Just kept a promise to myself, taking two-thirds of the profit from MSCFX Mairs & Power Small-cap and feeding it to MAPOX Mairs & Power Balanced. Took profit from TRAMX and fed it to PRWCX. Watching and waiting for SFGIX to do something. It's up for me, but it has sat still for months and months. I see I've finally broke even again at this point with DLFNX.
Mobius predicts Nigeria will outperform. Over the years, Mobius seems to me to be always a day late or just wrong. Anyhow, I'm back down to the sum I started with in investing in Frontier Markets via TRAMX. Letting that ride, hoping Oliver Bell (Fund Manager) continues to get it right.

* Beefed up VEUSX for more lg cap Europe.
* Put in 2nd half of a position in long-short PMHIX; it's now my largest stock holding.
* Bought half a position in BBB muni fund VWALX.
* Moved $ from SFGIX (a lot) and MAPIX (a little) to a new position in EM allocation fund TGMEX.

We have a smallish portfolio with a long horizon so I cut down fund positions today from 8 to 6 in order to get more out of my savings:
Gone are MAINX, ARTWX and SFGIX. Proceeds went into starting GPROX and increasing MAPIX to 15% each. SFGIX will probably replace MACSX in fiancee's IRA of balanced funds.
Increased DODWX and PRBLX to 25% each. Considering changing PRBLX to VIG.
Bonds down to 10% with only DODIX. Considering going lower or eliminating for time being.
10% position in VVPSX remains unchanged, though eye is on BIAUX and FLPSX.
Also considering starter positions in MLPI and XBI or another biotech fund, though might wait for correction.

No recent USA buys- mutual funds or stocks. Added to OAKIX and SFGIX at beginning of the year. Sold WAEMX and bought GPEOX. For the short term, risky, mad, contrarian, gambling, keep things interesting money - researching junior silver, rare earth, and uranium miners. For the margin of safety, long term stocks continuing to look at small/mid cap companies that should benefit from low input natural gas prices and/or the re-industrialization of America.

Reply to @MarkM: I would be careful using M*'s portfolio breakdowns. They list ARTGX, for instance, as having 44.3% U.S. and 43.8% foreign equities, with 11.8% cash (as of 9/30). Artisan lists the numbers as 48.8% U.S. and 39% foreign equities, with 12.3% cash (as of 12/31). What's even more bizarre is that ARTGX has been slowly increasing its foreign stake over the past few months, so the M* numbers were never close to correct.
The M* numbers on SFGIX are close, but I always check the fund site to be sure now.

If you are comparing WESNX, SFGIX, and WAEMX, you ought to also be looking at RIMIX and CEFZX. These are all EM smallcap funds, launched roughly around the same time (the Wasatch fund is older, and now we have GPEOX launching). Seafarer is trawling exactly the same waters as these other funds, with perhaps small stylistic differences but basically living in the same higher-quality SMID EM world. The key difference, as you surmise, is to look closely at the stock selection process for each fund. Quantitatively, you can look at beta, downside capture, sortino, etc, but these are all such young funds you won't learn much. Turnover rate is a pretty good early indicator of differences in process. The best way to gauge the difference is to look at their holdings and written communications about them.

Reply to @MarkM: Morningstar breaks SFGIX into 68% emerging, 32% developed. It's split between Japan, Singapore, Taiwan and South Korea.
David

Reply to @David_Snowball:
David, If you had clicked on the hyperlink, it would have opened the chart in full with the legend.
Anyway,here is the order starting from the top: WAFMX,WESNX,SFGIX,MSMLX and WAEMX

Hi, guys.
In truth, the Blair fund (WESNX) wasn't particularly on my radar screen until you began discussing it in the recent Seafarer (SFGIX) thread. Spent a few minutes looking at the numbers for WESNX, SFGIX and Wasatch EM SC (WAEMX, closed) since that's one of the sector's flagship funds.
The most obvious place to start is the big picture: Seafarer is not trying to trawl the same waters as the other two.

• Wasatch is 95% invested, 83% small to midcap, MMC 1.8 billion, with a forward P/E of 17.
  
• Blair is 98% invested, 75% small to midcap, MMC 2.2 billion, with a forward P/E of 19.
  
• Seafarer is 98% invested, 50% micro to midcap, MMC 3.4 billion, with a forward P/E of 14.
  
