Melrose Credit Union, Massachusetts. 2.25% rate, 2.27% yield. Still pathetically low. But insured, guaranteed. Lock your money up for 5 years and you're losing purchasing power, this way.
...I cannot recommend it, but if you have a minimum of $25,000 and willing to go 10 years out, you can get 3.8% here.
http://www.israelbonds.com/invest/investments-current-rates.aspx

PETDX is leveraged real estate fund using treasuries and mortgage backed securities. Below is a MarketWatch perfomance table.
Anyone have any experience with this fund?
Symbol Fund Name 1 Wk 13 Wk YTD 1 Yr 3 Yr 5 Yr 10 Yr
PETDX PIMCO:RE Rl Rtn;D -0.67% 10.13% 23.55% 8.84% 15.43% 30.40 12.87%
prinx

Hmm. What's the appeal --- supposedly reduced risk? Its 08-09 slump is much worse than, say, PKW, VOO, presumably SCHD, PRBLX, and GABEX. And its $10k gain over the last 3-4-5y is like only a third to a half of theirs! Not even taking taxes on the yield into account. So what's your thinking here?

Thanks for the Bryan questions. I'd been curious about his decision to leave Waddell & Reed (was bloat an issue?), his take on HY valuations (including stuff in the portfolio other than HY bonds) and how he sees himself as distinctive. Had not thought to ask about the research team issue.
The Litman Gregory gathering is crowded, but I can certainly raise the e.r. question and can angle to get to the ARBFX performance slump.
I'll try, as before, to post highlights in the evening. I might, with Chip's help, be able to get stuff out during lulls throughout the day - I often have 15 minutes free there but almost never have 20.
David

Hi, guys.
The nice folks at the Leuthold Group share a copy of Perception for the Professional, their research publication for paying clients, with me each month. About 60 pages of data analyses and reports. Jun Zhu this month wrote "Dividend Paying Strategies -- Which is Best?" and the findings are interesting.
Zhu notes that dividend-oriented strategies have been exceedingly popular, though many now fret that those stocks have been badly bid up. There's also a fear that dividend paying stocks lag when interest rates are rising. That turns out to be true, but not an investable insight: rate rising cycles tend to be triggered with little warning and last an average of nine months.
Even allowing for a lag during the 20% of months in which rates have risen, the strategy works well over time. Zhu writes "In the falling rate and neutral months, dividend paying stocks outperformed non-dividend paying stocks by a large margin. Regardless of interest rate changes, from 1927 to 2013, dividend paying stocks were the winner."
Zhu argues that there are at least four distinct dividend oriented (or dividend-oriented? Drmoran notes that I over-hyphenate. Overhyphenate? Over hyphenate?) strategies that manifest themselves in funds and ETFs. They are:
1. broad focus on dividend-paying stocks, which typically imposes simple size and liquidity requirements, then invests in dividend paying stocks.
2. high dividend-yield, which targets the highest-yielding stocks.
3. dividend growth, which requires consistent increases in payouts over 5-10 years.
4. quality dividends, which adds screens for the quality of the firm's financial strength and management. Those might include debt load, return on equity, earnings stability and dividend coverage ratios.
Leuthold tested those strategies by looking at the performance of dividend oriented ETFs from 1989 - 2014. They admit that few of the ETFs represent pure instances on one strategy of another, but most are strongly aligned with one of them.
They found (1) the dividend strategies as a group substantially outperformed the S&P500 (12.2% annually versus 9.0%) with lower volatility (4.2% S.D. versus 4.3%), (2) that "companies which have raised dividends for 10 consecutive years are actualy the worst performers" and (3) the quality dividend strategy blew away the competition on returns without incurring heightened volatility.
Quality dividend ETFs returned 14% annually with 4.1% S.D. The other three strategies clustered between 10.9% - 12.2% returns with S.D.s of 4.0 - 4.5%.
Charles might be the one to ponder about the mutual fund implications of the research, since fund managers add the overlap of relative value and absolute value orientations. As I think about the funds we've profiled, Guinness Atkinson Inflation Managed Dividend (GAINX) strikes me as a quality dividend / relative value bunch while Beck, Mack and Oliver Partners (BMPEX) would qualify as quality dividend / absolute value.
Leuthold's list of "quality" ETFs includes:
Schwab US Dividend Equity (SCHD)
iShares High Dividend Equity (HDV)
FlexShares Quality Dividend Index (QDF)
First Trust Value Line Dividend (FVD)
WisdomTree US Dividend Growth (DGRW)
FlexShares Quality Dividend Dynamic Index (QDYN, with the note this is a higher beta product)
FlexShares Quality Dividend Defensive Index (QDEF, lower beta).
For what interest it holds,
David

