FYI: Reader Charles Calvert stepped off the USS Shangri-La and into civilian life in 1961 at the National Savings and Trust in Washington, D.C. Little did the tyro securities analyst realize that interest rates were poised for a 20-year lurch to the upside followed by a multigenerational break to the downside.
He realizes it now. Like many who came of age in the inflation of the late 20th century, Calvert has had the devil’s own time adjusting to the era of subzero percent bond yields. He can’t get it out of his head that the borrower ought to pay the lender, not the other way around.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.barrons.com/articles/jim-grant-theres-trouble-ahead-for-austrias-100-year-bonds-51569615760?mod=djem_b_Weekly Feed for Barrons Magazine

FYI: Harvard University’s endowment gained 6.5% in fiscal 2019, joining other colleges in a year of lackluster performance.
College endowments are now reporting investment returns for the fiscal year ended in June, and they’re getting beat by the S&P 500, which gained more than 10% in the same period.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.barrons.com/articles/harvard-endowment-gains-6-5-in-lackluster-year-for-college-endowments-51569590704?mod=hp_LEAD_2

FYI: (This is a follow-up article.)
The $4 trillion exchange-traded fund industry has, for the last 27 years, operated via a quirk in the law. After some dramatic back-and-forth this week, the Securities and Exchange Commission has finally changed that.
The 2,273 ETFs on the market today have essentially been created via a loophole in the law that governs mutual funds and other investment products for individual investors. The much-hyped and long-awaited “ETF Rule” was supposed to change that, making it easier for companies to create new products. After canceling an open meeting scheduled for Wednesday to vote on this proposed regulation, the SEC announced on Thursday that it has in fact adopted the ETF Rule, more officially known as Rule 6c-11.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.barrons.com/articles/will-the-secs-new-etf-rule-benefit-investors-51569519577?mod=djem_b_Weekly Feed for Barrons Magazine

FYI: The Federal Reserve’s latest rate cuts are taking yields back down to nearly zero percent at online brokers.
TD Ameritrade reduced the interest it pays on cash sweep deposits by 0.03 of a percentage point on balances under $200,000. The annual percentage yield on cash at TD now ranges from 0.01%-0.04%.
In a note published Thursday, Credit Suisse analyst Craig Siegenthaler said that with the yield reductions, TD is “running out of room” to offset the next Fed rate cuts.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.barrons.com/articles/your-cash-is-earning-even-less-at-one-online-broker-after-the-feds-rate-cut-51569513908?refsec=income-investing

Going global - VGWLX, VMVFX, and putting David Herro in an old 401k brokerage and trying to forget about it with OAKIX. Also testing the waters with BCSVX.

@davidmoran: It's raining here, but I still don't have time to read 1779 X 20 e-mails from the trove you linked. What's wrong with me?

FYI: A billionaire former bond trader once accused of putting dead fish in air vents to get back at his ex-wife is involved in a new stink — this time with his 31-year-old rocker son.
California financier Bill Gross is scrambling to thwart youngest child Nick’s auction of five 1918 “Inverted Jenny’’ postage stamps, which could fetch up to $3.4 million if they hit the block as scheduled Friday, sources told The Post.
Regards,
Ted
https://nypost.com/2019/09/22/bond-king-bill-gross-in-postage-stamp-feud-with-rocker-son-sources/

FYI: President Donald Trump’s administration is considering the possibility of delisting Chinese companies from U.S. stock exchanges, a source briefed on the matter said on Friday, in what would be a radical escalation of trade tensions between the two countries.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-09-27/white-house-weighs-limits-on-u-s-portfolio-flows-into-china-k12ahk4g

This article provides a good background discussion about IOFIX...including the niche, the process, the people, and the competition.

IOFIX offers a pure-play into one of our favorite areas of the bond market, non-agency MBS.
The trade on legacy non-agency MBS is waning, thanks to lower rates and improving homeowner balance sheets.
The fund is a great play to add defense to your portfolio while generating a fairly safe 5%+ yield.

https://seekingalpha.com/article/4293861-alphacentric-income-opportunities-fund-offers-safe-5_21-percent-yield-limited-time

+1.

