Recently initiated holding in ZEOIX and added to IOFIX. Plus, recently picked up GE at under $13 ... it had a really good day today (ha). Own just three mutual funds currently: SIGIX, ZEOIX, IOFIX. Plus MINT.

The article actually said "a married couple would require a net worth of $4 million" rather than "the $4M portfolio". I read that as including their home equity, which could be a big number, especially if, as msf notes, "you've owned your home for many years, you've got no mortgage and likely a tax bill of just a few $K/year courtesy of Prop 13".
On balance, the information in the article, tempered by msf's observations, is really pretty accurate.

Hi Guys,
It depends. It depends on the timeframe of the forecast. Economic research that records the long term average returns and the variability of various asset class returns are indeed very useful inputs to my investment decision making. It establishes the likely outcomes and risk potential for the future. That's helpful when making asset allocation decisions.
Here is a Link that demonstrates the usefulness of such a study for a small number of stock investment groupings:
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/8-lessons-from-80-years-of-market-history-2014-11-19
This data teaches useful investment lessons that I need not learn from costly and time eroding personal experience. Knowing history is important and research generates that knowledge.
Best Wishes

@MFO Members: Sticking with the funds I brought to the dance, MSOPX, TRBCX, IVV, QQQ, and PONCX. Why wouldn't I, TRBCX, MSOPX, QQQ are up over 15% YTD.
Regards,
Ted

FYI: ( If link doesn't work, Google article title.)
When Gary Greenberg graduated from business school in 1985, he had idealistic views about how investors could help open doors for progress in developing markets and beyond. “The only issue was finding anyone who would actually pay me to do that,” says Greenberg, who is 65.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.barrons.com/articles/alibaba-tencent-and-sustainable-investing-1531939543?mod=hp_highlight_3
M* Snapshot CVMAX:
https://www.morningstar.com/funds/XNAS/CVMAX/quote.html

So much depends on housing there. If you've owned your home for many years, you've got no mortgage and likely a tax bill of just a few $K/year courtesy of Prop 13, so you're likely well able to afford that $5 gallon of milk. (If you've got the $4M portfolio mentioned in the article, you could even afford milk baths.)
Under the old tax laws, you could have even downsized, say moving from Palo Alto to SF "for free". That is, back when you could transfer your basis rather than paying cap gains on appreciation over $250K/$500K, swapping homes in general wasn't a problem. And California still gives a one-in-a-lifetime opportunity to retirees to transfer their low tax base to their new home when downsizing.
There's even a new ballot proposition that would extend this tax break to older homeowners who want to trade up rather than down.
NYMag: California Ballot Initiative to Expand Property Tax Breaks for Wealthy Seniors Could Be Another Boon to GOP
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/05/ca-property-tax-initiative-could-be-another-boon-to-gop.html

FYI: Economic predictions are wonderfully useful...after the fact. A fund manager sent back to 1973 and stripped of his investment memories, save for knowing that inflation and commodity prices would soar for many years before subsiding, would thrash his rivals over the ensuing decades. He would be long commodities and short bonds, before switching to stocks in the early 1980s. Toss him a second tidbit--the 2008 housing collapse--and his victory would be complete. His fund would have the best 35-year track record in the business.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.morningstar.com/articles/873681/are-economic-predictions-ever-useful.html

Never been one to simply compare daily, yearly or even 10-year returns in trying to decide whether a particular fund belongs in my holdings. That sometimes seems at odds with other investors’ sentiments.

@Hank, this is something I've gravitated to also, thanks to you in part. Pick a good fund (like PWRCX) and believe in your decision. There is so much buying and selling, toe hold investing and movement from investors that, I believe, ends up being a lag in investment return over time.

Yep - PRWCX and DODBX are very different creatures. The former has been running ahead of the other for many years now. Suspect (but can’t prove or demonstrate) that over very long periods they’ll come out about even. PRWCX seems to have more latitude in how it invests and to be quite dependent on a particular managers’ style and market read - coupled with Price’s very fine macro-analysis team (a deep bench). With Giroux at the helm, that’s been a potent combination. I’ve mentioned before that PRWCX does a lot of hedging - using put / call options (neither of which I’m qualified to explain). Both funds struggle with asset bloat - confining them largely to large cap holdings.
DODBX, as I understand it, is essentially a compilation of (60-70%) DODGX and (30-40%) DODIX. So reading the reports on those other two funds might provide additional insight into how it invests. The firm at last report was still more positive on stocks than bonds - so the fund’s stock component was closer to that 70% weighting. As others have said, Dodge and Cox are deep value investors, willing to wait years or even decades for a holding to rise to what they consider its true value. And, they very much use a team-managed style. One additional note: A lot of D&Cs more recent underperformance has been tied to their heavy weighting in financials. Part of that is their belief that financials (like banks) will do well in a rising interest rate environment, while many other sectors won’t. Watching DODBX somewhat closely, I’d say it’s daily performance is quite dependent on how financials perform.
To me watching the ball / moving parts of how managers position their funds is part of what makes investing fascinating. Never been one to simply compare daily, yearly or even 10-year returns in trying to decide whether a particular fund belongs in my holdings. That sometimes seems at odds with other investors’ sentiments.

