An experienced trader can always tell the frauds and Pretenders from the real deals. The Pretenders have this need to always prove their brilliance by never being wrong and never admitting mistakes. One way to do this is always post your winning trades after the fact but never ever mention your losers.
But I digress. Speaking of making mistakes, I just made one of my biggest blunders in many, many a moon. My affinity for IOFIX is well documented above in this thread. Can’t think of a better bond fund technically and even more so fundamentally - the ever shrinking legacy rmbs market. Best of all it is not a groupthink fund. IOFIX is also a pattern trader’s dream and for reasons I won’t go into here. Also look at its performance in August 2017 and 2018. I was fully expecting a day like today this August. Mentioned it to a poster here in one of our many messages. I was locked and loaded with 89% in IOFIX. Yet last week went from 89% to 55%. Dumb me! That cost me five figures in additional profits today. As for being petty and complaining about an otherwise great day, real traders are also never satisfied and always striving for perfection. Trading was my profession and how I built my nest egg and old mindsets are hard to break.

For no other reason but for diversification. Only hold 2 bond specific funds, IOFIX and MAINX.

Thanks @Crash and @Junkster for sharing your current holdings. Junkster it sounds like IOFIX is a long term holding for you and not one that you trade in and out of. I'm about 10 years away from retirement so am 70% equities and about 30% in money markets. I've been looking for an entry point into bonds all year but have shied away because I keep expecting rates to rise... have been wrong to date. Certainly hard to establish a position now with the big run up in bonds.

”Other than IOFIX, my positions and opinions can change quickly based on market action. I may sell two of my holdings today. I guess that is why I get so many warning and ban notices from some fund companies because of my trading activities.”

Love it! Thanks for sharing @Junkster.
You remind us that bond investing can resemble anything from driving a Studebaker ...


To driving a Ferrari!

All depends.

I had been in VEMBX earlier in the year. But I also held PDIIX a multisector sector bond fund with a large exposure to emerging markets bonds ( as well as junk). I eventually sold VEMBX because I didn’t want the dual exposure to emerging markets. In retrospect should have kept it. This is the year everyone is a bond genius because of their outsized returns. You are correct in that presently my largest exposure by far is with IOFIX. That is because I am in a somewhat defensive mode now. I hold small positions in BDKAX, PDIIX, and PFORX the later a world bond fund. I am concerned about junk bonds in that they led the S&P up this year but then stalled the past couple weeks as the S&P surged ahead. Never listen to me though. Other than IOFIX, my positions and opinions can change quickly based on market action. I may sell two of my holdings today. I guess that is why I get so many warning and ban notices from some fund companies because of my trading activities. If anyone missed the first half rally in bonds I would be concerned about suddenly chasing performance now.

Thanks for sharing @Junkster. As I recall IOFIX is your major bond fund position currently. Are you also invested in an international bond fund? I'm trying to decide whether to establish a holding in international.

A M* discussion board personality who parrots a lot of what @Junkster says (and others here at MFO), but takes credit that it’s his own “research.” We disagree on this poster’s usefulness (I happen to follow/enjoy many of the discussion threads he starts), but he makes many trade claims/wins after the fact, that he won’t show proof of.
@Junkster , I went to M* shortly after I read your above post, and saw he had made a post there....about pooped myself at the “coincidence”, but saw it didn’t mention IOFIX. Thanks for sharing your portfolio/ideas from time to time, and your personal messages to me....I (and this forum) appreciate reading your thoughts!

Another nice day for IOFIX as it reaches yet another all time high. The ever dwindling legacy non agency rmbs market seems to still have life left in it and looking for a nice second half in 2019. Please close this fund!!

I don't see any reason to own this fund. YTD over 8% is impressive but I would not buy a bond fund that made over 5% in one day (that was at the end of 01/2019). This is a red flag. If I want to Multi sector funds see the following
Suppose I wanted to hold several bond OEFs without much trading. I searched at Schwab the following
Taxable Bond;
Morningstar Category: Intermediate Core Bond, Multisector Bond, Nontraditional Bond, Ultrashort Bond;
Morningstar Overall: 4 Stars, 5 Stars;
Standard Deviation: Less than or equal to 3.6;
Total Return (3 Month): Greater than or equal to 2; Average Annual Return (3 Year): Greater than or equal to 5; Average Annual Return (1 Year): Greater than or equal to 4.5; This criteria is to ensure a fund with good performance for 3-12-36 months to cover ST+LT performance.
Fees/Loads: OneSource Funds (no-load, no transaction fee); Open to New Investors: Yes
The following are pretty good choices I can live with (select 4-5 funds from the following VCFAX+PIMIX+JMUTX+PUCZX+JGIAX+IOFIX).

With junk corporates not the place to be for the time being, have returned to IOFIX. Also in a few groupthink funds (groupthink isn’t always bad). VCFAX ,PFORX, and JGIAX. Also hold HFATX and BDKAX. The later a bit of a plodder but a steady eddy plodder. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention how well RCTIX has recently performed. Dennis Baran profiled it in the May MFO commentary. Tough market when an unexpected tweet here or there can change the whole tenure of the markets.
Edit. If this market turns around today may buy some MWHYX in junk corporates. This fund has held up well among the recent decline in junk much like it did in the fourth quarter of 2018. While it will lag on any rebound a safe play nonetheless.