Howdy folks,
As of this time, the house will impeach and the senate will not convict. Whether or not they will convict should have no bearing on the house impeachment proceedings.
The interesting thing about impeachment is that it goes to a different level of legal procedure (i.e. executive privilege is much reduced in an impeachment as compared to a border wall issue [read: Roberts will vote for disclosure]).
The issue is what will be revealed during the investigation and how will that impact the voters. Right now, Trumps chances of reelection are about two points lower than whale shit. However, in 14 months, "the horse may learn to sing".
Impact on the markets? feh. WTF cares. The fundamentals of investing will not change, just some of the nuances. I've been driving under a yellow flag since the Ides of November - I see no reason to change.
And to think that you can be a part of this on your streaming device.
and so it goes,
peace,
rono

I didn't have any problem. Vanguard gives you the option of going directly to the "personal investor" site, which I have not elected to do. So vanguard.com just brings me to the corporate portal, where I select "Personal Investors" to get to the familiar home page. From there, there is a login link in the upper right corner, or one can log in directly from that investor home page by scrolling down to the username/password boxes on the left.
Vanguard has provided free stock/ETF/MF trades for Flagship customers for many years. About a year ago, Vanguard terminated trading of virtually all explicitly leveraged ETFs on its platform and eliminated commissions for online trading of all non-leveraged ETFs.
https://mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/42948/vanguard-brings-unrivaled-access-to-etfs-with-launch-of-industry-s-largest-commission-free-platform
Bond trading (aside from new issues) still carries a commission ($1 or $2/bond, depending on your Vanguard level), which is not waived even for Flagship customers.
https://investor.vanguard.com/investing/transaction-fees-commissions/cds-bonds

impeachment risks was 42% yesterday w/ vegas betting
2020 odds:
trump 1:1
warren 800+:100
biden 650+:100
sander 1000+:100
if it does go through, many states Trump maybe stronger and Democrats may loose house + 2020 president.
never seen so much corruptions recently

The markets are remarkably uninterested in most things Presidential, unless it affects them directly. (Some shameless self-promotion in my part) https://johnmwaggoner.wordpress.com/2019/09/26/impeachment-and-the-stock-market/

10 year performance of FSUTX verses VFINX...impressive and steady for a sector fund!
https://screencast.com/t/cbgef8RiE
Here's VGENX added to the a ten year chart:
https://screencast.com/t/RBpNIvxkFF6

FYI: Cumulative assets in the U.S. exchange-traded fund industry zoomed 90% during a nearly five-year period through last month and now hover around the $4 trillion mark, but this amazing growth story has a downside in that 24% of ETFs closed during that period and another 7% are rapidly declining, according to statistics from investment research firm CFRA.
CFRA last month bolstered its in-house research chops when it acquired data-and-analytics firm First Bridge Data LLC, and CFRA today held a media call that utilized First Bridge’s research muscle to provide an in-depth look at the winners and losers in the ETF space during the period from December 2014 through August 2019.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.fa-mag.com/news/roughly-25--of-etfs-closed-during-past-five-years-51860.html?print

Interesting graphic displaying companies by revenue in 2019...Energy companies look good...also, Walmart's revenue was twice what Amazon has done so far in 2019 ($514B vs $233B)
https://screencast.com/t/ez3tesnf8T6
Article:
https://howmuch.net/articles/worlds-largest-companies-by-revenue
Comparing VGENX to VDE since March of 2009. VGENX has outpaced it's ETF counterpart...especially since 2016.
https://screencast.com/t/y3lXBxQdHO

You're conflating delivery mechanism (with various effects of their own) with addictive substances. The addictive substance in e-cigarettes such as Juul is nicotine. Same as in cigarettes, cigars, etc.
Cigarettes are proven much more dangerous? Fair enough to say that cigarettes are proven dangerous. What one can't say is that e-cigarettes are proven to be less dangerous. Where are the 30 year studies? Oh, wait.
When even the relatively toothless FDA (I agree with you on that) says that Juul hasn't proven its products to be safer, it seems fair to ask where's the proof (not just fragmentary evidence, but "proof").
https://www.wired.com/story/fda-juul-cant-claim-safer-cigarettes/
Nicotine issue ignored?
https://www.fda.gov/tobacco-products/ctp-newsroom/fdas-comprehensive-plan-tobacco-and-nicotine-regulation
From an investor perspective, Fidelity went out on a limb investing in a company where (according to the cited article) 80% of its revenues come from flavored products. The historical pushback on cigarette ads targeted at youths was well known before recent events unfolded. Foreseeable risk.

https://seekingalpha.com/article/4293351-vanguard-energy-etf-time-greedy-market-fearful
Vanguard Energy ETF (VDE) owns a portfolio of giant and large-cap U.S. stocks in the energy sector.
Summary
VDE’s portfolio of stocks consists of mostly giant-cap and large-cap U.S. energy stocks.
The ETF has not performed well in the past year due to weak demand caused by a slowdown in the global economy.
Fortunately, stocks in VDE’s portfolio are stocks with moats and have generated excessive cash flows from its operations.
The fund pays an attractive 3.5%-yielding dividend.

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)

You will have slightly different results is you punch in VWENX instead of VWELX, if the admiral shares go back that far. Has a lower fee/higher yield.