Hi @hank and others,
In reviewing the income area of my portfolio which consists of two sleeves one a fixed income sleeve and the other a hybird income sleeve with a combined area total of 15 funds I do not have a single fund that has not had positive returns so far this year. And, the area as a whole is up so far this year by 1.2% as of this evenings market close.
Can it go the other way? You can better believe it can and most likely will if the flood of recent bond money starts to flow. However, with the 10 year now yielding about 2.5% perhaps it might bring more "flood" money in as I am thinking bonds became oversold with investors selling bonds and moving money to stocks during the recent stock market bull run. And, we are now seeing investors rebalance portfolios selling off some stocks (taking profit) and now buying bonds to rebalance portfolios.
Take care ... and, have a good evening.
Skeet

Looks good on a tablet device. I'm seeing almost 2.5% on the 10 year on cnbc today. If that's accurate, suspect those investors will be racing back out again.

Add:
LQD (corp. bonds) closed down today, Jan. 19 (Thursday) -.34%.
-1% for the last two trading days......very smelly, IMHO. Perhaps most equity sectors are going to catch fire after Jan. 20. Magic eight ball indicator will not function at this house.
Note: only 5 digit mutual fund tickers now highlight here, thus I named LQD above for those not familiar with this symbol.

I gave up on FAIRX, but FAIRX and FAAFX may finally see some earnings / profits come their way:
Interview:
former-fannie-mae-cfo-trumps-treasury-pick-can-get-fannie-out-of-government-control-reasonably-fast

@David

I get a sense that Mr. Deshpande will have a substantial investment in the fund and in the firm; often founders underwrite these start-ups to the tunes of hundreds of thousands to millions. I also had a sense that some of his net worth might have been locked-up at First Eagle, but my recollection could be faulty. Firms often have exit clauses that don't let the principals simply walk away with tens of millions in cash; they get their money in installments.
For whatever nuance that might add,

David, here's what I've learned: The SAI document, which shows Mr. Deshpande's personal stake, was created on the fund's inception date just after the "seed" money was placed in the funds. He now has over 8 figures of his own personal money in the funds. Also, the highest breakpoint you will find on Morningstar or when the SAI gets updated in May is over $1 million, but in fact, he has 8 figures in the funds.
@LLJB Thx for the update.

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/890540/000113542817000035/kopernik-497.txt
DOCUMENT>
497
1
kopernik-497.txt
THE ADVISORS' INNER CIRCLE FUND II (THE "TRUST")
KOPERNIK GLOBAL ALL-CAP FUND (THE "FUND")
SUPPLEMENT DATED JANUARY 19, 2017
TO THE SUMMARY PROSPECTUS AND PROSPECTUS DATED MARCH 1, 2016, AS SUPPLEMENTED
OCTOBER 24, 2016
AND THE STATEMENT OF ADDITIONAL INFORMATION DATED MARCH 1, 2016 (THE "SAI")
THIS SUPPLEMENT PROVIDES NEW AND ADDITIONAL INFORMATION BEYOND THAT CONTAINED
IN THE SUMMARY PROSPECTUS, PROSPECTUS AND SAI, AND SHOULD BE READ IN
CONJUNCTION WITH THE SUMMARY PROSPECTUS, PROSPECTUS AND SAI.
Effective March 31, 2017 (the "Effective Date"), the Fund will be closed to
certain new investments because Kopernik Global Investors, LLC (the "Adviser")
believes that the implementation of the Fund's investment strategy may be
adversely affected if the size of the Fund is not limited.
While any existing shareholder may continue to reinvest Fund dividends and
distributions, other new investments in the Fund may only be made by those
investors within the following categories:
o Direct shareholders of the Fund as of the Effective Date and the date
of the new investment;
o Participants in qualified retirement plans that offer shares of the
Fund as an investment option as of the Effective Date; and
o Trustees and officers of the Trust, employees of the Adviser, and
their immediate family members.
The Fund reserves the right to modify the above criteria, suspend all sales of
new shares or reject any specific purchase order for any reason.
PLEASE RETAIN THIS SUPPLEMENT FOR FUTURE REFERENCE
KGI-SK-004-0100

The immediate below is yesterday, Jan. 18, Wednesday:
Day, Week, One month, Three month and YTD

LQD (Price) -0.66, -0.44, 1.93, -3.15, 0.28

Corporate bonds were one of the better performing bond sectors in the investment grade area for most of 2016. This bond area got the whack from July, 2016 until late November when money started to buy these bonds again.
This bond area, if nothing changes for today (Jan. 19) will go negative for YTD at the market close.
A trend? Watching at this house is all I can state right now.
Oh, the times, they are a chang'in.....Well, yes; always chang'in.
Take care,
Catch

Neither CENTX nor CETAX appears to be available for purchase at E*Trade.

