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I moved all of my TRP funds to my Fidelity account a couple years ago since all of the funds are NTF at Fido. This has made my life so much simpler. I have kept the TRP funds that have been good performers, but sold the laggards and reinvested in Fi…
I started buying brokered CDs at Fidelity because the yields are higher, they are easy to purchase, and it’s a convenient way to build and maintain a ladder. My credit union used to offer very competitive rates but has not kept pace over the past co…
@MikeM — That’s low for a balanced fund with about 60% of assets in bonds and cash, but one month’s data is not enough time to draw conclusions from. The yield in December 2023 was quite a bit higher — about 3.1% if annualized. FMSDX has a similar a…
I think @Old_Joe has it right. However, I don’t understand why some would buy a jumbo CD requiring a deposit of $100,000 or more when they could buy a brokered CD (fully insured) that yields much more. Makes no sense to me.
I noticed that too because we own PRFCX in three different accounts.
By my calculations, that would amount to a 1.7% yield if it pays at the same rate every month (which is probably unlikely).
I don’t understand your comment. When I check the CD rates at Fidelity, the yields range from about 4.9 to 5.15% through the entire 1-month to 5-year range. The yield curve has flattened some, but the highest rates are still in the short term range …
It may be that TRP created PHEFX as a substitute for other hedge funds, as I know they’ve created other special funds in the past to use in their allocation funds, such as a commodities fund. My main concern is that I don’t like “black box” investme…
@BaluBalu
In addition to RPGAX, TRP uses hedge funds in some of their Spectrum allocation funds, such as TRPBX. In the last two bear markets, TRPBX (which I owned for many years) did not perform any better than most comparable funds. I owned TRPBX f…
I do not understand the interest in hedge funds. Most of them underperform simple market index funds, and some fail spectacularly. T Rowe Price started allocating about 10% of the holdings in their allocation funds several years ago, and I can disce…
FYI, I talked to a Fidelity representative this morning and this is what I found out. My additional shares in PRCFX were purchased at Friday’s closing price. For some reason, the transaction didn’t settle until Monday, but that seems to be irrelevan…
Sorry if I’m being unclear. Here is what happened step by step.
On Thursday, 1/4, I sold $20K in another fund. Fidelity website reported that the sale went through at the closing price Thursday, and that my account had $20,000 cash available to tra…
The settlement date for shares purchased on 12/8 was 12/11. Settlement date for shares purchased on 1/5 was 1/8. Both purchases occurred on a Friday, well before market closing. Both purchases did not settle until closing prices on Monday. In every …
@yogibearbull — I’ve purchased numerous third party funds through Fidelity over the years, and I’ve never had a transaction take so long to settle. This was a cash purchase, not an exchange. In other cases, if I placed an order before 4 pm, the purc…
FYI, I purchased shares in PRCFX 12/8/23 and 1/4/24 through Fidelity. Both transactions took 3-4 days to settle. I’ve never had a fund purchase take so long to settle since I’ve been doing transactions online. I plan to speak to someone at Fidelity …
@Old_Joe — Oftentimes it pays to acknowledge your ignorance. When I first started buying CDs last winter, I was ignorant of some important details— such as whether they are callable. Some more knowledgeable posters pointed that out to me, and I rest…
@SecretAgent - My issue with Matthews was an investment with MAPIX. I owned it for more than 7 years, and it still lost money. I’m a buy and hold investor, and didn’t realize all of the turmoil going on at Matthews — managers leaving, manager change…
The attraction for many, I assume, is for investors locked out of PRWCX due to its prolonged closure. TRP put a hard close on PRWCX many years ago. I jumped on PRFCX when it became available and paired it with TCAF, so hopefully the result will repl…
@Derf — You can pay estimated taxes with the IRS form, or ask the fund company to deduct taxes from the proceeds. You’re better off paying estimated taxes from taxable savings, however, to maximize the size of the Roth conversion.
Nice to know, although I primarily use M* portfolio now as a watch list for intraday market movements. I haven’t updated my portfolios for our various accounts in ages because they are much easier to track and compare on the Fidelity website.
Among the SC funds that I track, FDSCX, Fidelity Small Cap Selector, is among the leaders for every time period going out 15 years. It’s been a steady, reliable performer — unusual for SC funds, which tend to be streaky. I prefer SC blend funds for …
Personally, I find the Fidelity website much more useful now than M*. The only thing I use M* for is a watchlist that follows an ETF portfolio similar to my holdings.
Excellent article, @TheShadow
I’ve invested in some of the funds discussed in the article, but not Bruce. I might still be invested in YACKX but they instituted a hard close, even for existing investors. So I switched to PRBLX, which was all for th…
Your pie charts seem to confirm my view that high foreign investments have hurt its returns. TRPBX’s foreign holdings are much higher than FBALX. I don’t shun foreign investments, but will prefer to use dedicated foreign funds from now on, particula…
2023 went out with a whimper rather than a bang, but it was a better year than most expected. I was most surprised by the rally in bond funds over the past couple months. Also surprised by the performance of foreign funds, which still trailed the S&…
@msf
You are correct that TRPBX slightly outperformed FBALX by about 1.1% in 2022.
However, over the following time periods, FBALX outperformed TRPBX annualized by this much:
1 year, 6.7%
3 years, 4.1%
5 years, 4.2%
10 years, 2.2%
Put another way…
If and when foreign stocks outperform US stocks, I suspect that TRP allocation funds will improve their relative performance. However, my observation is that foreign and domestic markets seem to move in sync more and more each year. So I’m not convi…
TRP certainly didn’t market or describe TRPBX as a global allocation fund when I started investing in it, although they’ve always had more foreign holdings than most balanced funds. If it’s a global allocation fund, then why did they create RPGAX? I…
We also own TAIFX in our taxable account, and it is also classified as moderately conservative. It’s supposed to be tax efficient. However, even considering the tax advantages of TAIFX, FMSDX has greatly outperformed it on an after-tax basis.
I’ve had a fairly large stake in FMSDX for about 2.5 years. Unfortunately, I bought it just before the last big market drop, and it’s just broken even during the past month. I’m sticking with it because it has a great record and I trust Fidelity’s m…
As far as I’m concerned, Matthews has poisoned the well. I will never invest with them again. When an investment company destroys my trust, I’m through with them.
Yes and no. I bought some US Treasuries this week that are maturing in 3-6 months with yields about 5.3%. I consider them comparable to CDs with certain advantages. My CD ladders will have issues maturing every 6 months or so over the next 5 years. …
@yogibearbull — Sorry, I didn’t mean to shoot the messenger, but I am disillusioned by M* fund rankings. I used to research funds religiously on M*, and experience has taught me that their rankings are nearly useless. I have bought many highly ranke…
FBALX is team managed, and Fidelity has a large stable analysts to draw from. M* praises other fund companies for using team management but they don’t seem to like Fidelity’s approach, even when it yields excellent results. I’ve owned FBALX for more…
M* continues to slight FBALX, one of the top performing balanced funds over every time period. Yet they promote TRPBX, a mediocre fund at best. I owned both for many years (until I moved funds from TRPBX to FBALX this year), and FBALX has greatly ou…
My experiences with foreign small caps and emerging markets have not been good. I invested in Artisan’s global small cap, and it performed so poorly that they closed it after a few years. I invested in MAPIX, and it was still losing money after more…
