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.
Here's a relevant piece from the Barron's "funds" blog:
http://blogs.barrons.com/focusonfunds/2013/01/23/japan-bulls-stumble-but-investors-still-betting-on-yen-tumble/
Appears investors have already upped DXJ AUM by ~ 60% since the first of the ye…
David,
Great, great conference call; it really illuminated what they're doing at MAINX, very much to my satisfaction anyway.
I'd add to your #6 that TK said explicitly that they have no neutral position or target bands of allocation for anything,…
Reply to @catch22: From what reading I've managed to do on the subject, the key element is owning Japanese mega-cap "global brand" exporter stocks, which will make the most hay with devaluation of the yen. DXJ (WT Japan Hedged Equity) does that pret…
Hey Catch, don't know of course, but it's possible the whole fleet might have already sailed on this one on expectations, and if they don't pan out as rosily as they might, the upside from here might not amount to much.
One possible way to go woul…
Reply to @Maurice: From David's post above:
Our conference call with Teresa will be Tuesday, January 22, from 7:00 - 8:00 EST. Just click REGISTER and you'll take been to the Chorus Call website where you'll register and receive a toll-free number…
Reply to @andrei: MAINX at times has some risk-off characteristics that most straight-EM debt funds don't. Looking purely at Asia, there are quite a few days when it's up in price when Asian stock funds are down. I think it fits pretty well in a low…
FAX is a very good CEF. The other difference w/ MAINX is currency exposure: MAINX has more Asian currency exposure, and negligible Australian, at least now ... in very round numbers, FAX is 20% Asian, 40% Oz, & 40% U.S.:
http://www.aberdeenfax…
Here's a question, David:
I own a moderate-size position in the investor shares of the fund, have been impressed with the portfolio and performance, and am considering approximately doubling my investment in the fund. I'd like to get an idea first,…
Back to ~ normal page-loading speed here in the N. Rockies this evening, FWIW. I didn't change any settings between the last slow-load visit and this apparently normal one. (This was the first time I've ever experienced any problem whatsoever with t…
Seems like a good idea to moi ... all I can think to suggest would be to add the expense ratio to the general-info template, encourage the managers to write in simple English and avoid financial jargon, and clearly communicate that this opportunity …
Reply to @Hiyield007: The implication is a substantial correction during the year. Arnott, who a lot of people like to listen to, is talking about risk of recession. I'm agnostic ... but I do get a kick out of all the turn-of-the-year prognosticatin…
Reply to @Mona: Hi Mona, I'm not very familiar with either of those funds. Does PEBIX vary the currency exposure, or is it all U.S.-$ denominated? I think at this point, depending on what else you have in foreign currency exposure, I might be more u…
Interesting idea; the hangup I can see is that even if you found a manager to do dynamic allocation, and he/she was good enough at it you'd want to hire them, you'd probably pay much more for it than you do now. One thing to maybe consider, if you l…
JG's projections for total returns for 2013 for different assets are sorta interesting:
http://www.learnbonds.com/6-market-predictions-from-bond-guru-jeff-gundlach/
To sum up:
10y T's: 3%
HY bonds: 6%
MBS: 6%
S&P 500: 5%
Nikkei, the big win…
Reply to @andrei: JG's positioning in DBLTX may be as much a result of the billions upon billions of inflows over the past year as some conscious decision to accumulate cash: he probably would have been hard-pressed to put all that cash to work even…
I've had several similar questions about Lipper's tax efficiency scores in the past, and since they don't explain them, I mostly use M*'s tax pages, which give you columns of data rather than just one unexplained rating number. The "tax cost ratio" …
Not buying, but holding the moderate overweight to small caps and EAFE initiated ~ first of December ... looking at this as more or less the usual turn of the year bull run. When it cools, the plan is to underweight U.S. stocks, equal weight EAFE, &…
Reply to @AndyJ: To correct the "2013 dividend" mention in my post just above this one, Vanguard has accounted for the 12/31 dividend paid in January as 2013 income, and that's not right -- here's what IRS Pub 550, Investment Income, says on the sub…
Lots of good suggestions here; I'd just add that the WisdomTree etf DGS (small cap dividend) is a fairly decent option, too. Don't own it myself, but it's one of three EM etf's I keep a relatively close eye on.