I found CETAX available load waived with $100 minimum both taxable and IRA accounts at E*TRADE.

"Investors are unwinding the big bond selloff since the U.S. election, showering U.S.-based fixed income funds with the most new cash in five months during the latest week, Investment Company Institute data showed on Wednesday. U.S.-based bond funds harvested $9.6 billion in new cash during the week ended Jan. 11, the most since early August, according to the trade group."
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-mutualfunds-ici-idUSKBN1522MB

Indeed. He left at year's end but, on his Linked In page, still lists himself as responsible for 40% of the TAVFX fund's assets.
Ian Lapey worked as Marty Whitman's co-manager then the sole manager for much of 2012. The fund performed brilliantly that year but was hemorrhaging cash (AUM was down despite a 27% return) and, at the start of 2013, added three co-managers. Since then they've dropped from $2.6 billion to $1.1 billion in AUM and two of the three co-managers have departed.
Not sure whether it's a reflection fund size or different staffing preferences between the Whitman/Lapey and Rewey eras.
David

@DanHardy,
I have been giving this some thought and this might be what you are looking for ... It usually has a section on bonds.
Check the link to see ... Scroll down to the section on bonds. And, the professor breaks down the model portfolios to both an equity side and a bond side along with writting a blurb about both.
http://funds-newsletter.com/jan17-newsletter/jan17-new.htm
I've been trolling through some of my finds and here is another link of interest ...
http://www.seninvest.com/article13.htm
Hope this helps.

Rondure’s products will be more complementary than competitive with our existing products. I would describe Rondure’s investment focus as more “core” as compared to Grandeur Peak’s “growth” bent, and Rondure will not impact our liquidity constrained products as the new firm will focus on companies above $1.5 billion market‐cap.
www.grandeurpeakglobal.com/documents/grandeur-peak-global-opportunities-fund-sar-20161031.pdf Page 9

This sub-asset class is one to consider as an add-on to an existing EM position. Understand it probably carries more volatility and risk than any other. And the generally very high expenses should be considered in the risk/cost/reward evaluation. Then consider if you are getting real active management. HSBC's fund, for example, has expenses of 2.2% but only an 8% turnover. Driehaus has higher expenses with 19% turnover. Turnover does not necessarily relate to performance here, but you have to wonder what some of these funds are doing that results in such high expenses. A lot has to do with asset size. Morgan Stanley, Harding, and Wasatch have some size (still much less than $1 billion), but most are pretty small. And if you pick a fund that has boots on the ground to verify the companies it owns, that is bound to have an impact of fees. Personally, I am not sure I would want to own a fund that does not verify aspects of a company it owns. And the management better have a lot of their own dollars in the fund they own, or I would cross them off the list. In the end, I am not sure this sub-asset class warrants much attention, unless the investor has money they can afford to lose or unless they have really good market timing in this area.

@hank
Perhaps you are recalling the LearnBonds web site.
http://learnbonds.com/
The handle of BondInvestor was at this board for several months, until about August of 2013. He, from my recall is the or a primary owner/writer of the site.
But, this date period is prior to DanHardy being here. @DanHardy , how far back do you recall this newsletter link?

I now believe that it is nuts to use active equity funds in taxable accounts . SInce 2014 my taxes have been destroyed by unwanted distributions. Obviously carry over losses from 2008-2009 were exhausted in that year and following /

Ran into this .Good chart of nearly every domestic index's performance in time frames dating to the past five years.
So, is there magic in the post-election sprinkling of Trump Fairy Dust? I am encouraged by many of the ideas put forth, especially on tax reform as a way to unleash America's potential (less excited about other ideas). Consumer sentiment and small business confidence rose sharply following the election, suggesting the positive feelings or animal spirits are on the rise. That said, experience tells us that the political sausage grinder has a way of neutering the most well-intentioned plans, and that the economy continues to struggle to achieve "escape velocity,” constrained by low productivity and labor force growth. Still, pull up a chair and grab some popcorn: I expect an exciting show!
https://www.ridgeworth.com/articles/market-perspective-december-31-2016
Here's a longer perspective on the Trump Effect
SEIX BOUTIQUE PERSPECTIVE (CAN TRUMP MAKE BONDS GREAT AGAIN?)
December 5, 2016 However, the structural issues will continue to serve as headwinds to growth as they have for the duration of this recovery and lower for longer remains our base case as these deflationary forces remain firmly entrenched and secular in nature. More time and very difficult decisions are required to remedy these issues and politicians have been unwilling to tackle them thus far. As history has instructed, the political class typically fails to act absent a real crisis. Perhaps this is another political tendency the President-elect can approach from the non-traditional perspective of an outsider elected by Main Street. Hope springs eternal…
https://www.ridgeworth.com/articles/can-trump-make-bonds-great-again

