PIMCO's asset losses (and Mr. Gross's tantrums) have been much in the news, but Morningstar's recent fund flows report shows a fascinating collection of firms whose investors have been hitting the exits over the past twelve months:

• PIMCO, down $79 billion to $506 billion (owie)
  
• Columbia, down $11B to $167B
  
• Janus, down $11B to $102B
  
• American Funds, down $10B to $1.1 trillion
  
• Fidelity, down $6B to $1.2 trillion (which does look a lot like a rounding error)
  
• Hartford, down $6B to $97B
  
• Voya (nee ING), down $6B to $94B
  
• Thornburg, down $4B to $61B
  
• DWS, down $3B to $49B
  

The big gainers: Vanguard, DFA, JPMorgan, and Goldman Sachs are all up by more than $20 billion.
David

I've been toying for a while with a story on Morningstar's venerable "buy the unloved" strategy. It starts with the simple premise that most people, quite reliably, do exactly the opposite of what's in their best interest. In its first manifestation, the strategy was to buy the three sectors that saw the greatest outflows (measured by change in percentage of assets at year's end) and hold them for 3-5 years while selling the most popular sectors. I liked it, then Morningstar stopped publishing it. When they resumed, the strategy had a far more conservative take: buy the three sectors that saw the greatest outflows measured in total dollar volume and hold them, while selling the most popular sectors.
Oh, by the way, they haven't traditionally allowed bond funds to play. They track bond flows but, in a private exchange, Mr. Kinnel allowed that "Generally they are too dull to provide much of a signal."
The problem with, and perhaps strength of, the newer version is that it means that you'll mostly be limited to play with your core sectors rather than volatile smaller ones. By way of example, large cap blend holds about $1.6 trillion - a 1% outflow there ($16 billion) would be an amount greater than the total assets in any of the 50 smallest fund categories. Large cap growth at $1.2 trillion is close behind.
Morningstar has taken, very quietly, to publishing fund flow reports each month. Here's the August report, for what interest it holds.
Who's unloved? Over the past 12 months:
intermediate term bonds - down $57 billion but up $7 billion YTD
large cap growth - down $35B
intermediate government - down $23B over the past 12 months
TIPs - down $22B
National munis - down $13B
commodities - down $11B
EM bonds - down $8B
Who's really unloved? Though Morningstar doesn't do the calculations, it appears that some of the emerging markets (China and India in particular) and currency funds have seen 10-25% of their assets disappear over the past year.
There's a lot of poke through. Hope you enjoy.
David

Hi Guys,
Here is a quote from Gerd Gigerenzer's book “Risk Savvy”: “People aren't stupid. The problem is that our educational system has an amazing blind spot concerning risk literacy. We teach our children the mathematics of certainty -- geometry and trigonometry -- but not the mathematics of uncertainty, statistical thinking.”
This quote appears in a recent article by the Motley Fool’s Morgan Housel titled “How to Scare Yourself Stupid”. It is an excellent short piece. The work addresses risk assessment and puts it in a proper context. Please access it at:
http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/08/05/how-to-scare-yourself-stupid.aspx?source=iaasitlnk0000003
The article correctly identifies that the problem is tightly coupled to our statistical blindness, our statistical illiteracy. Based on my long running MFO post record, you all recognize that understanding and acting on a statistical/probability basis is a primary theme on my posts. So Morgan Housel and I at least share this one common agreement.
In the 1950s through the 1980s I managed a stock portfolio that ranged from 15 to about 30 holdings. Keeping track of this number of holdings, when augmented by perhaps 30 candidate alternatives, was just an overwhelming workload. In the 1990s I began a switch to actively managed mutual funds, 100% actively managed funds. Then I read John Bogle’s “Common Sense on Mutual Funds” followed almost immediately by Burton Malkiel’s “A Random Walk Down Wall Street”.
These classic books are statistically loaded documents. They are eye-openers in terms of an overarching investment philosophy. My current portfolio still has a 50/50 mix of active and passive mutual fund products. By nature, I test the waters slowly and incrementally. I have finally decided to mostly join the passive investor camp.
The statistics are substantial and persuasive, but I still retain some measure of a flickering internal fire for active funds. Some do just fine over extended timeframes regardless of unattractive overall odds.
Please enjoy the Linked article.
Best Regards.

