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.
The 30 day SEC yield is the best approximation of what a fund would return if it held its bonds to maturity/call. If one thinks of a portfolio consisting of a single bond, the SEC yield would be the YTW.
For example, a 5 year bond selling at $…
No problem on the M* investor site downloading VWELX data going back to 1929. Of course M* data for that era is only monthly. So while daily values are downloaded, they don't change most days. You might want to do some interpolation as a fixup.
The fact that 73% of TROW is own by so called “smart money” ... says something
Regardless of whether one agrees with that or not, one doesn't get that datum (73% owned by institutional investors) from a ranking of the largest institutional investo…
I find "Top Institutional Holders" tables of dubious value. The pecking order correlates with the size of the institution. Vanguard owns a lot of everything because Vanguard is larger than other institutions. That doesn't mean that it's enamor…
Not only that, but if the stock is sold within 61 days of purchase, that dividend will be taxed as ordinary income.
https://www.fidelity.com/tax-information/tax-topics/qualified-dividends
My condolences as well. The first thing to do is to take a deep breath and not rush. Especially with Vanguard. For one thing, as others have said, they're just not available now. Another reason is that the instant you notify them of the death…
It's Friday night, thoughts getting a little weird. Below the image is my Rube Goldberg-ish idea on what Vanguard might have done.
When the institutional investors place exchange orders from retail to institutional class shares, Vanguard redee…
The savings bond calculator will display the value of a savings bond as of any given month. To find the net amount of interest credited to the savings bond between two given months ask for the values on those two months and take the difference.
N…
The Regular TDF did not have its own institutional class. It didn't even have Admiral shares. Below is an excerpt from the 2020 SAI for the funds.
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/752177/000168386320000191/f2353d1.htm
That's why Vanguard…
Was it possible for Vanguard to preemptively convert retail fund shares
(for $100M+ accounts) to institutional fund shares and avoid this debacle?
Yes and no. For, say the 2030 target date, there were two completely different funds. A retail fun…
I suppose it's possible, but the investors would had to have been lucky in their timing. For example, suppose they looked at Vanguard's projected cap gains distributions and decided that they had to pay a Q4 estimate by Jan 15th. They might have…
See yogi's thread (citing also WSJ and IBD)
https://mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/59772/vanguard-settles-on-tdfs-with-ma-regulators
The reporting on this has left me rather confused. As near as I can tell, Massachusetts was focused on…
So, what was that all about pointing out FZDXX is subject to redemption gates, without mentioning that SWVXX is also subject to the same redemption gates?
Schwab doesn't treat SWVXX as a checking account. So at Schwab you can't pull money out (say,…
The incremental yield between SPAXX and FZDXX is about 40 basis points (0.99% vs 1.40% SEC yield as of June 30th). And as @BaluBalu noted, you don't have to move money out of FZDXX to write a check. So you get that extra 40 basis points for week…
From Fidelity: " government money market funds: Transact at $1.00 and are not subject to SEC liquidity 'gates and fees'".
https://institutional.fidelity.com/app/item/RD_13569_45072/government-money-market-funds.html
Same difference. All prime fun…
Anyone can open a conventional taxable brokerage account at TIAA.
https://shared.tiaa.org/private/mytcbrokerageaccountopening/aobrokerageapp/secure/required
It gives you access to what you'd find at most brokerages - stocks, ETFs, mutual funds. …
I put in an order to sell entire SWVXX at Schwab yesterday [Wed June 29]. I had to wake up today at 6 AM PST to pick a family member at the airport. So, I checked my Schwab account pre-market and the SWVXX sale cash was already in the account.
Cas…
What I tried to do was look for a similar historical period and see how different stock allocations would perform under those conditions. The cash buffer was a conceptual attempt to mitigate most, but not all impact of market swoons.
In essence,…
One can't always believe what one reads. Especially from tertiary sources.
Investopedia writes:Not every security will have the same settlement periods. All stocks are T+2, and mutual funds differ but are T+1 and T+2, depending on the fund. Howev…
I agree that seems like one part of the issue. Another perhaps related part may be the way the put spread collar works.
Because the three month collars have different start and end months in each of the funds, it's possible for one fund to be i…
While I a not sure I believe them, Schwab chat claims with fed reserve raising rates, next months payout will be close to 1.19%. The "waivers' apply to individual investors also he says.
