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Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.
  • 2022 YTD Damage
    Time to pick up on this update. 2 views of major indexes, 1st YTD (shows Nasdaq Comp down -20.16%), 2nd from 11/22/21 that was Nasdaq high and from there it is now down -21.22%, in a bear market and below 3/14/22 low.
    Indexes YTD https://stockcharts.com/h-perf/ui?s=$SPX&compare=$COMPQ,$INDU,$TRAN,IWM&id=p42765942979
    Indexes from 11/22/21, https://stockcharts.com/h-perf/ui?s=$SPX&compare=$COMPQ,$INDU,$TRAN,IWM&id=p49535142330
  • OUCH !
    Tues: More stinky doggy poopies. My best ones today were bonds: TUHYX. PRFRX. PRTXX. And BHB was down by just a penny. Overall, down -1.57%. I'm not buying anything more, yet... I think when new, higher rates are actually IMPLEMENTED, there will be a lot of fecal material hitting the oscillating rotisserie. WORST: ENIC. Next-worse: TRP FIN. SVS. PRISX, -2.92%. EL BIG-O SUCK-O. But "what's a mother to DO?" I'm 32% in Financials.
  • Musk to Buy Twitter
    Tesla shares sink, wipe out over $125 billion in value, as Musk scores Twitter deal
    Following are excerpts from ☞ a current NPR article:
    Taking over Twitter may be good for Elon Musk, but it hasn't been good for Tesla's shares.
    One day after Twitter announced it had accepted Musk's $44 billion takeover bid, Tesla shares sank 12.2%, wiping out more than $125 billion off the electric vehicle maker's market value.
    When Musk announced he had secured the money to finance the transaction, he said he would cover $21 billion himself, with banks helping finance the other half. What remains unclear is how he will come up with that money — whether he will sell some of the Tesla shares he owns, borrow against them, bring in additional investors, or all three.
    If Musk does offload some of those holdings, it could drive Tesla's share price down further. This is something the company warned investors about in its latest annual report, filed in February with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
    "If Elon Musk were forced to sell shares of our common stock that he has pledged to secure certain personal loan obligations, such shares could cause our stock price to decline," the company wrote.
  • Musk to Buy Twitter
    New SEC/Edgar filing today - breakup fee $1 billion; no-shop provision for Twitter but Twitter has to consider a better/higher offer if it comes; other usual contingencies related to shareholder vote, anti-trust/regulatory clearances, etc.
    After-hours trading shows 9.8% discount from the cash-deal price, so there is decent skepticism on the deal.
    https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/0001418091/000119312522120461/d310843d8k.htm
    https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/0001418091/000119312522120474/d310843ddefa14a.htm
  • Fidelity will start offering bitcoin as an investment option in 401(k) accounts
    @rforno Capital International Group has a 560M stake and Blackrock a 700M stake in MSTR. MSTR owns almost 1% of all available Bitcoin at a low cost basis. While I'm not a personal fan of leveraging Bitcoin to buy more Bitcoin (as they have recently in a big way), it's being done with full board approval and transparently. I don't like their debt to equity ratio.
    It's a software company that generates huge cash flow that instead of placing that cash in a bank and earning negative interest, they buy Bitcoin. So far, that gamble has paid off handsomely. Free cash flow has grown dramatically in the last couple of years. The point I was trying to make is the direct correlation of MSTR to Bitcoin with lower costs.
    To MSTR, Bitcoin is just a better store of value. I do own a tiny bit.
    @Anna imho my answers are: No, No, Depends if you meant speculative vs. contrarian.
  • Fidelity will start offering bitcoin as an investment option in 401(k) accounts
    While I'm interested in whether they will actually be able to pull this off without government intervention, I have a better suggestion for FIDO customers interested in placing some of their retirement in Bitcoin.
    Instead of paying a .70 - 1% fee to Fidelity for Bitcoin purchases, there's a much less expensive path already available in Fidelity. Coincidentally, @Old_Joe mentions the way without naming the company above. " Fidelity's first customer "already signed up one employer" ...is the better path.
    Just purchase some MSTR stock (at the right time) and you'll have the Bitcoin exposure you want with much lower fees. MSTR is the "Bitcoin Spot ETF" that is already available to all.
    You are not able to auto-contribute up to 20% to MSTR unless it's in your 401k plan. This is what is so curious about Fidelity's first 401K Bitcoin customer Microstrategy. Interesting.