FYI: As we ride off into the sunset, I don't know how many times I have linked this quote from John Bogle,"Why look for a needle in the haystack when you can buy the whole haystack?"
Regards,
Ted
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-best-investment-advice-ever-2014-06-11/print?guid=66F0EAC8-0CE4-48BF-AC80-BA8F582B86C5

More From Guggenheim
Capital flows have come as a result of low yields in Europe, Japan and elsewhere.
In Europe, the risk is that the euro will depreciate. That makes buying U.S. Treasury bonds and other U.S. assets attractive because the local currency could depreciate and interest rates are so significantly higher in the United States than in Europe. On June 6 in Germany, 10-year government bunds traded at 1.35 percent, compared with 10-year U.S. Treasuries at 2.58 percent, so, German investors seeking yield certainly want to look at the United States.
For Japanese investors it is a similar picture — U.S. Treasuries at 2.58 percent look cheap compared with 10-year Japanese government bonds yielding 60 basis points. And legislation in Japan now allows larger allocations overseas by pension funds.
Investment Implications
With no pending crisis expected thanks to central bank liquidity and a bias among Fed policymakers to keep interest rates low, the recent bull market for credit spreads is alive and well, supported by surging capital inflows, which have also helped U.S. stocks hit fresh highs.
http://guggenheimpartners.com/perspectives/media/central-banks-chart-a-course-for-overheating?utm_source=SilverpopMailing&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Market Perspectives - June 20

M*'s Samuel Lee looked at 31 short-term bond ETFs and compared them with some bank CD rates, concluding that bank CDs are better right now. He notes that Synchrony Bank and Barclays offer 5-year CDs yielding 2.25%. "There is no better deal out there in fixed income," he says.

This, another offering in M*'s small series on the active share metric, looks at the spread of active share for 20 large-cap foreign funds (by assets). Artisan ARTKX tops the list, with an active share of 94.3. FILFX, Strategic Advisers, is in 20th place, with an active share of 65.7. This is a large spread.
Although most funds on the list (15 of 20) with high active share are 4-star or 5-star funds, high active share funds are not necessarily "good" funds to own, Adam Zoll, the article's author, points to TGVAX, with an active share rating of 83.4, yet is a 2-star fund.
Discuss.

Author's thesis: Correlations among different sectors of the market have been falling, which should produce a better environment for stock-pickers.

In May, the average correlation of the 10 S&P 500 large-cap sectors to the index itself was just 70.6%, the second-lowest level since October 2009, according to Mr. Colas’s calculations. That’s down from 79% in the prior month, 85% three months ago and the 95% levels that consistently occurred during the middle of 2011, when Europe’s debt crisis and U.S. political turmoil roiled markets.

FYI:
Regards,
Ted
http://news.morningstar.com/articlenet/article.aspx?id=650510

FYI:
Regards,
Ted
http://news.morningstar.com/articlenet/article.aspx?id=650538

Thanks David. Can you find a way to ask Litman Gregory if they would please lower the expense ratio of Litman Gregory Master Alt Strats Inv MASNX? The expense ratio is 1.91% (ouch). Yes, I know that category tends to have high expense ratios, but they could lower it......and their ER is even "above average" in their category, per M*. I do like their multi-manager concept, and choosing 'Masters'.
For the Arbitrage Fund crew.....don't know how you would ask this....but the fund seems to be 'dead in the water' with respect to performance. Not a happy shareholder. Their 2013 total return: 0.85%. 2012 return: 0.27%. No complaints about 2011. 2010: 1.44%. Not focusing on the category, but on an absolute return basis, can't they do better?

......Back to the original thread: I guess I own enough Jardine Matheson!!!
Top holding in MAFSX, as previously noted. (7.08% of the fund's holdings.) ALSO, just saw it is the top holding in MACSX. (3.57% of the fund's AUM.)

