FYI: The DoubleLine Shiller Enhanced CAPE Fund doesn’t directly own stocks, yet is in the top 1% of the large-value equity fund category
Regards,
Ted
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/doubleline-fund-doubles-the-returns-of-rivals-by-uncovering-a-curious-strategy-2017-11-30/print
M* Snapshot DSENX:
http://www.morningstar.com/funds/xnas/dsenx/quote.html
Lipper Snapshot DSENX:
https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/fund/dsenx
DSENX Is Unranked In The (LCV) Fund Category By U.S. News & World Report:
https://money.usnews.com/funds/mutual-funds/large-value/doubleline-shiller-enhanced-cape/dsenx

FYI: (Click On Article Title At Top Of Google Search)
Millions of Fidelity Investment's retail customers were unable to access their online accounts on Wednesday morning due to an internal technical error, according to CNBC and other news outlets, but the outage did not appear to affect advisers using the firm's institutional online trading and wealth management platform, WealthScape.
Regards,
Ted
https://www.google.com/search?source=hp&ei=BM4fWqKGJsnF_QawxYywBA&q=Fidelity+outage+sidelines+retail+customers,+but+advisers+not+affected&oq=Fidelity+outage+sidelines+retail+customers,+but+advisers+not+affected&gs_l=psy-ab.3...3625.3625.0.5284.3.2.0.0.0.0.77.77.1.2.0....0...1c.2.64.psy-ab..1.1.83.6..35i39k1.83.k8NRAZNeTR4

Also what do you think of Matthews? I used to own 2 of their funds. Now, none. I now think of them as overpriced and under achieving. Just me saying.....

If someone wants to weight the Asian region on their own, I personally think Matthews funds are the best way to do that. I own SFGIX though, which has a heavy dose of Asia, both developed and EM. GPGOX also is quite heavy Asia. In fact, M* xray has my portfolio over-weight Asia in the foreign sector. These fund managers are a bit smarter then me, so I don't think I need a sector or region fund. To me it dilutes their (my fund managers) expertise. Hell, that's why I'm paying them. :)
All that (regional weighting) said though, I am strongly considering combining my percentage in DSENX fund with DLEUX to get a bit more of the CAPE value theme with developed European. Same process, more value(?) That's my thinking anyway.

" - And yes, I have reported (my "technique") that one who purchases DoubleLine NTF / higher-ER class shares at Fido can get them reclassified for free at DoubleLine to the lower-ER class once above a certain $ amount.
- This last procedure has nothing to do with anything else."
You do sound emphatic that this has nothing to do with anything else, including BCOIX.
"And yes, I am saying that Fido says one cannot buy BCOIX for other than a $50 TF, and moreover with a 25k min except for self retirement accounts, where the min is $500. "
I'll admit that I haven't asked Fidelity about this Baird fund specifically, but I have verified in the past that they'll let you convert Baird funds with no TF.
"As for transferring TF fund shares from one brokerage to another, I don't know much about that, never having bought (rightly or wrongly) TF fund shares. I don't know anything about other ways to escape TFs. I think someone here posted that the receiving brokerage sometimes pays one's fees of that sort. Certainly some give plain bonuses for transferring, though not Fidelity except in the form of lower-commission or some free trades. ML otoh pays serious moneys for transferring, depending on amounts"
As I've posted before, the fact that Fidelity does not currently have a cash offer on the table does not mean that it has not done so in the past or will not do so again in the future.
I have had positions in TF funds at Fidelity that I opened at no cost at another brokerage. When I closed that other account, I moved all the positions in kind to Fidelity. In fact, I opened a half dozen funds for free specifically to create open positions at Fidelity should I later choose to invest more than a small amount in them. Of course they were carefully selected funds; I wasn't going to open up dozens of junk funds "just in case".
I've also opened funds directly with the distributor when they were closed at brokerages, for the sole purpose of transferring them to my brokerage account. That can often be an easier process than going through a brokerage.
It's not that I'm insensitive to cost. It's that I'm willing to put in little sweat equity to get something that's both cheap and ultimately convenient. I'm also willing to pay a few bucks for convenience, but not much. Certainly not $75 - I'll do that to get cheaper shares (institutional TF vs. 12b-1 NTF); I won't pay $75 for convenience alone.
Everyone has their own threshold. Yours sounds like $0. But just in case it's a little higher, you might want to check out your ML account's fee schedule for purchases and transfers. Just follow this link (you'll have to log in):
https://olui2.fs.ml.com/RelationshipPricing/CommissionsAndFees.aspx