Good bond funds in my mind are there for good managers to navigate the market better than I could. Over the last 5-7 years I identified the best managers for me. So I own MWTRX, PIMIX, TGEIX, and TGBAX. That's where my bond money is.

rjb112, the Y axis represents the assets in billions, so your fund looks like it has kept the AUM under $500M.
Kevin

Couldn't read the article. It says not available. But I'm sitting here at about 90% in cash for the last couple weeks, all because I'm in the middle of a 401k to IRA roll-over. Perfect time for me if the market decides to correct. I've been conservative at about 40-50% equities the last couple years.
I have my new fund portfolio set up on paper and I plan to invest again with an aim of 50-60% equities by October with a tilt towards balance/allocation fund managers and large caps. I'll sprinkle in maybe end-of- (bull market) cycle sectors like technology and energy for alpha.

you have to option to edit your own posts - just start a practice post and type ignore in the title in the off-topic section.
C is for computer code you don't want formatted of fixed space tabs.

<?php
echo "this is a test";
or
col1  col2 col3
1        2      3

second red arrow is image thread
click on it and post an http link to your image

the third button above with red arrow is the url button - to add urls
hightlight the text as in "this is a test link pointing to your post"
below is test link pointing to your post
this is a test link pointing to your post
the fourth button is a quote

the fourth button is a block quote

>

Check out fundmojo.com. Not perfect, but not bad for a free web site.
I've attached a link for PTTRX.
http://www.fundmojo.com/mutualfund/fund_netasset_report/mutualfund/PTTRX

Check out fundmojo.com. Not perfect, but not bad for a free web site.
I've attached a link for PTTRX.
http://www.fundmojo.com/mutualfund/fund_netasset_report/mutualfund/PTTRX

MOZART325, that's not a bad website at all. Glad you pointed that out. Has some interesting information. I'll be visiting that website more often.
AUM data was very good but limited to about one year.

Paul, in the past I've used the Wellstrade site for this information:
Enter Symbol
Select "Get Mutual Fund Profile"
Total Net Assets By Year
Kevin

Kevin, for the fund I looked up, here's what I saw under Total Net Assets By Year

I wasn't able to tell what the actual AUM were. Just a general idea whether they were increasing or decreasing.
This was with Internet Explorer. Maybe with Chrome or Firefox you see something different.
Perhaps I missed a link that you saw?

David-
I think the OP wanted historical assets under management, not historical prices.
George..

Yes, that's certainly what I'm interested in, historical AUM.
I've known about the Yahoo Finance historical prices for quite some time.

Can someone please post a brief tutorial on how to use the below three buttons (red arrows) when posting? [Code; Image; URL buttons]
I have seen a couple of message boards that have "practice threads." On the practice threads, posters can practice using some of the tools, such as the three buttons above, attaching graphic images like the one I'm about to attach, etc. Might be good to have a practice thread at MFO.

Also, today I saw a post where the following words (in quotations) were a clickable link, "Japan, monetary policy and recession?" I've posted words as clickable links on another message board using HTML code. I have a feeling that the C button above can do that, but don't want to "practice" and mess up a post. Is that done by using standard HTML code, or the C button?
thanks

A bit more conservative this year: 50% stock (20% EM), 30% bond, 20% cash.