Investment portfolio science is always evolving. There is a big push towards the low fee, indexing narrative as it is a huge profit center and the financial industry flocks to where the sales $ exist.
The 21st century has afforded the investor and portfolio researcher alike, the benefit of the use of ETFs that focus on underlying academically based CAPM "factors" and other attributes. Implementing these products within a tactical framework can provide much more flexibility in the goal towards asset accumulation https://docs.google.com/document/d/14OG8dGZolcXg7WGy_vGFN1dTJq1TccfgKwK7x27HAAA/edit?usp=sharing.
The additional innovation of "motif" investing allows users and investors to build managed portfolios that other retail investors can track and invest in; this without the staffing, SEC approval, advertising, legal, etc. involved with the launch of funds and maintenance of running a "brick and mortar" fund enterprise.

@msf: Cute! I'm gonna steal that one.

Thanks Ted. A good sign that you're doing better. Good post.
I think what is often overlooked in discussions about international markets (like a recent thread) is the dollar. Its strength is one reason those markets have lagged for several years. Of course, currency trends can persist for years or decades. No one really knows. Eventually, they do reverse. Today the trend reversed (probably temporarily) and the dollar fell hard. Will be interesting to see what impact, if any, that has on international funds today. Many international stock and bond funds hedge against dollar flux and many international stock funds also use something called "Fair Value Pricing" (FVP) - some more than others. Both practices would tend to mitigate any big gains in international funds on any given day. (FVP): https://advisors.vanguard.com/iwe/pdf/FAFVP.pdf
As regulars know, I'm pretty conservative at 70+. I'm also 80+% buy and hold (sometimes called "buy and die"). But it's fun to play around a little around the edges. In December I sold my remaining shares in PRNEX (heavy on refiners). It jumped 25% in 2016 as oil began the year around $30 and reached over $55 in late December - a near doubling in less than 12 months. I suspect it has further to go, but didn't want to risk the year's gains. Used the $$ (about 2.5% of holdings) to boost cash a bit and also to buy my first ever index fund, PIEQX, which invests in developed overseas markets (Europe, Japan, Australia, South Korea, etc.). A month is way too short a period to draw conclusions, but the new fund has been my best performer this year. One reason I chose an index international fund (over a managed) is my assumption (could be wrong here) that T Rowe isn't using dollar hedging or FVP on this one. So the currency play should be near 100% - for better or worse.
Good luck folks. Always enjoy hearing how others invest and see things.

FYI: Below is a look at the recent performance of various asset classes using key ETFs that we track on a daily basis. For each ETF, we show its performance year-to-date, since the Fed hiked rates on December 14th, and since the close on Election Day 2016 (11/8/16).
Most US equity ETFs (left side of matrix) are up between 0-2% so far year-to-date, but the Nasdaq 100 (QQQ) has been a standout to the upside with a 2017 gain of 3.95%. The Dow 30 (DIA) has lagged with a gain of just 0.60%. Looking at sectors, Consumer Discretionary (XLY) and Telecom (IYZ) are up the most YTD, while Energy (XLE) and Consumer Staples (XLP) are down the most.
Since the Fed hiked rates in mid-December, the Energy sector is the only area of the US market that has felt any kind of pain (-2.48%), while Consumer Staples is down less than 1%. Since the election, the Financial (XLF) and Telecom (IYZ) sectors are the only ones up more than 10%.
Outside of the US, many countries have already posted nice gains in 2017. Brazil (EWZ) is up 7.8% YTD after posting a big gain in 2016 as well. Hong Kong (EWH) and Australia (EWA) are both up more than 5%, while Canada (EWC), China (ASHR), India (PIN), and Japan (EWJ) are all up more than 3%. Mexico (EWW) is the only country on our matrix that is down year-to-date, and that follows a very weak Q4 as well.
Looking at commodities, gold (GLD) and silver (SLV) have both gotten off to good starts to 2017, while oil (USO) and natural gas (UNG) are in the red. Treasury ETFs are up both YTD and since the Fed hiked rates, but they’re all still down since the election.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.bespokepremium.com/think-big-blog/recent-asset-class-performance-international-markets-bounce/