https://news.yahoo.com/7-best-balanced-funds-pick-193106242.html
U.S.News & World Report
7 Best Balanced Funds to Pick Right Now
Barbara Friedberg
September 1, 2020, 2:31 PM CDT
The best balanced mutual funds for simple investment diversification.
As markets reach new highs, an all-stock portfolio might be too risky for some. The alternative is to own diverse assets. Choosing one balanced mutual fund with stocks and bonds will likely temper any large swings in the portfolio's value. So if the stock market declines, you'll have fixed assets to prop up returns. The benefit of investing in a balanced fund is simplicity and diversification. Balanced funds normally rebalance back to a target stock/bond mix, saving investors time and the stress of portfolio management. As life becomes more and more complicated, a balanced mutual fund can streamline investment decisions. Most of these balanced funds have reasonable expense ratios, and some are sensitive to the tax consequences caused by excessive turnover. There is a mix of passive index fund choices along with several actively managed picks. Here are seven of the best balanced funds to invest in now.
Vanguard Wellesley Income Fund Investor Shares (VWINX)
-- Vanguard Balanced Index Fund Admiral Shares (VBIAX)
-- Vanguard Wellington Fund Investor Shares (VWELX)
-- Fidelity Freedom 2045 Fund (FFFGX)
-- Vanguard LifeStrategy Moderate Growth Fund (VSMGX)
-- American Funds American Balanced Fund (ABALX)
-- Dodge & Cox Balanced Fund (DODBX)
We have wellington and dodgecox. Both great for long terms imho
vgstx us another to consider

In Baltimore since forever, homeowners have paid land-rent upon which their homes sit. Ya, pretty effing crazy. Just like the Excise Tax on the car. So, you have the right to buy a car if you can afford it. And you most likely will park the car in a space provided, if you rent, or on your own property, if you own a home. So, for the privilege of parking the car, you have to pay the tax, every year. I call it the Extortion Tax. Dunno if there's one in my new State, after the move. ...Oops, just looked. And of course, THIS crap is really HELPFUL: (LAUGH!)
https://tax.hawaii.gov/geninfo/get/

Outside of some superficial similarities, ground rent is something completely different from lease revenue bonds.
In theory, if I own a house and the land beneath it, I could sell you the house and retain ownership of the land. For example, from 1953 until the original Yankee Stadium was renovated in the early 1970s, the land it sat on was owned by the Knights of Columbus. The Yankees paid $128K/year rent for the land.
The virtue of this arrangement is that you do not have to pay as much to buy a home, especially in places where much of the property value lies in the land itself and not in the improvements (house).

In the present day, ground rent is commonly viewed as a dying, yet no less legally binding, vestige of Maryland’s colonial past. Almost all of the remaining national instances of ground rent are confined to the Greater Baltimore area, isolated areas of Pennsylvania, and most of Hawaii.

https://www.peoples-law.org/understanding-ground-rent-maryland
These are little more than basic lessor/lessee private contracts, involving private parties, not the government.
As with the Yankee Stadium example, religious institutions may be one of those parties. "All land in Ocean Grove [NJ] is owned by the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association and leased to property owners. The Camp Meeting Association is a Methodist group. Every homeowner in Ocean Grove pays ground rent to the Camp Meeting Association, a Methodist group. There are still many tent homes on the camp grounds. "Tent inhabitants do not have to be Methodist, but they do have to support the association’s spiritual mission."
https://thecoaster.net/wordpress/no-increase-planned-for-ocean-grove-land-leases/
https://njmonthly.com/articles/jersey-shore/ocean-grove-nj/
I don't see the connection between excise taxes and ground rent or revenue bonds. An excise tax is similar to a sales tax (percentage of value, one time). Hawaii draws the distinction as being the fact that the excise tax is assessed on businesses, rather than customers. Though as we all know, it's the customer who pays it in the end.

https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/mohamed-el-erian-warns-us-stock-market-decline-another-10-2020-9-1029562738
El-Erian: Stocks 'Could Have Another 10% Fall, Easily'
Investment guru Mohamed El-Erian warns that the stock market could easily continue to tumble, adding to Thursday’s drastic selloff.
Could be another 10% haircut, anyone adding more equties?

