FYI: The American Funds family of mutual funds is home to some of the most widely held funds in the world. They can be found in 401(k) plans, IRAs, brokerage accounts and even 529 plans. But some of their most recognized names are not performing as well as their lofty assets under management might suggest
Regards,
Ted
http://investorplace.com/2015/02/american-funds-underperforming/print

Ukraine only about 6% of holdings. Over 95% of portfolio are investment grade. Might hurt a bit but far from a catastrophe. Hasenstab will come through just fine.

I just looked at the portfolio on Morningstar and it looks like only a little more than 81% is in investment grade bonds. I looked at TPINX, Templeton Global Bond A. The Global Total Return Fund is only a little more than 65% investment grade. Please correct me if I've got this wrong. I view investment grade as BBB and above.

I use TGBAX

ron, my comment was with respect to yours which said "Over 95% of portfolio are investment grade"
That doesn't coincide with the info I looked up in M*. Don't know where you are getting the info that over 95% of the portfolio is investment grade. Looks to me like about 81% and 65% for the two funds, per above. Perhaps you were referring to something different

Sorry that I didn't highlight this earlier. One of the questions you had for the guys is "why is there an ETF atop your portfolio?" The answer appears to be "it was an experiment that we don't intend to repeat." Here's their exact explanation:

Pear Tree does not hold the ETF anymore. Before year end, the Fund had +12% in cash and decided to pare it down to under 10% by using ETF to gain some market exposure. The Fund management team had built up cash while working on some buy ideas and did not want to put the cash to work and then sell again to buy the new companies. Henceforth if the Fund builds up +10% cash, we will not buy ETFs but try to put it to work in the most liquid companies until such time we have buy ideas.

So they had excess cash, wanted to put it somewhere but didn't want to create a short-term equity position that they'd just have to unwind so they tried using a sector ETF. Apparently didn't like the experience and don't plan to repeat it.
David

We’d be delighted if you’d join us on Monday, February 9th, from noon to 1:00 p.m. Eastern, for a conversation with Matthew Page and Ian Mortimer, managers of Guinness Atkinson Global Innovators (IWIRX) and Guinness Atkinson Dividend Builder (GAINX).
Register
These are both small, concentrated, distinctive, disciplined funds with top-tier performance. Guinness reports:

Guinness Atkinson Global Innovators is the #1 Global Multi-Cap Growth Fund across all time periods (1,3,5,& 10 years) this quarter ending 12/31/14 based on fund total returns. They are ranked 1 of 500 for 1 year, 1 of 466 for 3 years, 1 of 399 for 5 years and 1 of 278 for 10 years in the Lipper category Global Multi-Cap Growth.

Why? Good academic research, stretching back more than a decade, shows that firms with a strong commitment to ongoing innovation outperform the market. Firms with a minimal commitment to innovation trail the market, at least over longer periods.
The challenge is finding such firms and resisting the temptation to overpay for them. The fund initially (1998-2003) tracked an index of 40 stocks chosen by the editors of Wired magazine “to mirror the arc of the new economy as it emerges from the heart of the late industrial age.” In 2003, Guinness concluded that a more focused portfolio and more active selection process would do better, and they were right. In 2010, the new team inherited the fund. They maintained its historic philosophy and construction but broadened its investable universe. Ten years ago there were only about 80 stocks that qualified for consideration; today it’s closer to 350 than their “slightly more robust identification process” has them track.
This is not a collection of “story stocks.” The managers note that whenever they travel to meet potential US investors, the first thing they hear is “Oh, you’re going to buy Facebook and Twitter.” (That would be “no” to both.) They look for firms that are continually reinventing themselves and looking for better ways to address the opportunities and challenges in their industry.
Matt volunteered the following plan for their slice of the call:

I think we would like to address some of the following points in our soliloquy.

• Why are innovative companies an interesting investment opportunity?
  
• How do we define an innovative company?
  
• Aren’t innovative companies just expensive?
  
• Are the most innovative companies the best investments?

I suppose you could sum all this up in the phrase: Why Innovation Matters.

In deference to the fact that Matt and Ian are based in London, we have moved our call to noon Eastern. While they were willing to hang around the office until midnight, asking them to do it struck me as both rude and unproductive (how much would you really get from talking to two severely sleep-deprived Brits?).
HOW CAN YOU JOIN IN?
Register
If you can't join but have questions for the guys, share them here. In general, either the managers will read them or folks from the adviser follow these discussions then brief them.
Hope you're all safe and warm,
David

I have built up a nice nest egg over time and not because I am smart or skilled (actually probably the opposite) But by concentrating solely on trend persistency combined with LOW Volatility. That has enabled me to go 100% all in whatever and abstain from the diversification game. A game that while it may work, nonetheless leads to lower returns than a concentrated portfolio.