  • Fidelity will start offering bitcoin as an investment option in 401(k) accounts
    The following is an excerpt from ☞ a current NPR article:
    NEW YORK — More workers may soon be able to stake some of their 401(k) retirement savings to bitcoin, as cryptocurrencies crack even deeper into the mainstream.
    Retirement giant Fidelity said Tuesday that it's launched a way for workers to put some of their 401(k) savings and contributions directly in bitcoin, potentially up to 20%, all from the account's main menu of investment options. Fidelity said it's the first in the industry to allow such investments without having to go through a separate brokerage window, and it's already signed up one employer that will add the offering to its plan later this year.
  • OUCH !
    FD1000
    +1
    Is the Schmeissing just getting started?
    Inquiring minds want to know...
    I have a special style. You can see it (here). Since 2013, I have been practicing sell to cash at certain conditions (proprietary). Since retirement in 2018, my selling rules are tighter, I never lost more than 1% from any last top. Going to cash depends on big picture analysis + current conditions and why it's different from others. I missed all the big meltdown of Q4/2018, 03/2020 and YTD. I can be wrong, it happened twice since 2013, I was back within 3-4 days.
    Remember, it's more important to miss the worse days than the best(link).
    I posted several ideas YTD on other sites:
    1) Best wide range category so far in 2022 is VALUE(VTV), posted in mid-January. See (chart). In my world, it means most of the stocks would be in value.
    2) I'm in cash for weeks because high risk conditions were met. It's the longest I have been in cash since 2013. Based on that, I only allowed to make short-term (hours to 2-3 days) trades.
  • Grandeur Peak "mea culpa"
    Happened upon the new quarterly letter which, inter alia, states the rather obvious:
    "We’re sure you are well aware that our portfolios have not been immune to this shift in market sentiment; we have delivered the worst relative (to our benchmarks) quarterly performance in our history. We’ll address this in more detail later in this letter, but at the heart of the problem is that for the past 10 years, with the exception of a few short periods in 2015 and 2018, the market has rewarded Growth Assets with ever expanding valuations. By November 2021, valuations for Growth Assets had become extremely stretched across most markets. For most of the Grandeur Peak portfolios, this ballooning of valuation was a key driver of our strong outperformance in 2020 and 2021. But now the pendulum is swinging back the other way. While the corrections in valuations we’re seeing across the portfolios isn’t surprising in hindsight, unfortunately we just didn’t position ourselves very well for it because the fundamentals of our underlying holdings have been so strong."
  • Calpers Plans to Vote to Replace Warren Buffett as Berkshire Hathaway’s Chairman
    Thanks Lewis. Pointing to PG&E is another example of whataboutism. And not especially meaningful even so. It's conflating issues of distribution and production.
    A bad actor? Sure, nothing new here. Can you say Diablo Canyon? Forty years and still not decommissioned. San Bruno? Bankruptcy shell games? Nothing new here either. In 2001 PG&E Corporation moved assets around so that they could not be reached when its Pacific Gas and Electricity Company subsidiary declared bankruptcy.
    None of this makes Berkshire Hathaway any less problematic. S&P reports that Berkshire Hathaway is the largest operator of coal-fired power plants without selective catalytic reduction technology. Further, it will keep operating nearly half of those plants past 2030. It has said that it will retire those plants by 2050, but as you wrote, 2050 commitments are not to be believed.
  • OUCH !
    FD1000
    +1
    Is the Schmeissing just getting started?
    Inquiring minds want to know...
  • Calpers Plans to Vote to Replace Warren Buffett as Berkshire Hathaway’s Chairman
    I am interested in companies' current actions on climate and not words. NYT, like most media these days, has devolved into selling outrage.
    Since when? Climate science is not new:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_climate_change_science
    In 1896 Svante Arrhenius used Langley's observations of increased infrared absorption where Moon rays pass through the atmosphere at a low angle, encountering more carbon dioxide (CO2), to estimate an atmospheric cooling effect from a future decrease of CO2. He realized that the cooler atmosphere would hold less water vapor (another greenhouse gas) and calculated the additional cooling effect. He also realized the cooling would increase snow and ice cover at high latitudes, making the planet reflect more sunlight and thus further cool down, as James Croll had hypothesized. Overall Arrhenius calculated that cutting CO2 in half would suffice to produce an ice age. He further calculated that a doubling of atmospheric CO2 would give a total warming of 5–6 degrees Celsius.[32]
    At one point about a decade ago 97% of climate scientists concurred based on many decades of research that anthropogenic climate change--the kind exacerbated by human activity, not the "natural" kind the current deniers fixate on--was a serious problem and threat. Many of the remaining 3% had ties to the fossil fuel industry. Now that percentage is 99% as the evidence is overwhelming. I would add that the evidence for climate science is far more conclusive than any financial theory currently accepted in the market or on Wall Street.