Jlev,
Vanguard does have performance-based fees for its active funds, but these adjustments are usually relatively small in either direction so that Vanguard still has the edge over many ETFs. Also, it is in most cases a win-win situations because the fees only go up if a fund is beating its benchmark, which is usually the benchmarks the ETFs are tracking--so either the fund has a performance advantage if fees are higher or a fee advantage if performance is lower. The only way investors would lose out in such a situation would be to buy the active fund aftera hot streak when fees are higher and then sell too soon as performance cools, thus paying the higher fee and missing the performance edge. With these funds it makes sense to buy and hold or if you're more of a risk taker to buy after the funds lag and get the lowest fees, hoping the fund will bounce back.
I don't have an opinion really on the law suit yet as I haven't read the brief. But in my experience law suits against fund companies even when they have merit rarely go anywhere. The industry has very good, powerful lawyers. It also seems doubtful that that the argyment that charging consumers less for management services is a form of tax evasion will hold up in court in a lengthy appeal process. Where Vanguard does seem more vulnerable is in the $1.5 billion cash reserve, which could appear as a slush fund to the right judge. Although I haven't read the brief, I think it's high time Vanguard's bonus system for its executives be examined more closely as evidence that the firm really isn's a "non-profit" as it often claims. But that is another story....

Interesting interview.
He said something that caught me off guard, at the 8 minute mark.
Something to the effect that since 10 year Treasury bonds have a yield of 2.5%, that is equivalent to a stock with a P/E ratio of 37.5, and he said Apple has a P/E of only 14 and the S&P 500 has a P/E of about 16.5 in comparison, so bonds are very expensive.
Do you buy into that line of reasoning that bonds yielding about 2.5% are equivalent to stocks with P/Es of 37.5, and therefore bonds are very expensive?
Not sure where he got that 37.5 P/E figure.
Any idea?
2.5 x 37.5 = 93.75, so that's not it.
Do you ever equate the 10-year Treasury yield to a given P/E?
I just viewed that segment a couple of more times, and am now convinced that he just made a mistake on his math. He said 37.5 P/E, but should have calculated it to be a P/E of 40. But I'm not sure I buy into this idea that a 10-year Treasury yield equates to a P/E of 40 in a stock.
Is that a logical way to look at it?
I know people will look at the inverse of the P/E: the E/P is the earnings yield, and people compare that to a bond. So if a stock has a P/E of 20, it's earnings yield is 5, and they then compare that to the yield on bonds

Causeway International Small Cap Fund:
http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1156906/000119312514295671/d769174d485apos.htm
Causeway International Opportunities Fund:
http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1156906/000119312514295634/d769169d485apos.htm

Book link:
The House that Bogle Built
@LewisBraham It has been my understanding that some number of the Vanguard actively managed funds have ER's that depend on performance, does that affect these calculations? do these not apply to these sector funds? or if it does do the ER's always remain below comparable ETF's? Also, any thoughts on their recent law suit?

My Portfolio Is 55% Stocks - 33% Bonds - 12% Cash

As a sidebar, I have a question for you. Is your Mrdarcy moniker a reference to the Mr. Darcy character in Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” book? If so, do you see yourself in the dual roles that characterized Mr. Darcy’s overarching behavior, initially a charming cad and later a romantic hero, on this panel? Yours is a puzzling name choice for these MFO discussions. Please respond.

I'm a little unclear if this is an honest question or backhanded. I'll assume the former.
There is nothing particularly insidious or deep, it just happens to be my own name (hence the different spelling). Any romanticism or feigned arrogance is entirely a joke (well, sometimes), as is the ridiculous picture. I really don't even like Austin, though Thug Notes has a pretty funny take:

Andy,
JW was corrected. Fairholme was down 0.1% last week while most of high yield bond funds were down 1.5 - 2.0%.
Eaton Vance Bond fund was down 2.0%, but it also hold higher stock allocation that were also down even more. Dan Fuss's Loomis Sayles bond fared much better with only 1% loss. Also notice that the cash position has been increasing over the last 3 months.

I plan to stay diversified but I have gone conservative this year going from 80/20 stocks and fixed income to 65/35 at the moment. If the situation gets dire I may shift more to fixed.