Leigh shared the following with Jim, sending it as a private message though he'd intended to post it here. He gave me permission to copy and paste it.
David
The FundAttribution site has been up since June 2015. The website is in beta test.
Backtesting results are posted in the password-protected portion of the site. Historically, the predictions have been accurate: managers who have been skillful in the past tend to remain skillful. The statistical confidence in the predictions is high.
Forward-looking predictions for the large blend category are also posted on the site.
Registration for demo (free for MFO readers) is required to access the studies. Demo users can also see results for individual funds in two categories with limited functionality
I failed to mention that class probability is the single best metric because 1) it takes account of fund expenses 2) it considers how much confidence we have that current skill will carry forward.
Leigh

"The value of sustainable business opportunities could reach $10 trillion annually by 2050 — 4.5 percent of the world’s projected GDP: Morgan Stanley"
"There's a $100 trillion global sleeper risk behind the moves to fossil fuel-free investments."
"One of the concerns is that fossil fuel companies' won't be able to tap reserve assets across the globe in the future due to the governments of the world waking up to a worsening environment and taking strict regulatory action. The idea that oil and gas companies will have to write off tons of natural resources underground, and possibly go bankrupt themselves, is referred to as the "stranded assets" theory."
For those who are interested, here are a few carbon-free socially responsible funds:
Parnassus Endeavor Fund (PARWX)
Expense ratio: 0.95 percent
5-year return:15.23 percent
$1.4 billion in assets
PAX World Growth (PXGAX)
Expense ratio: 1.26 percent
5-year return: 12.28 percent
$191.3 million in assets
Gabelli SRI (SRIGX)
Expense ratio: 1.64 percent
5-year return: 7.66 percent
$73 million in assets
Portfolio 21 Global Equity (PORTX)
Expense ratio: 1.4 percent
5-year return: 6.27 percent
$433 million in assets
Calvert U.S. Large Cap Core Responsible Index Fund (CISYX)
Expense ratio: 0.60 percent
5-year return: 14.34 percent
$636.5 million in assets
See: Constance Gustke

the correct link for the Virtus Funds 2015 Year End distributions https://www.virtus.com/vsitemanager/Upload/Docs/7065_capgainsestimate.pdf

OJ, 'Tis a problem that gets worse every year. My husband goes RMD next year and then me in 2018 and my mattresses are full to overflowing without any cozy comfort at all. Even the utility room storage cabinets are already full. Where do I put it? Muni and blinders?

Don't know, now that the bloom appears to be off RPHYX. Maybe ZEOIX? See thread here.
Otherwise, I still look to internet banks (1%+ liquid rates), or short-intermediate munis (the blinders don't have to be quite so dark) like VMLTX.

Yes, but the maximum purchase allowed is $10,000 per calendar year. That wouldn't make a dent in my need to find a decent place to park cash.

You can also buy $5K/year in paper(!) bonds by purchasing them directly with your IRS tax refund.
https://www.treasurydirect.gov/indiv/research/faq/faq_irstaxfeature.htm#refund
So maybe you can make a dent-and-a-half in your stash.

OJ, 'Tis a problem that gets worse every year. My husband goes RMD next year and then me in 2018 and my mattresses are full to overflowing without any cozy comfort at all. Even the utility room storage cabinets are already full. Where do I put it? Muni and blinders?

Here is a good headline and an accompanying article about the new S E C rules
YOU TOO CAN NOW INVEST IN STARTUPS! WHAT COULD GO WRONG?
JULIA GREENBERG BUSINESS DATE OF PUBLICATION: 11.01.15..wired.com
Risks, Rewards, Returns
The Securities and Exchange Commission voted this past week to approve so-called equity crowdfunding rules for investors
All of which is pretty exciting. Startups like Pebble and Oculus Rift have been able to succeed with the help of crowdfunding from sites like Kickstarter. . For new startup investors, however, the best plan is to take it slow. Oculus and Pebble are the anomaly, not the norm.
'It's the law of startups—mathematically the most likely exit for a startup is failure.'
“Even if you’re truly invested in investing in a startup, the odds are against you,” Swart says. .”
While individual angel investors and venture capitalists have been able to reap millions of dollars from smart investments, they don’t only invest in one or two startups—they invest in many, knowing most will fail and hoping that one hits it big. They also have experience, industry expertise, research, and money—all things that a regular person might not have when looking at a new equity crowdfunding platform. Education about what investing in early stage startups really means is crucial.
“It’s like the new lottery,” says Southwestern Law School professor Michael Dorff. “There are very few Peter Thiels in the world. It’s like asking, ‘Why can’t I be Warren Buffett?’ There are a lot of smart people trying to be Warren Buffet or Peter Thiel. Your odds are slim even with the experience, expertise, and education.
http://www.wired.com/2015/11/you-too-can-now-invest-in-startups-what-could-go-wrong/