    So, is it "selling outrage" for the NYT to cover what companies are doing to address the problem? Or is it whataboutism or a false moral equivalency to say all media is flawed and sells outrage and therefore the NYT is too?: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism
  • OUCH !
    Don't know. I'm in cash for months and only made a few short term trades.
    What do you do for excitement? :)
  • OUCH !
    Anything with metals or commodity exposure got dinged. I’d expect multi-strategy funds to be all over the place depending whether they had long commodity / gold exposure. Plus, the hedges (approaches using puts) swung from strong up in the morning to down by day’s end. In a sense “The first shall be last” applied as the day carried on, meaning a lot of things flip-flopped between open and close.
    Interest rates reversed, with longer rates falling for a change. Many funds have been hedging against rising rates - so they would have gotten hurt by the reversal. Another interesting factor was the weakness in Asia overnight which affected global / EM funds today. Cheer up (and stay away from windows). Commodities are said to be recovering in overnight trading.
    “Did anyone else happen to find their accounts down on Mondays (sic) close ?” - My tracker lost .01%. My portfolio lost .18%
  • OUCH !
    Yes, I am down on Monday by -0.29%. stinky doggy poopies. Oil, commodities down. My regional bank stock (BHB) was down, though the TRP Fin. Svs. PRISX fund was up by a mere penny. My best today was PRWCX, up by +0.23%. (35% of portfolio.)
    I'm 32 financials.
    12 Healthcare.
    10 Tech.
    9 Cyclicals.
    7 utilities.
    7 commodities.
    7 energy.
    8 cash.
    (Morningstar X-Ray.)
  • Calpers Plans to Vote to Replace Warren Buffett as Berkshire Hathaway’s Chairman
    and disclosure related proposals
    Berkshire Hathaway conglomerate ... owns energy companies, a railway, insurance companies and other businesses that pump huge amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. As Mr. Buffett holds out, critics complain that Berkshire’s businesses are doing less to cut emissions than similar companies.
    Mr. Buffett has repeatedly resisted shareholders who want Berkshire to provide detailed climate disclosures that encompass the whole company, not just parts of it, and spend more on sustainability. ...
    Despite Mr. Buffett’s insistence that his businesses are doing a lot to fight climate change, the company’s energy subsidiary in particular has set weaker targets for carbon emissions than other utility companies like Duke Energy and Dominion Energy. ...
    On getting to net zero, Berkshire Hathaway Energy uses looser language than other utilities, saying it is “striving to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 in a manner our customers can afford, our regulators will allow and technology advances support.” Xcel Energy and Duke Energy have said they are committed to reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2050.
    https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/25/business/energy-environment/warren-buffett-climate-change.html
    Proxy statement: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1067983/000119312522073447/d208624ddef14a.htm
    As fund investors, we might want to watch how our funds vote. The NYTimes article suggests that Vanguard, Blackrock, and State Street will likely support the environmental disclosures (there's also a workplace disclosure proposal).
  • Revian Ownership...it might be in your TRP Fund
    RIVN is one of the single largest holdings in NRGX, a PIMCO CEF. At some point, it was more than 10% of the portfolio.
  • Musk to Buy Twitter
    $21b equity commitment includes shares Musk already owns. He must have lined up other current / prospective large / institutional shareholders to take the company public. Normal closing conditions could include doing due diligence of technology, primarily for infringement of copy rights and patents, and of books and records. If the probability of the deal falling thru is greater than 10%, I would short the stock for a potential loss of 5% (when the deal closes) vs massive upside if the deal does not close. What am I missing?
  • Musk to Buy Twitter
    Here it is,
    https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/0001418091/000119312522117720/d319190d8k.htm
    https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/0001418091/000119312522117720/d319190dex991.htm
    Summary to follow - well, really not much new.
    "Transaction Terms and Financing
    The transaction, which has been unanimously approved by the Twitter Board of Directors, is expected to close in 2022, subject to the approval of Twitter stockholders, the receipt of applicable regulatory approvals and the satisfaction of other customary closing conditions.
    Mr. Musk has secured $25.5 billion of fully committed debt and margin loan financing and is providing an approximately $21.0 billion equity commitment. There are no financing conditions to the closing of the transaction.
    For further information regarding all terms and conditions contained in the definitive transaction agreement, please see Twitter’s Current Report on Form 8-K, which will be filed in connection with the transaction."