After taking a bit more of a look my concern is similar to Junksters. I owned IOFIX for a little over a year in my Bond Pot but sold it a couple of days after its large mid-November one day downward repricing. That just did not set well with me for a Bond Pot holding. Several weeks ago EIXIX got added to replace it at the high volatility end of that Pot. That continues to make sense for me. (There is also some SEMPX in that Pot.)

Yes, I too have seen the recent flattening, but no big drops fortunately.
Like Junkster said, this past month it rebounded quite well:

Up 2.3% YTD. Hard to complain.
Still 5% div.
I don't see the move away from RMBS Crash mentions.
@ MikeM. Yes, it's lumped in with MultiSector, but it's all about RMBS.
Tom Miner remains (a jewel). And Garrett. And Brian. And Jonathan.
Seems like nothing has changed in their thesis ... just the opposite I'd suggest, but I've not checked-in directly in a while (obsessed with making premium site priceless).
I remain heavy IOFIX. (FWIW, I was once heavy FAAFX!)
Hope all is well.
c

Oh, my! Thanks to all of you for responding. I'm quite certain that @Junkster AND the rest of you could play IOFIX much more intelligently than myself. I'm glad I asked. :)

I bought back into IOFIX last week with profits I took out of riskier CEfs after the big ytd runup began to slow, and looked at the current asset allocation on the web site before I plunked the $ down. It's still 98% residential MBS, but the legacy share is down to ~ 3/4 of the port. There's 0.4% in what they refer to as ABS, "which may encompass aircraft, shipping, and transportation assets" (so sayeth the fact sheet).
I'd suggest skipping M* entirely when researching bond fund allocation. It's easy to find almost any fund's allocation, using their info, and that info usually has the distinct advantage of being basically accurate. M* bollixed up their bond analysis several years ago, and it's really not worth the time using them for bond allocation info any longer.

IOFIX was near the bottom of the barrel in a robust Bondland until the past month where it has suddenly surged ahead. . Except for the new offering EIXIX which @The Shadow mentioned here, IOFIX leads all the others this year in the non agency rmbs arena. I still think IOFIX is an excellent and well managed fund. My problem with IOFIX was its one day decline late last year of 1.29%. Regardless, junk corporates from day one this year have been and remain the place to be in Bondville with gains in the 7% to 8% and more range. Even the normally staid (compared to its peers) Vanguard junk fund VWEHX is having a bang up year over 8% YTD. Four times out of the past five negative years in junk they came back the following year with double digit returns. So let’s hope this will be 5 out of 6 as last year was negative.

Thank you, @MikeM. I'm too lazy to go to the website, but M* shows it has apparently re-shuffled: 81% asset-backed. And 9% Agency MBS CMO. And 4% Non-agency RMBs. And 4% Commercial MBS.
I like my core bond fund, though it's billed as "Global Multi-Asset Bond," which is PRSNX. Anyhow, it is my anchor now, at over 50% of total portfolio. I'm growing my supplemental bond fund for the purpose of monthly income, which is PTIAX. I know it is not a "core" fund, either. It shows 30% Non-agency Residential MBS and 17% Commercial MBS and 7% corporate bonds and 4% Agency MBS CMO and 4% asset-backed.
Biggest difference between them is in the Asset-backed category. Quite a chunk of difference between them in the Agency MBS CMO category, too.
IOFIX doesn't hold any Corporates to speak of, apparently.
PTIAX is giving me a bit better dividend each month, but that's not etched in stone, either.
PTIAX suits me re: risk/reward profile, in category: Low/High.
IOFIX, so far this year, has produced a tiny bit more in share value at +2.59% vs +2.4% for PTIAX.
Just wanting to look under the hood. Unless things go to shit, maybe IOFIX could be a tertiary source of income, down the line. Its risk/reward profile looks good, too.

Hey, Charles.
Still in love with this fund? Still on-board? Still own it? Thanks.

Before jumping back into junk bond funds at the end of December I was 100% in a Fidelity money market fund. I would had no qualms whatsoever having all that in STATX were it available to me at T D Ameritrade. Kind of reminds me of IOFIX in early 2017 in its trend persistence. Many refused to invest in IOFIX then because they didn’t understand its mandate and portfolio of toxic debt.

Hey MFOs,
Other than GNMA funds (such as FGMNX) what other funds fit in this category?
Good interview, thks for posting!

He is talking primarily about non agency rmbs of which they still hold large positions in. A number of funds in that category including the often mentioned IOFIX and SEMPX as well as some lesser known ones such CADTX BDKAX DPFNX and RCTIX to name just a few.

I spoke with the manager today. He said that the fund does have daily accrual.

All you have to do is look at a chart of this fund or look at its daily price history to see it is not a daily accrual fund. The price declines by the amount of the dividends every two weeks. That is not the case with funds where the dividends accrue daily and then paid out whenever - primarily end of month like say a PIMIX. IOFIX a favorite here is another example of a fund that is not a dail accrual fund. Either I am really missing something here or the fund manager.....................