Yes, but the maximum purchase allowed is $10,000 per calendar year. That wouldn't make a dent in my need to find a decent place to park cash.

Even with a 0.0% fixed rate on some generations of I-Bonds, try to find another investment as liquid (after one year of ownership) yielding 1.54%, principal guaranteed, backed by the US government. Tax deferred (and state tax exempt) to boot.
Great place for emergency cash.

Doing ANALysis again, eh? :P
1) Use Windows
2) Snipping Tool
3) Free Image Hosting, e.g. postimage.org
That's what I do when I need too. What else do we need?

From Current Series I Bond Rates
When the inflation rate is less than zero, the earnings rate will be less than the fixed rate but never less than zero.

Fixed rate = 0.10%
6 month Inflation rate = +0.77%
Composite rate =[fixed rate + (2 x inflation rate) + (fixed rate x inflation rate)]
[0.0010 + (2 x 0.0077) + (0.0010 x 0.0077)]= [0.0010 + 0.0154 + 0.0000077)] = 0.0164077
0.0164077 x 100% = +1.64%

==> Thus, the current I Bond Composite Earnings Rate is 1.64% with a fixed rate of 0.10%
For older iBonds you hold, see Current Interest Rates for Older Series-I Bonds
I own some with a 3.0% base rate that will pay 4.56%!

Hi, expat!
Any leads on publicly-accessible versions of NDR's research? I spent about a half hour looking. The links at Ned Davis's "news" page lead mostly to bearish, locked stories. "Given the extent of indicator deterioration, last week's action has moved us closer to the latter conclusion (that the stock market is in the early stages of a bear market)," Ned Davis Research said in a note early Monday" (CNBC Pro) and "By this measure, the current stock market is anything but healthy. The 10-week moving average of weekly readings recently rose to 5.7%, well above the level that many researchers use as the threshold for a “sell” signal. (Fosback, for example, set this threshold at 5%, considering readings above that level as evidence of “extreme market divergence and ... bearish.” The threshold employed by Ned Davis Research, the Venice, Florida-based research firm, is 4.4%.)" (Hulbert).
I found one (danged fluffy) piece in Seeking Alpha that quotes an NDR headline ("Bottom in place: Overweight equities") without letting me find or understand the original. I searched for references to Ned Davis and "bull" in news articles for the past month. From that I learned that "Raw materials may be in the fourth year of a 20-year 'bear super-cycle,' according to the Ned Davis Research Group" and that gold might drop into the 600s from its current 1100s (locked article). There's the note that NDR says November - January are the best times to be in the market (I agree). Beyond that, it was pretty slim pickings.
Two things about my occasional (or more than occasional) market commentaries. One is that I try to rely on folks where I can get to the original research or analysis, rather than relying on a CNBC soundbite. I like GMO and Leuthold in particular because they've got a long public record and seem willing to own up to their limits. The other is that my impulse is to be neither bearish nor bullish; mostly I'm trying to get people to think beyond their immediate impulse, whether that's to panic (our September stuff denouncing the panic-mongers) or return to the "permanent high plateau" (November). Since the market goes up more than it goes down, I probably spend more time chanting "remember, thou too are mortal" (memento mori) than "live it up!" (dum vivimus, vivamus).
For what that's worth,
David (who, you're right, isn't grading that stack of papers to his left)

Not used much here by users, but a very cool feature of Jing are active screen videos (with audio). Sorry if my talents are quite ready for prime time, but humor me. I believe this was submitted to a thread back in August of 2015.
Video Comments on Price Trends of SGGDX