? Not quite following the misapprehension, but:
- Yes, I am saying that Fido says one cannot buy DODIX for other than a $75 TF.
- And yes, I am saying that Fido says one cannot buy BCOIX for other than a $50 TF, and moreover with a 25k min except for self retirement accounts, where the min is $500.
- No, I have had nothing other in mind all along.
- And yes, I have reported (my "technique") that one who purchases DoubleLine NTF / higher-ER class shares at Fido can get them reclassified for free at DoubleLine to the lower-ER class once above a certain $ amount.
- This last procedure has nothing to do with anything else.
As for transferring TF fund shares from one brokerage to another, I don't know much about that, never having bought (rightly or wrongly) TF fund shares. I don't know anything about other ways to escape TFs. I think someone here posted that the receiving brokerage sometimes pays one's fees of that sort. Certainly some give plain bonuses for transferring, though not Fidelity except in the form of lower-commission or some free trades. ML otoh pays serious moneys for transferring, depending on amounts.
HTH.

Hi Guys,
Diversification is easy to say, simple to do, but tends to sacrifice returns for reduced volatility. If you change your diversification category allocations dependent on perceived economic and/or market conditions that is a thinly disguised form of timing. It is a doable strategy but does require insights to be successful that escape most investors, and that includes professionals.
Class correlations do change as a function of time, but are just as hard to project as selecting winning stocks. It's never easy and simple. The Portfolio Visualizer site provides class returns and correlation data for various input timeframes. Here is the Link to that useful data source:
https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/asset-class-correlations
Good luck and good timing if you deploy this strategy for your own portfolio.
Best Wishes

It's not a bad choice but he dismissed a lot of possibilities without much consideration. It sounds like he started with the answer and needed to write a 300 word article (or whatever it is) to get there. If you've got 15 years then Schiller's CAPE ratio is pretty much the best predictor that's been found and that wouldn't really lead you to US stocks at this point.

About 15% of my self managed portfolio has been in DSENX. I decided to start moving some of that money to the International (Europe) fund, DLEUX. I started the process last week.
DSENX has made me a believer in the Shiller CAPE method. I've done well with the domestic fund. Though I told myself I would give the newer fund some time to prove itself, I decided to jump in sooner than later. The CAPE value method seems to work, at least when we are in a value market. My thought here is there is more value right now in Europe than the U.S. I plan to keep moving from domestic CAPE to the European model until the 2 are closer to 50:50.
FWIW, from their website, the 4 sectors DLEUX is invested in as of the end of the 3rd Q.
Consumer Discretionary
Consumer Staples
Health Care
Utilities

Disadvantage of a VG Brokerage account:
Can NOT use the 'directed dividends' (d/d) option, which is currently available only to "regular" (i.e., non-brokerage) accounts.
If you plan it out, the d/d tremendously!!! simplifies handling of IRA RMD's.
The supposed advantages of VG brokerage escape me, and their repeated promotion of the "brokerage option" - without mentioning the loss of d/d - troubles me.
IMHO, only a fool would convert to brokerage.

@davidmoran, two things:
(1) Some investors have had Pim multisector CEFs in general close to hair trigger for a few months now, because the monthly UNII/earnings reports have been showing lower distribution coverage - and this month's (which came out on Monday) was somewhat more brutal, with UNII falling quite a bit for several funds. PCI's been one that's been hit the hardest on that score. There's been a nice runup since the first very short-lived selling bout earlier that was an apparent response to one of those earlier data disclosures, so there'd prob'ly been some short-term valuation concern building after the recent runup.
(2) There was a really silly article on Seeking Alpha (which if I recall right, also came out on Monday) by some "advisor" who demonstrated in the piece that he doesn't understand CEFs or Pimco's strategies. It cast a shadow on PCI specifically. Appeared it was widely read, so it may have had an influence.
So the selloff started w/PCI but has since spread most of the way across the Pimco multi landscape, presumably because most have had lower distro coverage from income lately. (The average CEF investor is an individual investor who's in 'em for the income, so selloffs based on fears of income cuts are common.)
However, given the continuing, large NAV gains of '17, quite a bit higher than the sum of the distributions, there shouldn't be much doubt that most or all of the funds can meet the stated distributions for quite a while before there's a real question about it. They've likely got good cap gains on non-agency mortgages and other assets they can bring into the distribution stream if and when they want.
A lot of this stuff gets discussed on the M* CEF board.
-- AJ
P.S. The selloff started in the only Pimco multisector then trading at a discount.