I must admit that I think it will be good for some of the people born before civil rights to be gone. I grew up in MS Delta. The ratio of black to white even in the 50s was higher than average. The economy was such that all but the poorest whites could afford a private in-house employee that provided both cleaning and day care. Many whites resented welfare without realizing that welfare payments subsidized the affordability of their life style. A woman with children could qualify for welfare if their income was small enough. The welfare payment was too small so it created a need to subsidize her income. She was often employed in a private residence with an income paid under-the-table. The income was much, much less than minimum wage. In short, the welfare payment was also subsidizing the white employer. This is only one of the things that was lost with civil rights. My dad became furious when he was asked for minimum wage, payment to Social Security, etc. by people seeking private home jobs. He found his standard of living substantially lowered when he decided he could no longer afford a maid.
The "white" schools were integrated resulting in the establishment of "church" schools outside of town in the counties. Many whites moved to the "suburbs" along with the experienced teachers as the poor were left in the city. A private school was established inside the city with tuition high enough to exclude the poor. This expense exasperated the lowering of the white life style. The "white" school system became predominately black, without sufficient funding as many areas of the city became poorer and began to deteriorate.
During my last year living there (1970; I was 19) a young girl from a very poor family saw me walking down the street. She ran to catch up with me. She was in elementary school and an exceptional student. Her father was a drunk and her mother an invalid. The older kids and their wives and children lived with them. Somehow they survived. I asked the girl what her plans for the future were. As she turned and pointed back to her house, she told me that she didn't have any plans because she knew that no matter what she did she would end up "just like them". She was white; her family hated and looked down on minorities more than anyone I knew. During civil rights my friends and I found it remarkable that this need to feel someone else was less than oneself was a major factor in keeping all groups divided and powerless.

Here's the US News link:
https://money.usnews.com/investing/bonds/articles/2018-07-16/how-to-invest-in-zero-coupon-bonds
As it points out, zeros include those issued by a government:
"Like all bonds, zeros are loans from the bond purchaser to the company or governmental body that issued the bond."
If you want to buy zeros issued by the US government, you can buy them directly from the Treasury through TreasuryDirect. I've suggested using 3 or 6 month zeros instead of comparable CDs. Similar yield, better safety (full faith and credit of the US government), and state income tax-free, making the after tax yield even better.

If you have access to M* premium and look at the holding data (premium), you can see how the top 100 holdings did. (You'll have to do this within the next dozen hours give or take, before M* updates the daily changes for Friday).
If you export this into Excel (with a slight bit of tweaking to separate the day change/pct into two columns), you can sort by day's change to see what the big movers were.
FWIW, top winners by pct were:
Danaher Corp DHR (healthcare, LCB), up 4.47% (2.92% of fund)
Thermo Fisher Scientific TMO (healthcare, LCG) 2.20% (1.02% of fund)
PerkinElmer PKI (healthcare, MCG) 2% (2.39%)
Waste Connections WCN (industrials, LCG) 1.70% (1.06%)
Enterprise Products EPD (energy, LCV) 1.50% (0.66%)
Aramark ARMK (consumer cycl, MCB) 1.33% (1.6%)
DTE Energy DTE (utilities, LCV) 1.24% (1.49%)
Eversource Energy ES (utilities, LCV) 1.09% (1.36%)
NiSource NI (utilities, MCV), 0.97%, (1.21%)
The table doesn't give day change info on the bond holdings, but generally bonds did well yesterday, e.g. PTTFX was up 0.21%. So that had to help as well. That's consistent with utilities being near the top of the list above (for reference, VUIAX was up 0.96%). As Swen noted, the fund is overweighted in utilities (8% vs. 3% for category/benchmark).
The fund is even more overweighted in healthcare (21% vs. around 11% category/benchmark). Three of those stocks are at the very top of the list above. PRHSX was up minimally (0.03%) on the day, though VHCIX was down 0.40% and VGHCX was down 0.29%, suggesting that healthcare subsectors are not all the same. The second largest holding of PRHSX is BDX, which was up 0.34%, and represents 2.72% of PRWCX.