I would assume it is a export play. From the article:
“ There is nothing like the Nasdaq in Japan. Like Europe, Japan lacks a large and innovative tech sector.
Its top five companies—Toyota Motor (TM), Sony (SNE), SoftBank Group (SFTBY), Keyence (KYCCF), and Nintendo (NTDOY)—have their attributes, but don’t compare to the U.S. giants. Only four companies in Japan have market values above $100 billion—against about 65 in the U.S.
What Japan possesses instead is a group of high-quality industrial businesses like Toyota; Keyence, the leader in factory automation; Daikin Industries (6367.Japan), a top global maker of air-conditioning equipment; and Nidec (NJDCY), an innovative, major producer of electric motors.”

Personally, equities have been good to me for the past 50 years, with a few scary times in between. So, I’m not about to “jump ship”, although at nearly 74, I’m widely diversified with perhaps 30-40% in equities. Some bonds. Some commodities. Some cash. Some hedge-type funds. People don’t think there’s inflation. Look at what you paid for a house or a new addition to your home or a new car 10, 20, 30 years ago and tell me that. Sure, TVs and computers have fallen in price. You can’t eat them, drive them or sleep inside of on

You are doing fine going forward with your balanced allocation. Lots of uncertainty and volatility now. Being rational is not easy. got luck out when I rebalanced several week ago. Now I can sit back and watch the slow train wreck.

Good article from Barrons. Hopefully available to all.
https://apple.news/A3FA7CJprT0q52OyX8c5nQQ
“Japan is a value play,” says John Vail, chief global strategist at Nikko Asset Management. “But that’s also coupled with long-term structural improvements in corporate governance, operational gearing to a global economic upswing, and extreme political stability.”
“Japan is more like Germany than the U.S.,” says Masakazu Takeda, a portfolio manager at Sparx Asset Management in Japan and co-manager of the Hennessy Japan fund (HJPNX). “There aren’t too many internet companies, but Japan has highly competitive manufacturing businesses. Manufacturing excellence is one of Japan’s advantages.”

Nice to read stuff not connected to politics. :) Ritholtz is good - but the link didn’t provide much in the way of his opinions.
Lot of smart people been warning us for years about the excesses. Alas! What to do? Possibly cash at 0% is the “better” option at this time. What do I know? Stan Druckenmiller is another smart one who’s worried about valuations. And a reading of Mutual Fund Observer‘s back issues for several years brings up cautionary flags from David and others. I’m weird. I like Fleckenstein and subscribe to his daily rants. He’s about as bearish on equities as it gets. I don’t recommend him to most because I think he’d scare the **** out of you and have you run to cash - or gold which he likes.
Personally, equities have been good to me for the past 50 years, with a few scary times in between. So, I’m not about to “jump ship”, although at nearly 74, I’m widely diversified with perhaps 30-40% in equities. Some bonds. Some commodities. Some cash. Some hedge-type funds. People don’t think there’s inflation. Look at what you paid for a house or a new addition to your home or a new car 10, 20, 30 years ago and tell me that. Sure, TVs and computers have fallen in price. You can’t eat them, drive them or sleep inside of one.

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/924727/000110465920102657/tm2030240-1_497.htm
497 1 tm2030240-1_497.htm 497
(may wish to click link to see all information)
FPA Funds Trust
FPA Crescent Fund
Institutional Class (FPACX)
Supplement dated September 4, 2020 to the
Prospectus dated April 30, 2020
This Supplement amends information in the Prospectus for the FPA Crescent Fund (the “Fund”), a series of FPA Funds Trust, dated April 30, 2020. You should retain this Supplement and the Prospectus for future reference. Additional copies of the Prospectus may be obtained free of charge by visiting our web site at www.fpa.com or calling us at (800) 638-3060.
Effective immediately, the current single class of shares of the Fund is hereby renamed Institutional Class shares, and all references to the current single class of shares of the Fund in the Prospectus are hereby superseded and replaced with references to Institutional Class shares. In addition, the following changes are made:
The section titled “Fees and Expenses” on page 2 of the Prospectus is hereby deleted in its entirety and replaced with the following:
Fees and Expenses of the Institutional Class
This table describes the fees and expenses that you may pay if you buy and hold shares of the Fund’s Institutional Class. The table and example below do not reflect commissions that a shareholder may be required to pay directly to a broker or other financial intermediary when buying or selling shares of this class.
Shareholder Fees (fees paid directly from your investment)
Maximum Sales Charge (Load) Imposed on Purchases (as a percentage of offering price) None
Maximum Deferred Sales Charge (Load) (as a percentage of original sales price or redemption proceeds, as applicable) None
Redemption Fee (as a percentage of amount redeemed on shares held 90 days or less) 2.00 %
Exchange Fee None
Annual Operating Expenses of the Institutional Class of Shares (expenses that you pay each year as a percentage of the value of your investment in this class)
Management Fees1 1.00 %
Distribution (12b-1) Fees None
Other Expenses (Before Short Sale Dividend and Interest Expenses) 0.07 %
Total Expenses (Before Short Sale Dividend and Interest Expenses) 1.07 %
Expense Reimbursement2 0.02 %
Total Operating Expenses Before Short Sale Dividend and Interest Expenses 1.05 %
Short sale dividend and interest expenses 0.16 %
Total Annual Operating Expenses 1.21 %
1 The Management fees include both the advisory fee of 0.93% and class-specific administrative service fee of 0.07%. For additional information about the administrative service fee please see the section titled “Management of the Fund.”
2 First Pacific Advisors, LP (the “Adviser” or “FPA”), the Fund’s investment adviser, has contractually agreed to reimburse the Fund for operating expenses in excess of 0.05% of the average net assets of the Fund, excluding management fees, administrative service fees, short sale dividend expenses and interest expenses on cash deposits relating to short sales, brokerage fees and commissions, interest, taxes, fees and expenses of other funds in which the Fund invests, and extraordinary expenses, including litigation expenses not incurred in the Fund’s ordinary course of business, through September 4, 2021. This agreement may only be terminated earlier by the Fund’s Board of Trustees (the “Board”) or upon termination of the Advisory Agreement...