• the average EM fund is more-or-less fully invested, 20% small to midcap, MMC 20 billion, with a forward P/E of 12.
  

Seafarer simultaneously has more developed market exposure (32% to 25% for the others - firms domiciled in the US and Europe whose earnings are predominantly generated in emerging markets) and more microcap exposure (6% versus zero for the others). Seafarer has a 1.65% yield, while the others are at zero.
The youngest of the three is Seafarer, which launched March 2012. Since the date of Seafarer's launch, $10,000 invested would have grown to:

• $13,500 Blair
  
• $11,800 Seafarer
  
• $10,500 Wasatch
  
• $10,100 Average EM
  

Since March 2012, the EM group has lost money in 11 months. Blair had four down months, Seafarer seven and Wasatch eight. In the months when the market has fallen, Blair outperformed the market on nine occasions, Seafarer on eight and Wasatch on five.
In a head-to-head comparison between Wasatch and the others, in down months Seafarer outperformed Wasatch on eight of nine occasions. Blair outperformed Wasatch on seven of eight occasions. (Why eight or nine rather than 11 as the base? Because there are months in which these funds are in the black even when the index has fallen; I've only looked at months when at least one of the three was in the red.)
I'm intrigued by Blair's performance. I'm reassured by Seafarer's and quite surprised by Wasatch's. I'm likely to look more into Blair (largish, but young) and just remain curious about Wasatch's (both too big and too old to fall within our universe).
For what interest it holds,
David

Reply to @EMinvestor: Guess I wasn't too clear; I didn't intend my comment to be about volatility, only that a growthy, high-P/E fund is not the same thing as a value-leaning, income-oriented, lower-P/E fund -- therefore the "asset allocation" comment.
However, maybe I should have mentioned volatility specifically: the only available down-capture ratio (1 yr.), according to M*, is 146 for WESNX vs. 106 for SFGIX. From those figures, you'd expect the Blair fund to get hit harder in a correction. (The number of holdings isn't something that controls downside volatility independent of what the exact holdings are.)
Again, this is not a criticism of the fund switch, just an observation. FWIW, I'm no diehard fan of SFGIX; I own it but have reduced my stake in it considerably.
Cheers,
AJ

Reply to @AndyJ: Why do yall say that WESNX looks much more volatile than SFGIX? It has more holdings, and so far, doesn't seem much more volatile in its performance.

Reply to @MarkM: Agree. Seems like more of an asset allocation move than a fund switch to go from SFGIX to WESNX. Not that it's a bad move on momentum grounds, just an observation.

M* mentions THDAX today, an EM fund which seems pretty comparable to SFGIX but has outformed since SFGIX's inception and has a 3 year track record that earns it 5 stars. Any thoughts? Obviously SFGIX at not quite two years old is too young to judge based on its track record along (as opposed to its managers' previous record, which is spectacular), but does anyone have any thoughts on THDAX?

Besides performance, I can't find much information on WESNX. What made you decide to switch from SFGIX to WESNX?

I switched from SFGIX to WESNX about a year ago and never regretted that.
SFGIX : 13 wk: -0.19%
1 yr.: 2.19%
WESNX: 13wk: 5.8%
1 yr: 14.32%
Both are new funds and have no 3 yrs record.

1-year MSCI EM: -9.53%
3 years: -5.58%
SFGIX: 1-year +2.19%
(too young for a 3-year number.)
http://www.msci.com/products/indices/country_and_regional/em/performance.html
COMPARE:
http://quotes.morningstar.com/fund/f?region=USA&t=SFGIX
...It does not look wonderful to me, either. Until you compare apples to apples, I guess.

Reply to @Alejandro: It has been so-so compared to what?
I mean, if you're comparing SFGIX to the broader U.S. market (up 42.5%) or Developed Markets (up 30.8%) since its inception, sure it looks miserable. If you're comparing SFGIX to its EM peer group, Seafarer had top quintile returns last year, and has returned 18.5% since inception, where an investment in VEIEX has returned -4.3%. It has done so with less volatility (at least according to Charles' figures). MACSX, which almost no one considers a bad fund, returned 22% over that same time, with a meaningful stake in developed Asia, including >10% in ultra-bullish Japan.
Seafarer is certainly a "groupthink" fund here, but it seems to me the broader problem isn't its specific performance but general expectations of short term returns for EM equity funds.