Can't find the post where someone interestingly pointed out what happens w/ DSEEX / DSENX when US LCV persistently lags (a bit), but graphs are here (I added div etfs for the heck of it):
2y
http://quotes.morningstar.com/chart/fund/chart.action?t=DSEEX&region=usa&culture=en-US&dataParams={"zoomKey":11,"version":"US","showNav":true,"defaultShowName":"name","mainSettingId":"main","navSettingId":"nav","benchmarkSettingId":"benchmark","sliderBgSettingId":"sliderBg","volumeSettingId":"volume","defaultBenchmark":false,"id":"F00000QBBZ|F00000MVE2|FEUSA04AF8|FEUSA04ABY|F00000Q6JF|FEUSA04AEW|F00000OVWX|FEUSA00001","type":"FO|FE|FE|FE|FE|FE|FE|FE","region":"USA","name":"XNAS:DSEEX|ARCX:SCHD|ARCX:VIG|ARCX:DVY|ARCX:NOBL|ARCX:RPG|ARCX:CAPE|ARCX:SPY","baseCurrency":"USD","defaultBenchmarks":["",""],"chartType":"growth","startDay":"10/14/2015","endDay":"10/14/2017","chartWidth":955,"SMA":[]}
and 1y, with RPG and SPY pulling even or outperforming (I know RPG is equal weighting):
http://quotes.morningstar.com/chart/fund/chart.action?t=DSEEX&region=usa&culture=en-US&dataParams={"zoomKey":6,"version":"US","showNav":true,"defaultShowName":"name","mainSettingId":"main","navSettingId":"nav","benchmarkSettingId":"benchmark","sliderBgSettingId":"sliderBg","volumeSettingId":"volume","defaultBenchmark":false,"id":"F00000QBBZ|F00000MVE2|FEUSA04AF8|FEUSA04ABY|F00000Q6JF|FEUSA04AEW|F00000OVWX|FEUSA00001","type":"FO|FE|FE|FE|FE|FE|FE|FE","region":"USA","name":"XNAS:DSEEX|ARCX:SCHD|ARCX:VIG|ARCX:DVY|ARCX:NOBL|ARCX:RPG|ARCX:CAPE|ARCX:SPY","baseCurrency":"USD","defaultBenchmarks":["",""],"chartType":"growth","startDay":"10/14/2016","endDay":"10/14/2017","chartWidth":955,"SMA":[]}

You probably have your expectations set a little too high. Beating the S&P every year -- even by a little bit -- is near impossible and too much to ask for any fund. If you aren't going to match the market, the best you should hope for is to outperform the market over a "whole market cycle" (i.e. to the next bear market).
This fund is similar to Pimco's RAE Fundamental PLUS Fund (PIXDX / PXTIX) -- both are large cap US stock funds based on a value-investing methodology, and invest via derivatives backed by bonds to boost their returns. Looking at the two funds, DSENX / DSEEX has clearly outperformed so it seems to be doing just fine.
Last point is that it will likely be helpful for you to keep track of whether the fund's performance is due to the valuation methodology (CAPE index) or the bond portfolio return. I assume you can find this in the commentary or shareholder reports. It's possible that the bond side isn't working out for a period and ends up dragging down the fund return, but the stock side is still fine. Or the stock side could be lagging but it is being propped up by the bond wizard's magicks.

Per the Aug 31 stats, those are the four, and discretionary is the laggard. My question is why it wasn't knocked out by the poor momentum factor. Was energy the other sector in the top-5 value department, and so it was the one knocked out instead of discretionary?

Hmm, what's going on?
With a starting point of six months ago, CAPE and SP500 performance is close to identical,
Starting from 5/4/3/2/1mo, though, CAPE (which algorithmically value-churns every month) lags notably.
There must be a story here.

I hope no one noticed that I had stated Blackstone instead of Bridgewater for Dalio's hedge fund. Have now corrected that. Sorry for the goof.
Old Joe made an excellent point yesterday which did not escape me. And he generously repeats it here. That being that no one has exclusivity over particular topics. I'll go farther and state that when someone who seldom links stories or does so only a half-dozen times a week puts a story up on the board, I'm much more inclined to perceive their link as worthy of my time and thereby click on it. Human nature I guess. Ol Tom Paine said it well a couple hundred years a go: "It is dearness only that gives every thing its value."
None of this is meant to take away from anyone's contributions. Just that linking interesting stories found while reading has become more of a hassle nowadays than I recall in the past.
---
PS: @Ted, Ol'Joe is the best of the best here IMHO. No reason to insult him or anyone. Drive everybody away through this nonsense and what have you got left? The purpose of new posts should be to initiate/stimulate discussion. Otherwise, Google, Yahoo, Bing can churn out hundreds of financial stories daily.
I've said my piece. I'll shut up now.