That sounds more or less correct. As with MMFs generally, SW…
Fidelity's site will give similar comparison data, but only for funds they sell. That includes all funds and share classes the sell, not just their NTF funds. But it omits funds like Admiral shares of Vanguard's actively managed funds (e.g. VWIA…
Not sure if it's had the same name?
That would be a good guess. But it wasn't quite a name change. Kiplinger says that T. Rowe Price only started its first mutual fund in 1950.
https://www.kiplinger.com/article/investing/t041-c009-s002-top-funds-…
Pioneer Fund was founded in 1928 by Philip Carret as the Fidelity Mutual Trust (not on any list in the SEC study).
https://www.corporateknights.com/responsible-investing/a-short-history-of-responsible-investing/
On p. 735, both Loomis-Sayles Mutu…
Here are a couple of threads that may help:
Oldest Mutual Funds Still in Existence (2019 thread)
Second Oldest Stock Fund Is As Nimble As A Teenager (2014 thread)
As to the merger of Quarterly Income Shares into American Business Shares in 1944, yo…
I was about to post the same thing. This was happening sporadically yesterday. Today the "transition" is complete. Legacy pages have apparently, to borrow from Monty Python, ceased to be! Are expired and gone to meet their maker!
Further, some view ESG strictly from an investment perspective - how do these factors affect a company's risks - while others view ESG investing as a way to improve the world, or at least not contribute to its decline.
For the first perspective (an…
I would take a Treasury bill over a CD of the same maturity, all else being equal. They are state income tax exempt, so their post-tax return is higher than equal rate CDs if the income is taxed.
Duration is slightly different. T-bills pay inte…
GSIHX has 1/3/5 year tax cost ratios of 0.77%/0.31%/0.20%. That seems pretty well suited to a taxable account. Moreso because it passes through a foreign tax credit.
http://performance.morningstar.com/fund/tax-analysis.action?t=GSIHX
https://ww…
Fixed annuity yields are finally back to being significantly higher than CDs. They are another option to consider - for IRAs, for savers over 59½, for people who will be at least that old when the contract penalty period expires.
For example, ins…
The new (investor) interactive charts have less information. They don't have a volume bar chart underneath. Volume is also missing when you mouse over the graph.
The "old" interactive charts, if displaying a single ETF, would provide open, close…
It seems that M* has already begun the process by making it harder to find the existing tools. It used to be that the main page (www.morningstar.com) had links to the fund screeners (basic, premium), stock screeners (basic, premium) and other tool…
New funds do seem to draw a significant amount of attention. What else makes TOTR attractive?
Looking for a short term bounce? It's down a bit more than average YTD for its category (13% vs 11½%), but not enough to call it out.
Dividends? …
Fees
Schwab typically receives a fee from each issuer in connection with the placement of the CDs. Schwab may seek to negotiate a higher or lower placement fee based on Schwab's view of competitive necessities. The amount of the placement fee pa…
There are actually four different services:
Legacy - portfolio, watchlist
Investor - portfolio, watchlist
One can convert (import) a legacy watchlist into an investor watchlist. The investor watchlist page is found by clicking on the "eye" icone …
OK, I worked it out. Apparently what I have been calling "portfolios" M* has been calling "watchlists". There is an option to migrate watchlists and that was quick and easy to use.
The legacy portfolio manager has for many years had both portfolios…
had to establish a basis at time of death
ISTM that should have been very simple - it's the market value (not book value) of each asset at time of death (or six months later if using an alternate valuation date). In the case of MLPs which are trad…
Once upon a time there was a fund company that offered 1.25x funds, figuring the relatively low multiplier might hit a happy medium between increased returns on good days and the adverse cumulative effects ("beta decay") of leverage in volatile mark…
HaHaHa :) WABAC. I think of Pat every time I hear the name Paulson. He should have been president!
Just so long as he made sure to keep Officer Judy along with him for protection.
(Pat Paulsen and Officer Judy made recurring appearances on the S…
Sometimes it does. As described in a NYTimes article (excerpted below) about Target cutting prices. Or encapsulated more succinctly in this cartoon:
Target, like many retailers that faced skyrocketing demand in the early months of the pandemic…