Hi David, thanks for asking. Maybe ask Bryan Krug what his strategy for the near future of ARTFX is, given that the HY spread continues to sink (~3.5) toward the record low shown in FRED data (~2.5). Best, AJ

Few here have complemented our master Linkster more than I on the quality of some of his links over the years. He finds some real gems and, like most, I greatly appreciate his service to the board. However, there's always room for more selectivity in the postings - and I don't think any one of us - no matter how brilliant or well intended - has a right to dominate the postings day after day.
Like most, my time is limited. I'll pull-up the board half dozen times a day to see what's new. When 15+ out of the first 20 threads are all from the same poster and all linked articles it's overwhelming. I generally turn away. That's unfortunate because there may be a fresh original comment in there somewhere from Scott or Crash or OJ or MJG that's been already rapidly dispatched to page 2 or 3 on my tablet computer. It's a bit like looking for that single can of creamed corn in a cupboard stuffed with string beans. (You know it's in there somewhere:-)
Self imposed discipline is always best. But structure could be created I suppose that would limit the number of threads any one individual can create in a single day to encourage more participation by a broader array of posters. Do many of us seriously feel a need to initiate more than a dozen individual threads in a day? Hopefully, others will come up with better ideas. That's just one.
Regarding civility, that's not normally too much of a problem to my way of thinking. Possibly I'm missing something here. But, yes, there have been some egregious cases of bullying in the past and - with perfect 20/20 hindsight - those mean spirited comments should have been deleted. Everyone, including the perpetrator, would I think have respected such a decision.
Thanks David for your interest in our rumblings and for all you do for our community. I'm ever grateful. I'll try to step aside and avoid any further comment on this. Hopefully many others will chime in in coming days. And, thanks also to Old Joe for bringing these issues to the front. Regards

Hi, guys.
I'm prepping now for the Morningstar conference; I wanted to give you a heads up and to extend an invitation. I've got a series of manager interviews scheduled, in addition to the regular panel presentations. I thought I'd sketch out the confirmed interviews and ask if folks had questions they'd like me to raise with any of these folks.
Wednesday is mostly panel presentations but we're meeting with Steve Owens, one of Touchstone's managing directors, at 5:00 to talk about their fund lineup and philosophy.
Thursday is long.
7:00 a.m. Breakfast panel with Litman Gregory. Talks by guys from Northern Cross (the late Hakan Castegren's firm, which does and Harbor International) and Water Island (the Arbitrage Fund crew). Some prospect for a question or two there.
8:45 Zac Wydra of Beck, Mack & Oliver Partners (BMPEX)
2:30 Bryan Krug of Artisan High Income, formerly of Ivy High Income (WHIAX). WHIAX is bloated but really solid; Krug substantially outran the comparable funds from Fidelity, T. Rowe and Vanguard during his tenure.
3:30 Josh Alderman, a managing director at Diamond Hill, who wants to do the "firm philosophy" thing.
5:30 Venkatesh Reddy and Kara Paik of Zeo Strategic Income (ZEOIX), folks who describe their philosophy as “short duration meets Benjamin Graham – we invest in short-duration corporate debt, carefully selecting each security in our portfolio of approximately 25 holdings."
Unscheduled but likely is an informal conversation with one of the Columbia Acorn folks (he remembers me from the days that he was a high school debater) and, with luck, a interview with the Whitebox folks to discuss Tactical Income.
If there are questions you'd like me to raise with any of them, let me know and I'll poke on your behalf.
As ever,
David

The "spliced index" seems to mean that Vanguard has changed index providers over time and they've attempted to aggregate the returns of the combined indexes (one index's return in 2005 is married to the next index's return in 2006 ...).
Here's the official word:
**Russell 2000 Index through May 16, 2003; MSCI US Small Cap 1750 Index through January 30, 2013; CRSP US Small Cap Index thereafter.
The index's homepage describes it as covering the bottom 2 - 15% of the investable universe with an average cap in the $1.4 - 1.9 billion range. The fund sits at about $2.7 billion, essentially average for a small-blend fund.
For what interest that holds,
David

It also has 20.55% in Europe and 8% in the Americas. Seems to be new territory for Matthews.
Yum's KFC and Pizza Hut have a large presence in Asia and still growing. That is still a big chunk of total assets.

4.38% of fund is in Yum! Brands. That not Asia--- though surely, there are a bazillion fast-food joints in Asia that come under the Yum! bumbershoot.
I dumped MJFOX for this one: MAFSX. Since the change-over, it's up exactly 2.6% for me. No great shakes. Overall, with respect to the switch, I'm still down from my original amount by -2.95%.