FYI: Los Angeles-based firm added $10 billion in first quarter.
Total Return Fund increased to $57.6 billion on mortgage bet.
DoubleLine Capital, the Los Angeles-based investment firm headed by Jeffrey Gundlach, increased assets under management to $95 billion at the end of March, according to an e-mail from company analyst Loren Fleckenstein, $10 billion more than the firm reported Dec. 31.
The flagship DoubleLine Total Return Bond Fund, which invests primarily in mortgage-backed securities, climbed to $57.6 billion in assets, and has returned 1.75 percent so far in 2016, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Regards,
Ted
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-04-01/gundlach-s-doubleline-capital-grew-to-95-billion-in-march

FYI: Another quarter, another lesson in long-term investing.
Economic uncertainty around the world and a brutal start to the year for stocks helped send the price of gold surging to its best quarter in 30 years. But an analysis of 10 common investments by the Associated Press shows that regular investors who put a steady amount of money every month into an account like a 401(k) would have been far better off in stocks or bonds.
Regards,
Ted
http://www.bigstory.ap.org/article/9e6749ab7e694bf3b95cb56be104cbe4/investor-derby-gold-won-first-quarter-stocks-win-long-term

FYI: It may sound strange, but my wife and I live nowhere and everywhere. We’re Digital Nomads. That means we can make our living from a hammock, as long as we have Wi-Fi and a laptop. We often watch global currency rates and travel to countries where our dollars go the furthest. That’s why we flew to Canada instead of Costa Rica..
Three years ago, Canada’s dollar was valued higher than the U.S. dollar.
By January 2016, it was 30 percent lower. Two weeks ago, I took U.S. dollars and bought a condo in Victoria, B.C. I also bought a Canadian stock market ETF
Regards,
Ted
https://assetbuilder.com/knowledge-center/articles/why-bargain-hunting-investors-should-take-a-look-at-canada

BIV/VBILX/VBIIX also has noticeably more treasury exposure than AGG. It's basically AGG if you restrict in two ways: 1) limit to intermediate term bonds (those with maturities in 5-10 years), and 2) remove securitized bonds (about 1/4 of AGG).
The government and corporate portions increase proportionately, so there is more government bond and more corporate bond exposure. The latter resulting in an increase in credit exposure (relative to the MBS's it is replacing).
However, an MBS will generally yield more than a comparably rated corporate bond. That's because the MBS has extension/prepayment risk (which I view as a variant of interest rate risk). "To quote a Wall Street adage, a mortgage-backed security 'goes up like a two-year bond' when rates fall and 'goes down like a six-year bond' when rates rise." See negative convexity.
So if one swaps MBS for corporate, it is necessary to go down the credit ladder just to maintain yield. To put it another way, just because the credit rating has gone down doesn't mean that the yield has gone up - the rating may have dropped just enough to compensate for the inherently lower-yield of corporates.
The bottom line is that while it is true that there's more credit risk than AGG, without quantifying that difference it isn't clear that this is a factor that's increasing the yield. Even if the credit rating difference is large enough to increase yield, the resulting yield increase isn't as sizeable as the credit difference would seem to make it at first blush.

BIV is not a very credit sensitive fund, but it has noticeably more credit exposure than the Barclays Agg. During the financial crisis the mutual fund lost more than the Agg and fell about as much as DODIX in the Q4 2008. The fund currently has about 39% in Baa bonds v. 26% for the Barclays Agg and has a lower government bond stake.

Maybe we are looking at different websites but *M shows BIV as currently having 57% in AAA rated bonds, 16% with A rating and and 23% in BBB rated bonds. Based on these numbers, the fund does not appear to be credit sensitive overall. The duration is on the high end for an intermediate fund (6.5 years) so I do believe it has more risk on the interest rate side.

My take on his commentary:
SEQUX: Just another reason in the long line of reasons for the need to index. Not a popular opinion for stockbrokers or financial advisors or anybody who makes their living advising people. But these are the same people charging 4% commission for a Certificate of Deposit annuity paying 2.5%. I have previously discussed the value of VBINX or similar.
FPACX: I sold it a month ago. Held it for many many years. My reason is different from Mr. Snowball. IMHO, I believe human nature is such that it is difficult to be the best at a profession that requires so much. Eventually your motivation and drive begins to weaken. Asset size doesn't help matters. The funds commentary alerted me to that possibility.
Money Market: Are we saying that Treasury only Money Markets will not break $1.00 NAV? Is there no option left come October that will not break the buck for a brokerage sweep account?

