5 minutes is better than 0 minutes and you learned he wrote a book in those 5 minutes which may contain several hours of additional information reading and learning. Many times I have heard analysts/managers give one sentence that changed my investment thesis on a stock.

Year end distribution. You'll find info on it in the Shadows thread here. Look under Doubleline Funds.

AWS (highly touted by Mr. Giroux on CNBC yesterday) has been down much of the afternoon and no idea when it will be fixed. M* tracker is down (at last check) as a result of the AWS snafu.

My workplace experienced several service outages today due to the AWS issues.
AWS Service Health Dashboard (Snippet)
9:37 AM PST
We are seeing impact to multiple AWS APIs in the US-EAST-1 Region.
11:26 AM PST
The root cause of this issue is an impairment of several network devices in the US-EAST-1 Region. We are pursuing multiple mitigation paths in parallel, and have seen some signs of recovery, but we do not have an ETA for full recovery at this time.
3:03 PM PST
Many services have already recovered, however we are working towards full recovery across services.
4:35 PM PST (latest update as of 6:25 PM PST)
With the network device issues resolved, we are now working towards recovery of any impaired services.

Victory! First - I deactivated all my Schwab accounts in Quicken and changed the Financial info to say "Charles Schwab". Just plain old "Charles Schwab".
I followed the steps on this web Support page; specifically the sections titled "What if my Schwab accounts aren't all available for reauthorization" followed by the section titled "What if I am getting a CC-501 error".
https://www.quicken.com/support/errors-when-updating-or-adding-charles-schwab-accounts
After following those steps (except for the "Cloud reset" - I don't use their web version. I only use my Desktop software), I was able to successfully download transactions.
BEWARE: The download brought in a bunch of "Match" and "New" transactions that were already in Quicken. I reviewed every downloaded transaction and deleted the downloaded line items that were already in Quicken - even the ones marked as Match. I ONLY accepted the transactions that were truly NEW.
Now let's see how long it lasts!

Synchrony/SYF was spun out as IPO in 2014. The IPO was for 15%, and in 2015, GE distributed the rest 85%.
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/SYF/profile?p=SYF
https://www.ge.com/news/reports/ge-completes-the-separation-of-synchrony-financial

WeathTrack and Morningstar In-depth interviews are far better than CNBC. What can you talk about in 5 minutes slot, really not much.
Giruox gave a detailed interview last spring during the lockdown (he was doing it from home). Will post that agin when I locate it. He talked about the change of management that led them to buy GE at very good price. Their team know the companies well and forecast their earning several years ahead. The stable stocks revolve around healthcare, consumer staples and utility stocks. Took a more tactical approach on Amazon and Microsoft. That fits his approach being GARP and don’t overpay for growth. He explained his view of bank loans and how offer attractive yield (3%) with less than one year in duration. Think I will get his Kindle book over Christmas.

*Just now, 07 Dec., '21: 25 minutes to get to a human..... Using the Colorado Springs Office number. He told me the online system is down. Thus the long delay. I can't fart loud enough to express my response.

@ hank, msf mentioned that Pershing is running T. Rowe Price’s web service.
You are using Fidelity as your main brokerage?

Sorry I missed the reference to Pershing. Umm … I dealt directly with TRP since the mid 90s. Big difference today. Sure - 90% of interactions are positive / routine. But the 5-10% that aren’t can really set you on your head. Fortunately, this is not a reflection on their well run funds. However, it could possibly relate to cost cutting measures related to being a publicly traded company.
@Sven - Yes / I moved all TRP to Fido and followed up with all my PRPFX. Still have accounts with D&C and Invesco. Little need to interact at D&C. Invesco has been fine to work with. And, per your separate post, I’ve had no experience with TRP brokerage. Hopefully better run than their fund client service. And - of course, Fido’s been top notch. The issues at the beginning related to 3 of TRPs transfer checks bouncing at Fido and having to be reissued.

I've had an account with TRP for 20 years. The brokerage customer service is solid, the fund lineup is a above average IMO. There 'Sales Charge' is $35 compared to Fido's $49.95 so that's better. I like Fidelity's fund screener much better...it's probably the one area TRP is below average. Hope that helps or if you have any particular questions...

Wow, what a mess!
This is even worse than the Facebook mess (and no customer support) that my wife has encountered (locked her out of her account), because money and tax law are involved in your case.
Several years ago I opened 529 accounts for my two grandsons at TRP (the state of Alaska plan). I mailed in a check to fund the accounts.
Check didn't clear.
Waited a little while. Called TRP.
Waited a little longer.
Finally they said we've not received the check -- I should send another.
So I agreed to send another check, with the admonition "don't cash the first check!"
Second check arrived there and was deposited in the accounts.
Several weeks later, they returned the first check to me. I'll never know whether they had it all along or it was lost in the mail. I should've stopped payment on it.
Fortunately it all worked out.
The boys are now high school juniors and looking at colleges.
Which TRP fund did you choose to put the transferred funds in? How were you eligible to put money in the closed fund?
David

Thanks for sharing your experience with us. You brought to this board’s attending of TRP’s Summit program. With $250k transfer, one can get into closed funds plus other stuffs. So they cannot decline the purchase! Cash transfer between brokerages should be quick.
I thought about it but hesitated due to past (poor and painful) asset transfer experience. Now that one can get into many TRP funds on no-transaction platforms in large brokerages, there is little incentives to go to TRP.
Even so I talked with a TRP representative, got the specific email to send in the transfer form for in-kind transfer ( TRP funds). Now I hesitate whether it is worthwhile given your poor experience.
BTW, they ask me to send the transfer form (with my social security #) and a brokerage statement to a “unsecured email address” to get the process started. Also I need to send in the paper forms. I will NOT send the form unencrypted to an unsecured email address. In this regard, Fidelity is the best and secured where everything is completed online along with the brokerage statement in PDF/jpeg. No mailing the forms is required. The entire transfer takes about 5-7 business days to completed.