Since the February 2018 lows FSUTX is up 15%. I'm not sure that FSUTX is a poxy for PRWCX's holding in utilities, but it points out that portfolio components, especially defensive components are what separate out successful funds and fund managers.
Manager bets are often quite different.
His WealthTrack interview is re-linked here:
HOW DAVID GIROUX DELIVERS STOCK MARKET PERFORMANCE WITH MUCH LESS RISK

FYI: .There are no major data releases Friday.
.Market players will therefore be mostly focused on earnings, with General Electric reporting before the bell.
U.S. stock index futures pointed to a negative open on Friday, as investors awaited further earnings and digested news comments from President Donald Trump.
Regards,
Ted
U.S. : (MarketWatch)
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/stocks-at-risk-of-turning-negative-for-week-as-trade-woes-overshadow-ge-microsoft-results-2018-07-20/print
U.S.: (IBD)
https://www.investors.com/market-trend/stock-market-today/dow-jones-futures-microsoft-apple-supplier-skyworks-e-trade-earnings/
U.S.: (CNBC)
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/20/us-markets-focus-on-earnings.html
U.K.: (Marketwatch)
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/ftse-100-edges-higher-as-pound-lingers-at-multimonth-lows-2018-07-20/print
Europe: (MarketWatch)
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/european-stocks-fall-as-trump-threatens-china-with-tariffs-on-all-500-billion-in-goods-to-us-2018-07-20/print
Europe: (Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/article/europe-stocks/update-1-disappointing-earnings-trade-tensions-weigh-on-european-shares-idUSL8N1UG1NZ
Europe: (CNBC)
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/20/european-marketstrump-criticizes-the-fed-earnings-continue.html
Asia: (MarketWatch)
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/asian-shares-mixed-in-wake-of-us-stock-markets-weakness-2018-07-19/print
Asia: (Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/article/japan-stocks-close/japanese-stocks-slip-in-choppy-trade-as-yuan-swings-knock-sentiment-idUSL4N1UG2K8
Asia: (CNBC)
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/20/asia-markets-stocks-dollar-and-trump-fed-comments-on-the-agenda.html
Bonds: (CNBC)
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/20/us-treasury-yields-trump-criticized-of-the-fed.html
Currencies: (Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-forex/dollar-below-one-year-highs-on-trump-comments-yuan-eyed-idUSKBN1KA02H
Oil: (CNBC)
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/20/oil-markets-concerns-about-oversupply-ease.html
Gold: (CNBC)
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/20/gold-markets-poised-for-sixth-session-of-losses-as-dollar-firms.html
Current Futures: Mixed
https://finviz.com/futures.ashx

The last couple days I think PCI has crossed to the premium side, per M* graph, while PDI has an alltime high premium of 10% and PTY has remained near its alltime premium high >17%, which seems astounding. So while they are not comparable in many respects PCI looked like a better bet.
I wonder what its future holds, as it has outperformed (say) FAGIX just amazingly the last 5.5y over about any interval within you choose.
But note also the smart fundalarm's post of last fall:
CEF wrapper is dependent on VIX. As volatility is subdued, CEFs trade on fundamentals (based on NAV performance) and some investor sentiment (discount/premia). With quiet VIX and outstanding NAV performance, pimco (and other) CEFs attracted more and more new investor money. When VIX spikes, the fundamentals (NAV) become less relevant, and investor psychology dominates trading and discounts widen.

@davidmoran,
larryB beat me to it. Vanguard Prime money market offers 2.05% yield. Ultra-low ER allows for higher yield.
Last time I checked PCI the discount was less than 1% - not so attractive. As I recalled from Sam Lee who was a Morningstar analyst, he recommended to buy PCI only the discount is in double digits since the CEF is 40% leveraged. Any loss will magnify the leverage.

@Crash,
We just had a nonmassive, but large enough, angry wave, largely racially driven.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/19/opinion/voting-welfare-racism-republicans.html
Now what?

Yup: "This belief that the federal government is more willing to help blacks and Latinos than whites fuels the white threat and resentment that boosted support for Donald Trump in 2016."
"Americans believe that the poor are lazy; Europeans believe the poor are unfortunate,” report Alesina and Glaeser. (Time to buy my ticket and move to the EU? I could do it tomorrow. I'm an EU citizen!)
.................................................................
And: in lovely, Kentucky (as elsewhere, deeper in the south) there are a ton of so-called evangelical "Christians" for whom Republican politics is their true religion, while they engage in their church-hobby on Sundays. Their gospel is self-righteous selfishness, wrapped in the flag. (No, I mean the old Confederate slave-ocracy flag.)
Anyhow, thanks for posting that, @davidmoran.

@Crash,
We just had a nonmassive, but large enough, angry wave, largely racially driven.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/19/opinion/voting-welfare-racism-republicans.html
Now what?

I’ve reduced my stock allocations from about 60% to 50% over the past month, primarily due to political concerns such as the trade war and immigration crackdown. My view is that these issues will cause more inflation, leading to even more interest rate increases. I’ve also changed my fixed income allocation, shifting a higher percentage from traditional bond funds to assets that hopefully will hold up better to inflation and rates increases— such as ultrashort bond funds, floaters, CDs and stable value in 401K.

Thanks, @circa33. But, yes--- I'm angry, too. This country is overdue for a massive, angry wave. Truthfully, one of the things that bothers me the most (and not just right now, facing what we are facing) is the way so many are determined to be NICE and KIND, when injustice and corruption cry out, demanding that good people everywhere rise up to confront it. ( Jeremiah 6:14: "They dress the wound of my people as though it were not serious. 'Peace, peace,' they say, when there is no peace.")
.....And if avoiding 4-letter words is more important than addressing serious ethical issues, then priorities are upside-down.