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.
There’s a whole industry dedicated to helping us milk the stock monkey. I mean hedge funds, financial advisors, robo advisors, on line gurus like Zacks, The Motely Fool, Seeking Alpha and all the assorted publications. Then there’s the active fund h…
Oh boy, we flew on Southwest 737 last summer. They switched from the long time stable DC-10 to this new plane.
Hi @Sven - The DC-10 is a wide-body type of aircraft, probably closer to the early 747s in size than the 737. It’s very unlikely SW eve…
Got cable? Skim through the hundreds of available offerings nearly any time of day or night to get a read on where America’s deteriorating brains are.
Both sides here are correct in some manner. However if you gave a bushel basket of money to som…
Yikes - Looks like it was prepared by a Madison Avenue Advertising Agency. This is not your grandfather’s T.Rowe Price. (So impressive, I’m thinking of moving all my money back there.)
I appreciate that free of cost I can pull up a stock on Zacks and get their quick read. Rarely does it influence my buy / sell decisions. But doesn’t hurt to look. Met a fella while traveling recently who swore by Boggleheads. I’ve never used them.
@Sven - I deleted one incorrect reference in my previous post. GDX is a gold miners ETF and not representative of funds that invest directly in bullion. However, IAU & GLD are a couple that do invest directly in the bullion (generally less ris…
”Another reason why I generally find worthless the annual/interim discussions of the performance of all stock funds vs indexes”
I’ve found the thread to be far from worthless. I’ll side with @dstone42 who seemed to find much merit. Off-script? Per…
”Our brains are wired to send us immediate signals of fear and reward when we witness stock market volatility. Adrenaline and dopamine rushes cloud our judgment as we weigh the risks and benefits of our options. Ignoring fear or delaying instant g…
I’ll be honest. I don’t think anyone who posts on this active board could handle the boredom of owning an indexed asset allocation or target date fund for the entirety of their portfolio, even if it might be good for our investment health in the lon…
@Sven - Picking up on what Mike said, ETFs that invest in the physical metal are less risky (or, at least less volatile) than funds that invest in gold mining companies. So the metal itself experiences less volatility than a group of mining companie…
Thanks @MikeM - No problem. Just that I’ve tried over recent months not to mention specific trades or holdings. I hope you and the others in PRWCX do well. Will follow the progress.
:) That’s mean @MikeM.
Yes, I pulled out the limited amount I’d had in PRWCX sometime in 2022. Reasons were complex. (1) I had many more opportunities at Fido than when constrained to TRP’s in-house funds in the past. (2) I revamped my portfolio…
”If I own a volatile fund, I expect it to go down more than the market. But I also look for it to more than make up that underperformance on the upswing. And I'll wait that out, unless there are specific reasons for me to doubt the fund or the manag…
@Baseball_Fan - “the endless money train”. Yeah - I’ve seen that reasoning somewhere too. :)
Personally, I try to stay as far away as I can from the major U.S. indexes - but do hold small bit an index fund based on a non-U.S. developed economy. N…
Never invested with Vanguard. From recent posts, customer service has declined over the years - perhaps something more important to post-retirees than the young. And, it sounds like they’ve pushed hard to move shareholders from mutual funds into …
Hold a target date fund for 20, 30, 40 years? Sounds good in theory.
What legal or contractual agreement exists with the sponsor to operate that fund for an indefinite time period or as @Baseball_Fan says to adhere to the same allocations, opera…
”From 12/31/2021 through 10/12/22, PRWCX lost 16.91%. Since then it has gained 13.54%.”
At the depth of the decline, $100 invested on 12/31/21 would have fallen to just over $83 - perhaps enough to spook some little old “grannies” (but no one here)…
”It would seem to mean little more than average investors fleeing investments at their low points only to buy back at higher prices. Add this data point to the "even more evidence about not beating the market" thread.”
Absolute! :)
Yes - That’s th…
Barron’s notes this week that like other ”balanced” funds (their depiction not mine) PRWCX has experienced outflows over the past year. I don’t know what this says about the fund, if anything. Just reporting.
Excerpt: Memories of last year's po…
”The vast majority of investors don't have the stomach or temperament to passively invest in SPY or VBINX over 40 years. Even on this forum, how many are only invested in only these two or similar passive investments?”
For better or worse, the kind…
Hang in there. Financials rebounded Friday. I suspect you made a good move. My 2-cents. :) I too have a tendency to track investments by the minute and day. In truth, your chances of hitting it exactly right are slim.
Let me expound …. : One r…
"I’m afraid some of us wouldn’t appear much better in the public eye if held under a 24-hour magnifying glass."
If you picked the wrong 24 minutes I wouldn't look so hot.
How did you know I had you in mind? What better testament? :)
:) Hi Catch. I’ve nothing against perversions. Sailing’s certainly within bounds. What I would dislike is disparaging remarks about personal lives of well known public figures - including Bezos. As Nick remarks in The Great Gatsby “I’m inclined t…
Today is the 32nd anniversary of my purchase of DODGX. It was neck and neck with SPY up until the dot com bust. From then on, SPY never caught up. What happened the last 1-3-5-10-15-20 years doesn't make any difference.
Congratulations!
Most D&a…
”Half a loaf is better than none at all”. :) Thanks @msf. Wow. I didn’t know Sony had such a product earlier. Of course, Barnes and Noble tried to compete against Amazon with their own e-reader but finally gave up. Remotely related - ISTM that …
“A surprising conclusion is that investor-returns and fund-returns are the closest for allocation/balanced funds, and the reason is that these fund holders stick longer with the funds and don't trade like funds in other categories (leading to laggin…
Any average statistics about how retail investors who move in and out of these funds based on their own analysis of the macro picture perform?
- Do they beat the funds that don’t beat the market?
- Or are they beaten by the funds that are beat…
I've lost tract of when that was @hank. Definitely Fund Alarm days. I think I started watching FA around 2006-7 or so so probably around that time. PMs and Asia EM were the hot sectors. Harry Brown's permanent portfolio was also talked about a lot. …
”Goes back to your Asia and the Miners days ...”
When the **** was that? Back in the 90s? Some here weren’t born yet. Agree - it’s great to see @rono chiming in.
Recently sold small spec stake in a silver miner (a case of the kitchen gettin…
@Sven and @LouisBraham - Thanks for your knowledgeable comments. I agree with you both to the point of saying that absolutist views on financial matters can be counterproductive and destructive of wealth and that they may blind one to potential o…
Sorry for the tax mess. Thanks for posting. Picked up a couple collectible U.S. coins several years ago. Have appreciated nicely. Assumed long term cap gains would apply. But if the tax hit is 28% (sounds like it), am better off hanging on.
Fortuna…
Should bonds owned within a fund like PRWCX or VWENX be viewed differently?
Likely, that’s a rhetorical question. But, to set the record straight, I’ve always held some bond funds - and always will. Is that the same as owning bonds directly? Of c…
@MikeM- thanks for the suggestion, but I really don't like bond funds because I have no control over the duration or market value at any point. At our ages I just use CDs or TBills, and hold to maturity.
I rarely cite Bill Fleckenstein here. His dai…
It's been so long since I used a MMF with Merrill …
It’s been a long time since I remember folks getting excited about money market funds. About 40 years. The 80s as I recall. :)
BTW - If anybody missed it, this week’s Barron’s notes that municip…
”Jeremy Grantham had a long piece years ago, predicting dramatic increases in price of food and agricultural products for a number of reasons.”
Yep - I’ve been thinking that way. But most of this stuff has really run up in price the past several ye…