Standpoint fund management explains the poor November performance in this quite detailed accounting of its long and short positions.
https://www.standpointfunds.com/fund/documents/under-the-hood-november-2021
As some here opined recently, the fund was long oil and petroleum products at the time the Omicron news hit. It appears that the bets on oil have been closed out. I found it somewhat soothing to know that the fund is betting on the price of coffee; I contribute ever so slightly to the demand by regularly ordering 5 pounds of organic dark roast Honduran Marcala elixir.

Hi Randy.
In MFO Premium MultiSearch tool, there are four Display (evaluation) Periods that target periods of rising interest rates:
Normalization - 201601 To 201812
Rising Rates - 200406 To 200702
40-Year Bond Bear - 194001 To 198105
20-Year Bond Bear - 196001 To 198105
USBond (US aggregate) index dates back to 1960.
LGovBnd (US long bonds) index dates back to 1926.
For all the Display Periods available, check-out Definitions page.
And, this commentary piece: New MultiSearch Screens To Help Analyze Impact of Rising Rates.
Happy to do a Zoom call to walk you through. Let me know.
Charles

“All of the Stocks in Cathie Wood’s Ark Innovation Fund Are In a Bear Market Except 2”
CNBC

Wasn’t a very far reaching or in-depth interview. It opened with the CNBC interviewer plugging a book Giroux’s written, although Giroux didn’t comment on his book. Interview was only 4 or 5 minutes long. Giroux plugged Amazon, GE and one utility (Ameren?) - all of which the fund owns, of course. No mention of bonds or fixed income. Says he won’t buy more equities until “there’s blood in the streets”. And, not enough blood yet. (But I suspect he’s done some recent buying.)
The book
Digital (Kindle) Edition $39.99 / Hard Cover $60
570 pages
Link

Well, that didn’t last long. Friday I bought a little bit of DKNG @ around $28.50. Saturday Barron’s published a “Buy” recommendation on the stock attributed to a company called “Benchmark”. They predicted it would soon reach $50. Today, predictably, it bounced 8% + by mid-day. I sold all, locking in a 7% + overnight gain. Hate to “day trade.” OTOH - I have no control over what Barron’s publishes. Current price: $30.72 at 1:00 PM.
PS - This was inside the Roth, so no tax consequences.

@BenWP - Size 265/65R-18 - Japanese off-brand. They ship UPS in 3 days. Yes, I have a local dealer who’s happy to mount & balance them, for a fee of course. These are a mud & snow tire suitable for both winter and summer driving. Have had good luck with Tire Rack over the years.

Biotech stocks resemble a landscape filled with craters. The two ETFs that cover the sector, IBB and FBT, are hurting badly, YTD, 1yr or 3yr. FBIOX is down about 15% YTD while broader-based HC funds have not kept up with the stock market as a whole. I owned CELG until it was bought up by BMY which I kept for a while. The stock rose to nearly $70, but it now trades for about $53. At one time it was a M* 5 star pick, but it turned out to be a value trap. I feel lucky to have exited when I did. For a pure growth HC fund, BHCFX has impressed, but it’s volatile.

Originally I'd hoped to name this site FundWatch.com. A squatter in the Netherlands wanted $25,000 for the URL so, no. (Mercer now owns it.) To the extent we have an active going-forward, it would be good to find a way to signal the fact that we care about pooled investment vehicles (PIVWatch?) and recognize that the wrapper makes a difference in only a few special instances (you can't close an ETF to new investments so in a capacity-constrained strategy, you need an OEF, as an example).
Cheers and holiday good wishes!
David

Interesting observations.
I looked up fundwatch.com and there is mercerfundwatch.com, a fund advisory for HK and Singapore. This "Mercer" (not related to the "Mercer family" in news in recent years) is a subsidiary of Marsh & McLennan/MMC.
I think that MFO - Mutual Fund Observer name caught on nicely.
There have been several instances where creation/redemption processes for ETFs were disrupted and then they traded just like CEFs at premium/discount. Of course, ETFs are not designed with this in mind, but that can happen. And ETNs (terrible sponsor IOUs) are famous for shutting at the worst possible times for their holders.

Stocks as inflation hedge - Prudent Speculator, Market Watch in Barron's
".....nine-plus decades of market history suggest that equities have gained ground, on average, whether inflation is rising or falling.....Yes, stocks have performed better when inflation is moving lower, but they have performed admirably on average, both concurrent with and subsequent to increases (as well as decreases) in the inflation rate over 12-month time spans, with value stocks and dividend payers leading the charge. The effect was not limited to 12-month periods. When we analyzed the numbers for shorter and longer periods, the take-home message that stocks seem to care little about inflation (in the aggregate) was similar.....we have crunched the numbers to see how stocks have performed when the rate is above 6%. Many may be surprised to learn that equities have performed better when inflation has been higher than when it has been lower, with value stocks enjoying sensational returns, on average, over those ensuing 176 periods. To be sure, while supposed market experts might argue otherwise, equities have long been a terrific hedge against inflation. -- John Buckingham and team"