Uhhh ... Chuck asked me about these funds as he was writing the column. His email suggested that he'd already concluded that they were the wrong solution to a non-problem. In response I wrote:

The research is pretty consistent that low-vol stocks outperform (a) the broad market and especially (b) the market darlings by wide margins over time; that outperformance is very consistent in falling markets but does also occur in some bull markets as well. It looks like 100-200 bps of gain with about 25% lower standard deviation.
Why do they win? I don't know and I have rather more respect for the researchers who say "it's complicated" than for those with the smooth, neatly packaged explanations. There are two possible paths:
1. a low-vol stock portfolio is good because it invests in low-vol stocks. High dividend yield investing works because high dividend yields suggest something about the underlying business model, and something similar might be true here.
2. a low-vol stock portfolio is good because it does not invest in high-vol stocks. I like this explanation more. High volatility stocks tend to be "story stocks," drawing lots of attention and lots of eager investors. They soar and swoop. And, in general, disappoint investors either by crashing entirely or by posting miserable returns because investors paid for the story rather than for the earnings. Their mere exclusion from the portfolio solves much.
Curiously, that's the same argument made by Andrew Foster at Searfarer and the team at Guinness Atkinson: a large fraction of firms are structurally impaired, simply keeping those out of your portfolio leads to above average returns.

Apparently that wasn't compelling.
David

@TSP_Transfer : Ah, yes, the Dreyfus/Standish Global Fixed Income Fund. Sometimes it pays to be less than fastidious in cleaning up the old Ideas folder (and what a shameful mess mine is). I found a 2010 prospectus. Rhao, it is not (though he is an internatl. fund mgr.). The name of the portfolio mgr I was trying to remember is: David C. Leduc. FWIW

Ukraine only about 6% of holdings. Over 95% of portfolio are investment grade. Might hurt a bit but far from a catastrophe. Hasenstab will come through just fine.

I just looked at the portfolio on Morningstar and it looks like only a little more than 81% is in investment grade bonds. I looked at TPINX, Templeton Global Bond A. The Global Total Return Fund is only a little more than 65% investment grade. Please correct me if I've got this wrong. I view investment grade as BBB and above.

I use TGBAX

FYI:
Regards,
Ted
WSJ Slant:
http://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-stock-futures-trade-higher-1422883658
Bloomberg Slant:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-02-02/u-s-stock-index-futures-are-little-changed-paring-earlier-gain
Reuters Slant:
http://www.reuters.com/assets/print?aid=USKBN0L615120150202
MarketWatch Slant:
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/us-stocks-futures-higher-ahead-of-consumer-spending-ism-data-2015-02-02/print
WSJ Market At A Glance: http://markets.wsj.com/us
Sector Tracker: http://www.sectorspdr.com/sectorspdr/tools/sector-tracker
Current Futures: http://finviz.com/futures.ashx

FYI: Show me a guy wearing a belt and suspenders, and I will show you someone who a) is a pessimist and b) fell for a sales pitch that made him look both silly and redundant.
Regards,
Ted
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-low-volatility-funds-arent-worth-it-for-long-term-investors-2015-02-02/print

Pick one...see if they can chart 2015....

He said that on Friday!!!!!!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!
http://www.mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/18668/art-cashin-us-growth-rate-worries-stocks#latest

@rbj112
Prospectus: Templeton Global Bond Fund https://www.franklintempleton.com/forms-literature/download/406-PSUM
*"The fund may invest up to 25% of its assets in bonds that are rated below investment grade."
Prospectus: Templeton Total Return Global Bond Fund https://www.franklintempleton.com/forms-literature/download/407-PSUM *No restriction on below investment grade bonds.
-
From Wikipedia:
"A bond is considered investment grade or IG if its credit rating is BBB- or higher by Standard & Poor's or Baa3 or higher by Moody's. Generally they are bonds that are judged by the rating agency as likely enough to meet payment obligations that banks are allowed to invest in them."
-
Can't get Total Return fund's "Principal Investment Strategies" to copy. However, suggest folks take a look. Enough to sober up any potential investor (or lead one to take another drink). Terms like "non-diversified," "concentrated", (may purchase) "bonds ... in any category including bonds rated in default", and "(use of) derivatives" would make me think twice before clicking "Buy." ... Sad most investors don't read this stuff.