A wee reality check: only 3+ months ago, Sept. 14-21, the S&P 500 was closing at these levels, in the 1460s. The peak closing yield for the 30Y T then was 3.09%. The peak closing yield so far in this mini-cycle has been 3.11%.
We've seen this …
Right, phil, applicable Pimco funds had cap gains 12/12, the 'bonus' dividend 12/27, and the regular dividend 12/31. The latter just showed up as paid in my Vanguard account this morning ... and it's accounted for as a 2013 dividend, fwiw.
I'd guess it'd be continuing with the funds I've been happy with for several years -- mainly PRBLX (with strategic switches to the growthier PARWX), ARTKX, MACSX, and MAPIX -- plus a couple of newer favorites from the last year or so: FMIJX and PDII…
I'm in the "mildly disappointed with ARIVX" camp, but not planning to sell. I probably will sell DBLFX in favor of PIGIX, and did sell my whole substantial chunk in VWIAX. I've put the Wellesley proceeds, in similar stock-bond proportion, into other…
As a partial counter to what Joe is apparently hearing from the hair-on-fire soothsayers of cable "bid'ness" networks, etc., here via a Barron's blog is a more measured piece from Fidelity:
http://blogs.barrons.com/incomeinvesting/2012/12/20/fideli…
First, I'd suggest classifying bond holdings into something like these categories:
* "Safe" (intermediate or long, half or more in gov't issues, all investment grade, e.g., U.S. bond index funds);
* Core (mostly but not all investment grade, good …
Reply to @David_Snowball: Yeah, he did have a bit of bluster going on that could have struck people as a little offputting, but I guess I didn't read too much into it; he was probably trying really hard to sound on top of it, authoritative, etc. sel…
Bumped up stake in BBTEX pretty substantially with proceeds from a sale, and took a tactical 5% position in an EAFE index fund (pushing that geography well over neutral), which I'll probably sell when the mo' fades. Also watching munis with an eye t…
Good, informative conference call; the explanation of the "drawdown plan" and reversal answered the main question I had about it.
I'll be really interested in the T. Kong call if that comes about; been thinking about ramping up investment in MAINX…
The gap between the returns of long Treasuries and equivalent munis was nearly 1% Friday; Vanguard's long T fund was UP 0.6%, while the Vanguard & Price long muni funds were DOWN a bit more than 0.3%. As others have said, this very recent sello…
Thanks for the info; good stuff. I've been poking around in the Wasatch and Grandeur Peak territories, but haven't managed to settle on one of their funds yet.
Reply to @BobC: Au contraire, I think Bill G. comes off as totally loopy in his public persona, and think the monthly media starburst of "ooh! he trimmed mortgages from 43% to 42% last month!" is just nuts. The reason I have $ with him (in BOND) is …
I'm selling VWIAX and parceling the proceeds out to other stock and bond funds I own in roughly equivalent proportion, and may do something different with some or all of $ at DoubleLine ... e.g., PIGIX and/or more BOND instead of DBLFX.
I'm planni…
Reply to @hank: Right, info in general at Price is right up there with the best of 'em. I've always liked the way they organize the fund pages on their web site, and the data they cover.
Hank: "They seem to have no problem with someone exchanging all $$ into a single fund a few days in advance; then withdrawing everything from that one fund. This would result in only one $20 fee."
I can confirm that what Hank describes does work an…
Reply to @bee: It used to be Matthews Asia Convertible Securities (thus MACSX) & they kept that as a minor emphasis when they broadened the fund to "Growth and Income."
Reply to @bee: Hey Bee, here's the Matthews website for the specifics:
http://matthewsasia.com/our-funds/f-1/matthews-asian-growth-and-income-fund/composition.fs
It's convertibles & preferreds ...