Interesting:https://ft.com/content/75587aa6-1f1f-4e9d-b334-3ff866753fa2
I wonder what this means in the selloff if anything.

Well, it's been a helluva 2 days! I suppose we're just falling back to earth. But this is yet another example of the way the System is shot through with loopholes and exploitable omissions. Good thing I'm not in charge. Heads would roll. And the whole mechanism would be tighter. The frequency of this sort of news story is becoming less and less an exceptional sort of thing. So... I can't actually read the article, but I can understand LB's header. So, a handful of people "took the money and ran," eh? Suck-holes.

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/99188/000110465920102469/tm2030154-1_497.htm
497 1 tm2030154-1_497.htm 497
FPA Capital Fund, Inc. (FPPTX)
Supplement dated September 4, 2020 to the
Prospectus dated July 29, 2020
This Supplement updates certain information contained in the Prospectus for FPA Capital Fund, Inc. (the “Fund”), dated July 29, 2020. You should retain this Supplement and the Prospectus for future reference. Additional copies of the Prospectus may be obtained free of charge by visiting our web site at www.fpafunds.com or calling us at (800) 638-3060.
At a meeting held on August 28, 2020, the Board of Directors (the “Board”) of the Fund approved the reorganization (the “Reorganization”) of the Fund into the Queens Road Small Cap Value Fund, a series of the Bragg Capital Trust (the “Acquiring Fund”).
The Reorganization is subject to a number of conditions, including approval of the Fund’s shareholders and the terms of the agreement and plan of reorganization approved by the Board.
If the Reorganization is completed as proposed, each shareholder of the Fund would become a shareholder of the Acquiring Fund. The Acquiring Fund is an existing series of Bragg Trust with a substantially similar investment objective and similar principal investment strategies as the Fund, with certain differences, as described in the combined proxy statement and prospectus on Form N-14 (the “Proxy Statement/Prospectus”). It is currently expected that prior to the Reorganization, shareholders of the Acquiring Fund will be asked to approve the transition of the Acquiring Fund to the FPA Funds platform. In connection with this proposed transition, subject to approval by shareholders of the Acquiring Fund, FPA will serve as the investment adviser to the Acquiring Fund and Bragg Financial Advisors, Inc., the current investment adviser to the Acquiring Fund, will serve as the Acquiring Fund’s sub-adviser. Also subject to approval by shareholders of the Acquiring Fund in connection with this proposed transition, the persons currently serving on the Fund’s Board will serve as Trustees of the Acquiring Fund in replacement of the Acquiring Fund’s current Trustees.
It is expected that the Reorganization will qualify as a tax-free reorganization for federal income tax purposes, and no commission, redemption fee or transaction fee will be charged as a result of the Reorganization.
The Board’s decision to reorganize the Fund is subject to shareholder approval, though no shareholder action is necessary at this time. Shareholders of the Fund will receive a Proxy Statement/Prospectus that contains important information about the Reorganization and the Acquiring Fund in which they would own shares upon closing of the Reorganization, including information about investment strategies and risks; fees and expenses; and potential tax consequences of the Reorganization. Prior to the Reorganization, Fund shareholders may continue to purchase, redeem and exchange their shares subject to the limitations described in the Fund’s prospectus. If shareholders approve the Reorganization and other closing conditions are met, the Reorganization is anticipated to close in the fourth quarter of 2020.
The foregoing is not an offer to sell, nor a solicitation of an offer to buy, shares of the Fund or the Acquiring Fund, nor is it a solicitation of any proxy. When it is available, please read the Proxy Statement/Prospectus carefully before making any decision to invest or when considering the Reorganization. The Proxy Statement/Prospectus will also be available for free on the SEC’s website (www.sec.gov).
Please retain this supplement for future reference.