Not familiar with any ETFs that use preferred and common stock the way SFGIX/MACSX do. FEO is a CEF which might be closest. It is essentially a balanced EM bond/stock portfolio. There is a review here in the Funds section.
There are a spate of EM ETFs which focus on dividends. DEM and DGS come immediately to mind, though DEM's methodology has forced it to overweight state run Chinese and Russian firms. DVYE is available w/o transaction fee at Fido, as is the "minimum-volatility" EEMV.
Is there a particular reason you are looking for ETFs and not an active open-end fund like SFGIX?

You guys!!! :)
I remember very well getting recommendations from some of you in here, and I'm grateful. I just needed to feel more pain, I suppose--- and then also to have someone FACE TO FACE confirm what you all had told me. Then I moved pretty quickly. He suggested I hold up to 70% equities, in light of the prospect that I might NEVER cash-in and just leave my whole stash to loved ones. And, I should reduce my EM exposure. I do not think I'll reduce my EM quite as much as he suggested. My wife and I do have a legal will. Her brothers and my son (first marriage) are part of that picture.
I had been grossly overweight PREMX. It was up to about 35% of total porfolio. I stayed with it for several months too long, after the environment in the late Spring turned sour for bonds. And I'm sick of filling out forms, so I was bound and determined to find suitable funds WITHIN TRP. I chose PRWCX and PRESX. (And I own TRAMX at TRP, too.) All of these are Rollover IRAs.
After the New Year gets here, a substantial chunk of my MAPIX (Trad. IRA) will be fed to MAPOX (Trad. IRA.) The amount I'll be moving will be just less than one-third of my current MAPIX total.
(Sorry, but at the moment, I cannot be very precise, until I see the actual dollar amounts on statements and transaction confirmations.)
I'm taking some goodly profit from Mairs & Power small-cap MSCFX and feeding it to MAPOX, as well. MAPOX and PRWCX will be my twin domestic core anchors. And I'm taking TRAMX profit and feeding that to PRWCX.
Here's the picture right now, before making the "MAPIX to MAPOX" move, and the other steps I've just mentioned:
1. DLFNX 2.49% of total (Just treading water. I'm down literally only -$10.00 there, but that will be given back to me with the monthly distribution. That's the way it's been since I bought-in, at the Market top. Regular, taxable acct.)
2. MAPOX 8.09% Trad. IRA
3. MSCFX 3.33% Trad. IRA
(Both of these will be distributing nice year-end pay-outs, very late, as of next Monday, 30th December.)
4. MAPIX 36.27% of total. That will shortly be substantially smaller, about 22% of total. (Trad. IRA.)
5. MAINX 3.6% of total. It's treated me well. I added $1,000 lately, so it's up from $3000 invested to $4,000 invested. It's grown to $4,316.53 exactly. That extra $1,000 hasn't had much time to grow, yet. (Trad. IRA.)
6. MACSX. Held since 2003. I think it was my very first mutual fund investment. Regular, taxable account. It's 2.58% of total. This is the fund we "raid" as need be. But rarely.
7. SFGIX 2.76% Regular, taxable.
8. TRAMX 3.22% I bought it just when it stopped sinking and started growing, after watching it for years. Good luck, there. (Rollover IRA.)
9. PRWCX 17.81% (Rollover IRA.)
10. PREMX (Rollover IRA) 3.88%, down from 35%.
11. PRESX (Rollover IRA.) 15.97%.
ELEVEN funds. Too many. But it is prudent not to have too much in one place. The smaller holdings will remain, even SFGIX, which I was lately whining about. But I have learned, I think, not to be "married" to my choices forever. The PREMX move was late, but there was no disaster involved at all, by any means. I missed out on several months' profit in those other TRP funds, but caught the year-end pay-outs. Did I "buy" the dividends? I suppose. PRESX has been surging, even since the December pay-out. And since I made the changes in November, the portfolio is up nicely. Live and learn. :)

https://materials.proxyvote.com/Approved/MC6134/20131107/SAR_188690.PDF
These are the folks I want managing my overseas bucks. I sold SFGIX, kept MACSX, and will be allocating more dough to Grandeur Peak. Note in the report that they reduced exposure to emerging markets when it was the wise move. I like the sounds of their new EM fund as well. Happy New Year!