+1 Well played

How did we come to associate the first day of the fourth month of the year with an opportunity to take advantage of the more gullible among us? The short answer is nobody really knows.
http://www.vox.com/2016/4/1/11340608/april-fools-day-pranks-explained

Hi @hank,
Thank you for the inquiry.
I have my portfolio along with each sleeve and investment area set up in Morning's portfolio manager. With this, it is easy for me to view daily performance along with weekly, monthly, year-to-date and rolling 1, 3, 5 and 10 year performance.
I too, have to wait until the following day to find fund distributions reflected in Morningstar fund reports. In addition, it can take up to three days before the distributions actually show up in my brokerage account.
I hope this information helps.
Old_Skeet

Crude set to lose ytd gains on 1st day of 2nd quarter.
Oil tumbled 4 percent on Friday to open the second quarter, after a Saudi prince reportedly said the kingdom will not freeze production without Iran and other major producers doing so and data showed the global crude glut was likely to grow.
Brent crude fell $1.70, or 4.2 percent, to $39.07 a barrel by 11:29 a.m. ET. It was on track to a similar loss on the week, after ending the first quarter up 6 percent and March 15 percent higher.
U.S. crude fell $1.40 to $36.94 a barrel. It was on track to a 6 percent drop on the week, after a first-quarter gain of 4 percent and March rally of 14 percent.
The dollar's .DXY first rebound in a week after stronger-than-expected U.S. jobs data added pressure on oil,
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-oil-idUSKCN0WX00R
1st Quarter Wrap
The March rebound has made an impact on longer return windows too. For instance, nearly all corners of global markets are now in the black for year-to-date comparisons through the end of 2016’s first quarter....for the moment the rearview mirror is offering a new excuse to think positively.
1

http://www.capitalspectator.com/major-asset-classes-march-2016-performance-review/
Also; @Junkster's munis remain strong
Nuveen Muni High Inc Opp NMZ
NMZ (Price) 1 mo+1.14 ytd+2.85 1yr+8.13 3yr+8.31
http://performance.morningstar.com/funds/cef/total-returns.action?t=NMZ&region=usa&culture=en_US
SPDR Select Sector Fund - Energy Select Sector Stock Chart
Read more: http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/xle/stock-chart#ixzz44bC3QaOM
XLE
61.00 -0.92 (-1.49%)
Real-time: 2:00PM EDT 4/01/2016

With numerous Fed members making statements implying rate rises in the near term need to go up, SAMBX/GIFAX is getting my attention. We had a short window of opportunity to buy CEF's with 10% yields at large discounts during the oil sell off. I bought some and they are up 9% from purchase price.

"It's not just what happened lately".
To repeat my point, what happened lately (if there's a sizeable performance difference) distorts comparisons in all time frames. If it's not just what happened lately, let's throw out the past year (4/1/15 - 3/31/16) and run those figures again (e.g. 5 years 4/1/2010 - 3/31/2015):

Cumulative	BIV	MWTRX
1 year		10.69%	10.54%
3 years		11.25%	11.66%
5 years		13.43%	13.52%

Here's the source: 1 year, 3 year, 5 year
"OP had a specific request, and quite a valid one IMO"
Yes, a "bond fund that may act as a substitute for DODIX, which is a TF fund at Fidelity". BIV has transaction fees at Fidelity that are even higher than those for DODIX.
"You need something like BIV in your portfolio, perhaps now more than ever."
What does something "like" BIV mean, and why do you need something like that now more than ever?
In the context of the OP's request (with treasuries first on the list), I took note that BIV is heavily weighted in Treasuries. So if by "something like BIV" you mean something loaded with treasuries, why not a treasury (or more broadly, a government) bond fund? That would at least give one the ability to tweak allocations (by adding/selling some of the fund, especially in the tax-sheltered account).
Why now more than ever, when treasuries have had an extremely long run, and BIV has a longer duration than almost any other intermediate bond fund? (Out of 214 distinct intermediate term bond funds for which M* has duration figures, BIV/VBILX/VBIIX has the fourth longest.)
It is true that BIV (because of its large treasuries weighting) did well in 2008. Sovereign debt (such as treasuries) was virtually the only asset class that gained then. Are there other times where that's been true, or is stocking up on treasuries a Maginot line?