FYI:
Regards,
Ted
http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000351283&play=1

FYI:
Regards,
Ted
http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2015/02/drawdowns-in-sp-500-since-march-9-2009/print/

Ukraine only about 6% of holdings. Over 95% of portfolio are investment grade. Might hurt a bit but far from a catastrophe. Hasenstab will come through just fine.

I just looked at the portfolio on Morningstar and it looks like only a little more than 81% is in investment grade bonds. I looked at TPINX, Templeton Global Bond A. The Global Total Return Fund is only a little more than 65% investment grade. Please correct me if I've got this wrong. I view investment grade as BBB and above.

@Ron: I bought PFF in March of 2009 at 19.07, with a $2.49 Dividend in 2014 my yield is 13.0% +, and have almost doubled my inital investment. One preferred stock fund is enough plus I own a number of individual preferred stocks.
Regards,
Ted

Scott said: "I think what concerns me is the idea that a mutual fund owns more than half of a country's foreign debt..."
Hi Scott: That would be a very high percentage. However, as a percent of the fund's holdings, suspect it's still a relatively small amount, probably 10% or less of total investments. It's likely the fund's prospectus restricts how much can be invested in a single country and what % of any country's outstanding debt can be held. 50% of one issuer's outstanding debt would seem extraordinary high.
The numbers on fund performance didn't look terrible. One, anyway, was overall positive for the year - but lagged its "peers". How you put international bond funds or EM bond funds into a peer group eludes me. The world's a big place. These funds all take different approaches to international investing - choosing to favor some areas and avoid others. Some hedge against currency risk. Others choose not to. Makes a big difference in results. But, if looking for a pure play against the Dollar, the unhedged will give you more of that.
Here's the fact sheet for the Global Total Return Fund. I'm assuming it's the more aggressive of the two mentioned in the Bloomberg article: https://www.franklintempleton.com/forms-literature/download/407-FF Note that the Singaphore Dollar is the last currency listed as a substantial holding. It comprised 6.39% of fund's assets as of reporting. We can assume the Ukranean currency was something less than 6.39% of the fund's currency exposure. Correct?
Here's an article from May, 2014: "Templeton Fund Snaps Up a Third of Ukraine Sovereign Eurobonds"http://www.emergingmarkets.org/Article/3342021/Templeton-fund-snaps-up-a-third-of-Ukraine-sovereign-Eurobonds.html. This article puts this fund's total assets at around 71 billion dollars and the total investment in these bonds of just over 3 billion. That puts the total investment at around 4.25% of fund assets. Reasonable I think. Obviously, it was a speculative play that didn't work out.

"Investors last year pulled a record $14 billion from the U.S. and European versions of the Templeton Global Bond Fund and Templeton Global Total Return Fund, which have a combined $150 billion in assets ..."
Same old. Same old. Money pours in. Money pours out.
If these "in-and-out" investors are making a lot of money in the process, that's fine. I'm all for making a fast buck any way you can as long as you can keep reinvesting it for greater and greater returns. However, all the evidence I've read or viewed on this forum indicates just the opposite. That average fund investors who move in and out of their funds fail to achieve the returns those funds themselves achieve over time. So, in all this coming and going, something doesn't add up. Investors do worse than the funds they own. And, where did these investors get the idea that investing outside the U.S., especially in emerging markets, is NOT risky?
Not sure what my main point is here. But, hate to see mutual funds designed for "longer-term investors" (as almost every prospectus reads) subjected to rapid inflows and outflows. Hurts the funds and probably doesn't do much for 90% of those who are running in and out. In the end, all of us pay a bit more in the form of added operating costs the funds experience in aggregate. Old school I guess. Back in the 70s and 80s you needed to wait until next morning to learn the % of change & NAV of a fund, and maybe 3 months to learn how it was performing relative to so-called "peers". Time to reflect and take a deep breath. People were much more long-term focused. We expected our funds would experience both good and bad years. Nowdays, we sit at computer screens watching green and red numbers flashing.
Fund disappointed? How dare it? .... Shoot the ##**!!**
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*Slightly edited, mainly to delete an incorrect reference to Russian securities (not pertinent)

StarOne still only paying 0.85% today while I can get 1.00% in FDIC savings at two banks listed at
Best Savings Account Rates
I can't see tying up money in a CD now when savings pay more.
MikeM: Ally bank is listed as paying 0.99% for a savings account. If I put "CD - 1 YR & under $40K" into the tool at "Ally Bank Savings Rates" it says 1.20%.
Is it worth locking money up for a year for an extra 0.20% if we expect the Fed to raise rates by 0.25% this year? Perhaps if that is the only rate bump.... hard to say.
What do others think? Will the Fed raise rates by more than 0.25% this year?