Also, April 2014 discussion on using Jing:
mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/12722/a-jing-ping-for-new-mfo-members#latest

@heezesafe,
First, I kinda wished that the Met's first basemen had made a better throw to the plate in the ninth inning last night. If he had, well, "heezeout"!
Getting back to your question...
The displays I generate and embed into a MFO thread are captured and edited (with arrows, text, etc.) using a video capture tool called Jing. Back in July of 2014 I submitted this discussion which should still be accurate and might be a good place to start, especially the tutorials.
mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/14459/a-ping-for-jing#latest

David, Love the commentary as always, super appreciate your time and wisdom, but I wonder if, in the future, when you speculate on the overall market, you might want to cite a few reputable sources (Ned Davis, for one) who think we're actually in a secular bull? It's far from unanimous that the U.S. market is overpriced and ripe for a fall.
FWIW, I recently spoke to the top hedge fund manager here in Brazil (29% / year since fund started in 1997, only one down year ever, 2008, down only 6%, and this is Brazil!) who thinks EMs in general (not just Brazil) are broken and developed country equity markets are currently priced for 5-7% real returns (i.e. post inflation) in the coming years. He's also betting that the dollar will keep rising against most world currencies.
Who knows if he's right, and maybe it's just a question of seeing the warts better when you're close up, but your general vision, that we should be shifting equity allocations from the US to EMs, is by no means a consensus.

Several times, in the past several months. I have wanted to compose a post, or wanted to make a pointed comment to another's post, for which graphical info was either required or would be more supportive of the point I wanted to make. I tried any number of procedures and failed, so I stated nothing, since it would have seemed I was armchair musing or simply speculating without the graphical visualization.
1) @bee You seem to have it down. What database(s) do you use, and how do you bring it onto the Board? (And how to you add further your own arrows and color bars to what you produce? very effective)
2) @chip You've probably tried this and that. What do you recommend? Are the graphics generated on some sites more easily assimilated/accommodated by the Board's interface with the outside world, so to speak?
3) anyone have suggestions on what not to use, and things that are a pain in the rump to try? Not very good as a wrestler, but I'm educable (although my mind could be deceiving me on that point).
Perhaps we could form a Best Practices for these procedures, and @Old_Joe could add them to his very fine operational manual, in the MFO Resources section, on using the MFO posting tools?

That's not you? Damn. And here I thought we could go clubbing together.
Nuts. Well, maybe an after Christmas coffee in the Strip? With luck I'll be raiding Prestogeorge's some time just before New Years.

Sadly, I am considerably scrawnier than the photo of my online doppelganger in this month's commentary, but I must say it is hilarious. (I do think I have a poet's fine features, though, more of a Lord Byron type than a body builder. :-))
Regarding the five undiscovered funds, the one I found most interesting personally was Clearbridge International Small Cap (LCOAX). I should add that though technically a load fund, it is available at major brokers like TD Ameritrade with the load waived. One reason it intrigued me is that the managers designed it from the outset to only invest in a portfolio of stocks that a $2 billion in assets fund could also invest efficiently in. So they've employed intensive liquidity screens from the get go. The reason that is interesting is they think the fund's capacity is $2 billion so that the portfolio and the fund's style should remain consistent even as it grows. That kind of forethought is unusual in the fund world and should prevent the inevitable style drift you see at other funds as they grow. It is also difficult to find good international small-cap funds as the field is relatively narrow. That's one of the reasons I upped the screen in the story to funds under $200 million, not just $100 million and under.
I also think LKCM Balanced is a solid fund for conservative long-term investors--low fees, low turnover, low asset base and a deep analytical staff. Sarofim Equity, although performing terribly of late, could also make an excellent contrarian play when high quality mega cap stocks come back in favor.

On the Loomis Sayles site, there is also further commentary about the impact of foreign currency wagers losses on their returns (specifically, on their dvd payouts, which have turned quite low) but little explanation for why they are continuing to take that ride vs. going with an alternative plan under the circumstances. I'm getting annoyed; maybe it's time for a trim.
http://www.loomissayles.com/internet/InternetData.nsf/0/C1BA103433E9682085257E15007F20F1/$FILE/Multisector-Q&A-Oct-2015-1.pdf