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.
Take a look at Vanguard's Tax-Managed Balanced Fund (VTMFX). It is split 50/50 between U.S. stocks and municipal bonds. Good after-tax performance and low expense ratio (0.12%). I replaced VWIAX in my taxable account with VTMFX. Bear in mind, VTMFX…
Here's a link to the fund's investor returns over the past 1, 3, and 5 years. What a contrast to the fund's actual returns. Bottom line: Many investors didn't participate in the up years but are participating in the down years.
http://performance.m…
But that doesn't seem to jive with this current article from Barron's:
Investors Pull $27.5B From Pimco Flagship Fund In October
http://blogs.barrons.com/incomeinvesting/2014/11/04/investors-pull-27-5b-from-pimco-flagship-fund-in-october/?mod=BOLB…
Asset Allocation 7 More Information
AS OF 8/31/2014; MORNINGSTAR CATEGORY: MULTISECTOR BOND
Cash 19.12%
Convertibles 11.32%
Domestic Bond 19.41%
Preferred Stock 6.10%
Foreign Bond 21.02%
Fore…
I'm concerned about how much time Mr. Ivascyn will be able to spend on the Pimco Income fund, not to mention his involvement in several closed-end funds. Is he being spread too thin?
Mike_E
I second Andy's assessment. I would add that PONDX has significant exposure (~60%) to developed and emerging market bonds. PONDX serves as a global bond fund for me.
https://investments.pimco.com/Products/pages/314.aspx
I currently own both own fu…
Here's an interesting website where you can backtest passive portfolios.
http://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/backtest-asset-class-allocation
The bad part is that the data is only good thru 2013. The rest of the website is pretty neat as well.
Che…
I bought into MFLDX a few months before it closed when its assets were growing and yet manageable (around 3-4B). After it's sale, I grew concerned as I saw its assets balloon and wondered how effectively they could put all that incoming cash to work…
I'm considering swapping my MFLDX (Marketfield) for ICMBX (Intrepid Capital Fund). ICMBX risk-reward profile is very similar to Marketfield's. Intrepid's assets are much smaller, and hence can be more nimble. I'm concerned about asset bloat with Mar…
Active Share for FPIVX = 97.8% per 12/31/13 Website Factsheet.
http://www.fpafunds.com/docs/fund-fact-sheets/ivf-fact-sheet-q4-2013-v2E2114D09CBF3.pdf?sfvrsn=2
Great work David.
Mike_E
Sold out of SUBYX and bought RNSIX. I'm looking more for downside protection from a stock-market correction than protection from rising interest rates. Time will tell.
Hi PRESSmUP. It's not just a single day's return that I'm concerned about. SUBYX's portfolio is currently positioned to appreciate as bond yields rise. But if the market corrects (as it most certainly will and investors rush into treasuries and thus…
Hi catch22,
I am in no way bemoaning Mr. Ivascyn's spectacular performance of which I have been a glad beneficiary. What I'm more concerned about is the future - especially as he becomes stretched even thinner at PIMCO. I'm worried he'll have less …
Link to company's press release:
http://www.grandeurpeakglobal.com/documents/pdfs/grandeurpeakglobalfunds-pr-20131216.pdf
I found this quite interesting from the above press release:
Given the liquidity challenge this can present, our current int…
Hi David. Thanks for hosting this event.
My question is, as someone who is 20 years away from retirement, what percentage of one's bond fund allocation should be allocated to the high yield portion of the market.
Second, on average, what percentag…
Hi MJG. I appreciate your efforts at making the complex simple. I believe you two questions goes a long-ways towards that.
I answered no-no. And yet, only 10% of my portfolio is passive. Why the contradiction? Do I have a split-investing personalit…
Reply to @fundalarm:
PDI is more like a hare than a turtle. Have you seen it's three-month chart?
Price = -14.62% vs. VBMFX = -3.35%
Not my definition of a turtle fund. It looks like a hare on the downside as well.
Mike_E
Update on SUBFX 30-day SEC Yield:
Per Morningstar: 30-day SEC Yield = 0.08%
Now that is for the Institutional version of the fund. Morningstar hasn't updated the retail (SUBYX) shares yet.
Wow, that is low. Maybe the fund has more cash than we k…
Thank you msf for your insightful comments. It never occurred to me to compare a similarly dated Treasury bond yield to the fund's!!!! Duh!
Much appreciated,
Mike_E
Good. I would hate to see such a young, blossoming website ruined by being bought out by a large corporation.
Keep up the great work. It is very much appreciated.
Reply to @andrei:
I'm attracted to the current discount but I'm also very wary of it, as seen by yesterday's NAV price action (-1.15%) and PDI's price (+0.88) that quickly closed the discount by 2.03%.
I'm afraid PDI's NAV will catch up (or more …
I bailed on ARIVX back in early September. I became convinced that Mr. Cinnamond's penchant for "confirmation" bias towards his large cash stake would permanently limit ARIVX's future upside. Perhaps he will be vindicated one day. After all, a broke…
Reply to @Charles:
Hi Charles. The 10% is a self-imposed limit that I learned the hard way. I overextended during the dot.com bubble and leading up to the financial crisis of 08-09. I got badly burned by investing to heavily in specific fund manag…
Great thread. What I find interesting is not just the three top funds, but their percentage in the portfolio. I'm curious to see how many investors allow any single fund to exceed 10%, which is my approximate cutoff.
My top three:
PIMIX - 11%
MWCRX…
Reply to @Charles:
I wouldn't be surprised to see a GrandeurPeak Frontier Emerging Markets fund when they decide to close one or both of their funds. They even alluded to wanting to limit the amount in light of other offerings.
Mike_E