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.
It was only seven years since I made this post about STADX specifically and "enhanced cash" funds generally. How soon they forget :-)
https://mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/comment/21712/#Comment_21712
Until the GFC when most of these f…
There are a lot of different situations that are getting mixed together here.
@MikeM raises the question of employer plan rollovers in kind. Often employer plans require you to liquidate your holdings and transfer cash. If they make an exceptio…
Few years back I recall someone bringing a bill to congress which would make it illegal for members of Congress to trade on insider information. The bill was soundly defeated.
STOCK (Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge) became law in 2012. It w…
Glad to see @David_Snowball start this thread. I was thinking about starting a thread that was a bit broader - what's happening locally - that would include things like this.
I received email from one local restaurant asking people to buy gift ca…
Mark - This article https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/20/us/politics/kelly-loeffler-richard-burr-insider-trading.html?searchResultPosition=1 refers to Sen. Feinstein's office stating that her investments are in a blind trust. (There's a link.) Not s…
I think people tend to conflate libertarians and Austrians with a lot of other people and ideas on the right.
But hey. I know "conservatives" that think I'm a downright "communist" because I voted for some Democrats.
Politics are closer to an M* s…
Finally, the corporation's first duty wasn't always to shareholders. In the original history of corporate charters, a corporation had to be shown to be beneficial to society to exist. This shareholders' first and screw every other stakeholder--emp…
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/20/the-federal-reserve-is-expanding-its-asset-purchases-to-include-municipal-bonds.html
Good find. Here's the Fed's PR piece and the actual term sheet.
https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/pressreleases/monetary2…
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said on Friday that Tax Day would be moved to July 15, giving Americans an additional three months to file their income tax returns.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/20/world/coronavirus-news.html
Mr. Mnuchin said th…
What's the point of the obfuscation if the next document filed with the SEC (the reorg proxy) reveals all? (Don't even try to answer that.)
LREOX is the Predecessor Portfolio. It's a series of the Lazard Funds. The predecessor fund to the Prede…
That's a good question. These days I haven't been paying too much attention to muni MMFs because they're paying less than online bank accounts (after tax). So it doesn't make much sense to take on their additional risk. (Aside from consideratio…
In another thread, I wrote that according to IRS guidelines, taxpayers are allowed to defer their first quarter estimates until July 15th, though their second quarter estimates are still due a month earlier, on June 15th.
As to what I will be doing…
CNBC article, Monday:
"In the days ahead, Jones expects the Fed to institute some type of facility to address commercial paper."
NYTimes article Wednesday (link comes from Mark's MMF article):
"Taking a page from its 2008 financial crisis playboo…
Here's the Fed PR release:
https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/pressreleases/files/monetary20200318a1.pdf
I'm surely in the minority here, but my reaction is: how dare they!
The federal government bailed out MMFs a decade ago and swore it w…
The IRS finally issued its guidance as Notice 2020-17.
https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-drop/n-20-17.pdf
Payments may be delayed until July 15th, not 90 days as Mnuchin stated. Close enough for government work, I suppose.
Taxpayers are also allowed t…
"You get so used to CNN and the others exaggerating stories to attract viewers that by the time something serious like this comes along you’ve become a bit jaded and dismissive. But this is the real deal folks."
There's a fine weekly program on NPR…
In the past, ARTKX is a fund I would have looked at. But given its declining relative performance over the years (going from 5* over the past 10 years to 4* over the past five, to 3* over the past three), I might have expected it to have reopened …
"Ordinarily, individual income taxpayers must submit their 2019 tax returns by April 15. This delay would push the due date to July 15."
Are you sure? The article says that taxpayers can delay payments up to 90 days, but it doesn't seem to say th…
By definition, prime MMFs are not exclusively invested in federal government securities, let alone treasuries. This is why the SEC instituted regulations on prime MMFs that require them to impose redemption fees and/or restrict redemptions when th…
And then there's all the lights and heat not being used in the public schools, the parochial schools, the churches, (all of which have, in the past, been immune to recessions and are now closed).
Plus just the lights in restaurants and stores…
The US does have more ICU beds per capita than other countries as the graphic shows. A Johns Hopkins page provides similar data.