It was foolish to bid up the stocks. S&P500 lost 3% yesterday. Today it lost another 2.6% so far.

Interesting:https://ft.com/content/75587aa6-1f1f-4e9d-b334-3ff866753fa2
I wonder what this means in the selloff if anything.

Linked below is Morningstar's Fair Value Chart. To see how the market has moved in respect to fair value during the past year click on the 1 year tab. Very interesting? Yes! So, if I buy now ... I'm thinking ... that I would be over paying based upon the metrics of this chart and it's mythodology.
With this, I await a better buying opportunity.
Interestingly, Old_Skeet's market barometer indicates that the S&P 500 Index is overbought at this time as well.
https://www.morningstar.com/market-fair-value

Dows, sp500 may go up next few weeks... Maybe related long overdue correction or covid19 data improving and Techs got knocked down no support
Couple private bonds went up slightly +0.15 to + 0.25%
In two wks many people maybe crying double dip or W recovery. WE will see

The vaccine 'promise' won't matter because at this point, not enough people are going to take it. feh. Wifey and I got our flu shots day before yesterday, but I won't get a Covid-19 shot at least until fall of 2021 and maybe not then. I no longer trust anything coming out of Washington and the FDA. Any vaccine they approve will be on a scale with injecting rat poison or drinking bleach. I did hear someone suggest paying Americans $1000 each to get the shot and this is actually a very good idea. You get immunization AND stimulate Aggregate Demand.

The COVID-19 vaccine will first made available to the frontline workers including the ER's doctors and nurses, firemen and police, teachers, and military personnel. Hopefully there is sufficient dosage for the general population. There are a number of vaccine candidates which passed Phase II trial on human safety and efficacy. Moderna and Pfizer are in Phase III testing now involving 30-50K patients. It will take time to sort out the data before they launch to make billions of dosages and distribute them to the general population. It is also likely several different vaccines will be available to ensure robustness of the immunization program. Question is can the manufacturers deliver the vaccines on a timely basis?
As I stated before i will take the COVID vaccine when It is available. We took the flu vaccines several ago. The coming fall and winter will drive people indoor which could make the COVID situation worse.

Initiated a 500s likely starter position in VIRT this morning to 'play' the likely looming equity volatility surrounding the elections, covid, and general world condition. Solid company, can make $$ in any market condition, and pays a good div. IMO it's usually nice to be the 'house' in such situations.

Why the big downturn today? Poor selling data, uncertainties in market, large unemployment numbers...?
Much needed overdue corrections? Will it go 10-15% lower?

I see the US market really "priced for perfection" and to stay up a lot of things have to go right.
I think only about a third of the SP stocks are up for the year and most of the gains are FAANMG. Consequently if anything happens to get people to stop paying 50 to 300 times earnings for these things, it will be all downhill.
The market is up because 1) Federal reserve says it keep rates at zero for years, therefore increasing the market multiple ( currently at dot.com levels) 2) Stimulus bill kept consumer buying up 3) Belief that an effective vaccine is soon to come
For this to continue we have to see
1) Earnings meet the baked in assumptions of $165 S&P 500 2021 earnings
and $185 2022
2) No delayed, double-dip recession ie no resurgence of Covid this fall with the flu. I think this requires a vaccine that is at least 70% effective and most people get it. This is unlikely by December. Still it will be years before Hotels and airplanes are back at 2019 levels.
3) Low inflation and continued Fed easy easy money. What if they finally wise up to the fact that zero interest rates do not increase employment, just inflate stock prices, leaving millions in the dust ? Look at "taper tantrum"
4) No major second Black Swan. Candidates shooting war in China, massive defaults in Chinese banking system ( all very possible) or something totally unexpected ie 9.0 earthquake Major hack taking down electrical grid etc etc
5) Major fight over close election with Trump getting support form the military to stay in office and blood in the streets, or military having to remove him in shooting war with right wing nuts