MWTRX is one I've considered, but goodness--- the dividends are paltry.

Crash, div may look paltry because it is mostly high quality bonds. 70% rated AAA, 85% of the portfolio is A or above. On the other hand DFLNX is 53% and 67%. If you want more div you take on more risk. Always a trade off.
And total return is the measuring stick here unless you are using the dividends for income. Comparing MWTRX and DLFNX, return is pretty much even for 1, 3 and 5 year returns.

FYI: Below is our asset class performance matrix for Q1 2016 using key ETFs traded on U.S. exchanges. A ridiculously strong March propelled US stocks into the green for the quarter, but just barely so. As shown, the S&P 500 SPY ETF finished Q1 up 0.81% year-to-date. The Dow 30 (DIA) more than doubled that at +1.96%, while the Tech and Biotech heavy Nasdaq 100 (QQQ) finished down 2.4%.
Eight of ten sectors were up in Q1, led by Consumer Staples (XLP), Utilities (XLU), Telecom (IYZ), and Industrials (XLI). The two sectors in the red for the quarter were Financials (XLF) and Health Care (XLV) — both falling nearly 6%.
Outside of the US, Brazil (EWZ) won the quarter with a gain of 27%! Italy (EWI) was the big loser at -11.21%. Looking at commodities, gold and silver rallied 10%+ in Q1, while oil and natural gas finished down 10%+ even though they surged in March. Finally, Treasury ETFs rose nicely in Q1 with the 20+ Year Treasury (TLT) gaining the most at +8.7
Regards,
Ted
https://www.bespokepremium.com/think-big-blog/bespokes-asset-class-performance-matrix-q1-2016/

Also, N shares will remain open to new shareholders who purchase directly.
I'm wondering whether PRPFX will remain NTF at brokerages. If it does, the N class shares will remain available to new shareholders who purchase through brokerages. Often when share classes with 12b-1 fees are added, the no 12b-1 fee share class is no longer offered NTF.
Maybe it will remain NTF, maybe the A shares (that cost more than N shares because of an extra 12b-1 fee) will be offered NTF (load-waived).

Looking at cumulative returns (1, 3, 5 year) is good, but it's also informative to look year by year. If the last year has been particularly good (or bad), it can skew all the numbers. Just look at Sequoia (SEQUX).
As with that fund, if the last year is out of line, you have to ask - is this an anomaly, or does it represent the way the fund is being managed going forward?
BIV has done well in the past year because, as John Bogle has said, it's overweighted in Treasuries (more than half). A managed fund is not going to hold that much in Treasuries - yields are just too low, with too great an expectation that they'll go up (or at least not go down). So in that sense, I consider last year's relative performance an anomaly.
See how Treasury funds have done relative to any other taxable bond funds here:
http://news.morningstar.com/fund-category-returns/ (sort on 1 year returns)
Since we're looking at 1,3, 5 year returns and looking for a replacement for DODIX, it seems worthwhile to compare MWTRX with DODIX over those periods. MWTRX wins every one of them. So by that metric, it seems like a good replacement.
Curiously, while MWTRX holds over 1/4 in Treasuries, DODIX holds virtually none (though it is about 1/2 in high grade corporates). I do consider DODIX the more conservative of the two funds, with low turnover (24% vs. 246%), slightly shorter maturity, and because it seems to hold more premium bonds, lower duration as well. But both funds are excellent in their own ways.
Since the motivating factor seems to be avoiding the $5/transaction charge for buying more shares (at Fidelity once you have a position, adding more with AIP costs $5), BIV would appear to be out as well. That costs $7.95 at Fidelity to add shares, and you can't even add a fixed dollar amount (you have to buy a whole number of shares).

Pretty hard to beat BIV in this space, and doing so would be a lucky guess that could go the other way. It's #1 on MS ytd, 1yr, 3yr and 5yr. Only one down year since 2008 and that was down 3.58 in 2013. It was up in 2008 (my gold standard for a quality bond fund). Good luck.

If that's your outlook, why not something like HAP? That's something that will do well in an inflation scenario, real or perceived. I believe the last time there was an inflation scare was 2013. That year AGG down 1.98%, VIPSX DOWN 8.2%; HAP up 6.1%.