That's certainly one measure of preparedness. But it's just one of many and IMHO underscores how the US healthcare…
All gone. Donated: 2/3 to a local church, 1/3 to Tennessee attorney general's office.
https://www.boston.com/news/national-news-2/2020/03/15/matt-colvin-donates-hand-sanitizer
The originally cited column reads in part:
If you’re a young investor, and even if you’re anxious about the effects of the coronavirus pandemic, most of your 401(k) should be invested in stocks, with a smaller share in bond funds
But what if you'r…
Dollar, Equity Futures Drop as Fed Slashes Rates (Bloomberg via Yahoo)
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/yen-extends-gains-fed-slashes-210909833.html
Futures on the S&P 500 fell 3.9%. The gauge advanced 9.3% on Friday.
Also because, as @PRESSmUP pu…
But wait, there's more. Remember how WHO offered to send test kits to the US and we didn’t take them? Then Jared Kushner was put in charge of the response?
Oscar
Two guesses who’s brother owns this company...
About OscarNot to get too far off t…
In the way back days I lived in Taiwan for 2 years. There would be, as there are now; times when one wouldn't have a full understanding or full thought or reply to a question or circumstance.
One phrase I used, at times, in Taiwan was:
我能说什…
What about testing to know if someone has COVID-19? Bottom line, there is not enough testing capacity to be broadly useful. Here’s why.
■ The leading clinical lab firms, Quest and Labcore have capacity to process 1000 kits per day. For the na…
Here's a NYTimes article on the TP panic buying.
"A retail analyst, Burt Flickinger of Strategic Resource Group, said big box retailers like Costco and BJ’s Wholesale Club have been able to restock most empty shelves within a few hours, or by the …
I had transferred my taxable account holdings (cost basis figures don't matter in IRAs) out of Merrill Edge because of their rounding/fudging and other problems. Merrill provided the receiving brokerage its incorrect figures.
The receiving broker…
"This is why we have to Flatten the Curve."
All the bullet items shown are economic. Why would spreading out the same number of incidents over a longer period of time ("flattening the curve") help the economy? IMHO, we need to (a) flatten the cu…
Now I see for EACH of my $100 x 4 investments I've been charged $50 commission. If anyone contemplating TIAA, stop. I'll try to figure it out. The funds STILL show NTF. And I was never charged for my initial investment. It's also clear additional in…
If we're going to go all technical on a poorly written speech (cargo included), let's get it right. The speech mentioned the United Kingdom in the 7th paragraph, not Great Britain.
https://www.vox.com/2020/3/11/21176001/trump-coronavirus-speech…
I'd give the generic answer that Vanguard is better at running index funds - often holding less cash, trading with an eye to tax implications, etc. But there's an additional reason that Vanguard index funds are more tax efficient. They usually h…
A follow up article, of sorts:
in recent days, as fears of a pandemic have escalated, the market for Treasuries has experienced a liquidity problem — meaning that the buying and selling of this kind of debt at reasonable prices has suddenly gotten a…
Geez, thanks I think. I'm not sure I'm even in the same league as msf and TheShadow, and I often wonder if I'm even playing the same game. You're giving me way too much credit. Having worked a few years in the semiconductor industry (specifically …
As Boris Johnson explained a week ago:
1. Containment
2. Delay (so that resources will be less stressed)
3. Research
4. Mitigate
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1250211/Coronavirus-UK-plan-what-is-UK-plan-four-phases-Boris-Johnson-speech-in-ful…
I see the confusion - terminology. What you call the "retail class" is a fund with two classes, a retail class and an institutional class. The latter (PRAMX) has the same $1M min as the institutional fund's single share class.
The retail fund (i…
To clarify - these are two different funds. The fund being liquidated is "Institutional Africa & Middle East Fund". The fund you own, which has two share classes (investor and institutional) is "Africa & Middle East Fund".
The former (T…
Deposition and photolithography are two distinct steps in the manufacture of semiconductors. A third step is etching.
One deposits a layer of silicon, then applies the mask (stencil) for a layer of circuitry, and then etches the layer. Rinse…
