) is a large cap fund, so you weren't excluding funds by cap size. Which raises the question why all the large cap EM value-ish funds that the M* screen found were excluded by MFO/Lipper.
The M* screener (using P/E <= 15, P/B <= 1.4, category = EM) comes up with several funds not on your list. Like the MFO screener, M*'s generally returns the oldest share class.
One that shows up with this screen is:
ICON EM Fund, class S ICARX (NTF @TrowePrice)
https://www3.troweprice.com/fb2/fbkweb/gateway/snapshot.do?ticker=ICARX
Lipper says that this is an EM fund. Maybe the P/B in the MFO database differs slightly from M*'s; the latter says 1.38, so it's close to a cutoff.
FWIW, here are the nine funds that M* finds using its definition of value (and also excluding large cap funds):
Advisory Research Emerging Markets Opportunities Fund ADVMX
AllianzGI Emerging Markets Small-Cap Fund; Institutional Class Shares ALAIX
Ashmore Emerging Markets Eq Opps Fund; Institutional Class Shares AEOIX
Ashmore Emerging Markets Frontier Equity Fund; Institutional Class Shares EFEIX (Frontier only)
DFA Emerging Markets Small Cap Fund; Class I Shares DEMSX
Seafarer Overseas Value - now there's a surprise
Templeton Frontier Markets; Advisor Class Shares FFRZX (Frontier only)
Victory Trivalent Emerging Market Small-Cap Fund; Class Y Shares MYEMX (A shares NTF@Fidelity)
Virtus Emerging Market Small Cap Fund; Class I Shares VIESX
I suggest researching ALAIX carefully before jumping in; overall performance is good, but it looks like almost all of its pop (relative to peers) came in its first quarter (2Q2015) when it returned 6.05% vs. about 1/2% for peers.
A large cap EM fund that passes M*'s "value" screen (but barely misses the P/B criterion, at 1.46) is
Blackrock Total Emerging Markets Fund; Institutional Class Shares BEEIX
This looks a lot different from other funds; it's more like a world allocation fund restricted to emerging markets. Uses a lot of leverage, derivatives, etc. Not your father's EM fund. Available with a $2500 min (but TF) @Fidelity in IRAs. BEEAX available load-waived in all accounts.

Hi @VintageFreak,
As msf mentioned you can choose category=international equity [diversified emerging mkts] in M*'s Premium screener but you can then also choose equity style box=value. I added in limiting the results to Distinct Portfolios only and funds that are open to new investment and I got 52 results. From a quick glance through the results and your comments above I'd guess most of what you might be interested in has already been listed here but hopefully I helped a little with the screener.

Hi, msf.
I wasn't using Morningstar. I was using the Lipper database that MFO screens through. There are many ways to define "value" but the portfolio metrics we have preset in the screener is p/e and p/b. I tried the lowest p/e (<10) and got two funds, one of which is liquidating, so bumped up to the next-lowest setting (<15). That leads to nine OEFs:
AllianzGI Emerging Markets Small-Cap Fund; Institutional Class Shares ALAIX
AllianzGI NFJ Emerging Markets Value Fund; Institutional Class Shares AZMIX
Salient Frontier Strategy Fund; Institutional Class Shares FRNMX
HSBC Frontier Markets Fund; Class I Shares HSFIX
Advisory Research Emerging Markets Opportunities Fund ADVMX
Segall Bryant & Hamill Emerging Markets Fund; Class I Shares SBEMX
US Global Investors Emerging Europe Fund EUROX
Virtus Emerging Markets Equity Income Fund; Class I Shares VEIIX
Voya Russia Fund; Class A Shares LETRX
(The system defaults to oldest share class which is often institutional, which explains the "class I" dominance.)
The Salient fund is liquidating, US Global is Europe-only, HSBC is frontier-only, which leaves six broad, low p/e options to explore.
There are, certainly, other ways to measure "value" beyond p/e. That said, a couple were interesting so I thought I'd share.
As ever,
David

@MFO Members: SFVLX $2,500
Regards,
Ted
http://www.morningstar.com/funds/XNAS/SFVLX/quote.html

Ted, the point is that several commonly used brokerages do not handle the investor shares, as was noted earlier in the thread. That's true for Fidelity, where SIVLX at $25k initial is the best anyone can do. Of course you can set up a separate account with Seafarer, but the extra hassle to many of us isn't worth it. -- Andy J.

I used the premium screener to find EM equity funds with the lowest p/e ratios and ended up with 8 funds with a p/e below 15 and a p/b below 1.5.
...
David

Voila! Didn't think of using P/E ratio for fund to discover "value". Problem is even with Premium Screener there is no Emerging Markets screen, but just Foreign G/B/V. Will keep this in mind for future.

There's " category=international equity [diversified emerging mkts] " w/M*.
I don't think David has given you his complete screen. If you screen for this category (again, at M*), and the P/E, P/B figures he gave, you get 45 funds (out of a universe of 230 EM funds). If you add the requirement that the portfolio not be large cap, then you come up with 8 funds. That's "equity style box != large".
This seems like a quirky screen. A P/E ratio of 15 is well above the MSCI EM index figure of 12.8 and also above the diversified EM category average of 13.8. This wider net doesn't have an effect on the non-large cap EM funds though. All 8 small/mid cap EM funds have P/E's below 13.8.
But in setting the P/E above the benchmark, it does seem designed to include SIVLX. That's the only one of the 8 that would be eliminated by requiring the P/E to be below the 12.8 figure of the benchmark index.
One could take M*'s definition of value instead (not that this is any better or worse, just different), by screening for "equity style box = value" instead of P/E, P/B figures. That will give you 9 funds, with just 6 in common with the other screen. It introduces three different funds (and drops two).
P.S. to Shadow - I see you fixed the ticker symbol. LZEOX used to be a different Lazard fund until it was merged into LZUOX around the end of 2006.
http://www.lazardnet.com/lam/us/funds/equity.shtml (LZEOX fund page)

LOL. @VintageFreak: PRIJX (TRP) ...A very young fund, going back to Sept, 2015.

Now you are talking. You guessed I asked the question because I wanted a place where I could buy without load and at brokerage. I do have an account with TRP and this seems like a good option to research.
Thanks much.

I used the premium screener to find EM equity funds with the lowest p/e ratios and ended up with 8 funds with a p/e below 15 and a p/b below 1.5.
Advisory Research Emerging Markets Opportunities (ADVMX) sort of stands out.
AllianzGI Emerging Markets Small-Cap A (ALMMX) is newer and pricey, but has been doing well.
Beyond that, I found six ETFs and one recently-liquidated fund.
David

Voila! Didn't think of using P/E ratio for fund to discover "value". Problem is even with Premium Screener there is no Emerging Markets screen, but just Foreign G/B/V. Will keep this in mind for future.