Recently, mfs posted one of Old_Skeet's portfolio's dating back to December of 2015 that was linked back in 2016. For easy reference I am providing this same link beow.
http://mutualfundobserver.com/discuss/discussion/24926/old-skeet-s-new-portfolio-asset-allocations-2016
As there has been a good bit of changes in the holdings since then I am linking through this post the most current portfolio's holdings. A good bit of money has been moved left within the portfolio (since December of 15) into more conserative investments as the stock market has become more richly priced. Some sleeves and their holdings have been increased while others have been reduced. The growth area of the portfolio is where I am the most active with positioning naturally some takes place within the other sleeves as well. In tracking my portfolio through Morningstar Portfolio Manager it has had an investment return (excluding cash) year-to-date through July 2017 of 9.1% and for my bogey (The Lipper Balanced Index) 8.4%.
So, where did the money go?
From the reduction in the number of funds held in the growth & income area, the domestic equity sleeve was reduced from six funds to three funds. In the growth area funds were reduced from six to three in the global growth sleeve and from four to three in the large/mid cap sleeve. These monies were used to expand the holdings in the income area form thirteen funds to eighteen along with restablishing my CD ladder. So, indeed a good bit of money was moved left within the portfolio while some was added to current positions in the growth & income and growth areas plus there were also a holding change made within the global hybrid sleeve and some funds were moved from one sleeve to another. So, with this one can see Old_Skeet had indeed been active.
Sleeve Management System ... Here is how it works.
Now being in retirement here is a brief description of my sleeve management system which I organized to help better manage the investments held within mine & my wife’s combined portfolios. Currently, the master portfolio is comprised of two taxable investment accounts, two self directed retirement accounts, a health savings account plus two bank accounts. With this, I came up with four investment areas. They are a cash area which consist of two sleeves … an investment cash sleeve and a demand cash sleeve. The next area is the income area which consists of two sleeves … a fixed income sleeve and a hybrid income sleeve. Then there is the growth & income area which has more risk associated with it than the income area and it consist of four sleeves … a global equity sleeve, a global hybrid sleeve, a domestic equity sleeve and a domestic hybrid sleeve. An finally there is the growth area, where the most risk in the portfolio is found and it consist of five sleeves … a global sleeve, a large/mid cap sleeve, a small/mid cap sleeve, a specialty/theme sleeve plus a special investment (spiff) sleeve. Each sleeve (in most cases) consists of three to nine funds with the size and the weight of each sleeve can easily be adjusted, from time-to-time, by adjusting the number of funds and amounts held. By using the sleeve system one can get a better picture of their overall investment landscape and weightings by sleeve and area. In addition, I have found it beneficial to Xray each fund, each sleeve, each investment area, and the portfolio as a whole quarterly. Again, weightings can be adjusted form time-to-time as to how I might be reading the markets along with using a market barometer that drives an equity allocation weighting matrix as an aid to help set the stock allocation weighting. All funds pay their distributions to the cash area of the portfolio with the exception being those in my health savings accounts where reinvestment occurs. With the other accounts paying to the cash area builds the cash area of the portfolio to meet the portfolio’s monthly cash disbursement amount (if necessary) with the residual being left for new investment opportunity. Generally, in any one year, I take no more than a sum equal to one half of my portfolio’s average five year return. In this way, principal builds over time. In addition, most buy/sell trades settle from, or to, the cash area with some net asset value exchanges between funds taking place between funds.
Last revised: 07/31/2017 Master Portfolio
Here is how I have my asset allocation broken out in percent ranges, by area. My neutral allocation weightings are cash 20%, income 30%, growth & income 35%, growth & other assets 15%. I do an Instant Xray analysis on the portfolio quarterly (sometimes monthly) and make asset weighting adjustments as I feel warranted based upon my assessment of the market, my risk tolerance, cash needs, etc. Currently, according to Morningstar Instant Xray, I am about 20% in the cash area, 25% in the income area, 35% domestic stock area, 15% foreign stock area & 5% in the other asset area. In addition, I have the portfolio set up in Morningstar’s Portfolio Manager by sleeve and as a whole for easy monitoring plus I use brokerage account statements along with some other Morningstar reports for information and tools helpful in managing the portfolio.
Cash Area (Weighting Range 15% to 25% with neutral weighting being 20%)
Demand Cash Sleeve… (Cash Distribution Accrual & Future Investment Accrual)
Investment Cash Sleeve … (Savings & Time Deposits)
Income Area (Weighting Range 25% to 35% with neutral weighting being 30%)
Fixed Income Sleeve: BAICX, CTFAX, FMTNX, GIFAX, LALDX, LBNDX, NEFZX, THIFX & TSIAX
Hybrid Income Sleeve: APIUX, AZNAX, CAPAX, DIFAX, FISCX, FKINX, ISFAX, JNBAX & PGBAX
Growth & Income Area (Weighting Range 30% to 40% with neutral being 35%)
Global Equity Sleeve: CWGIX, DEQAX & EADIX
Global Hybrid Sleeve: CAIBX, PMAIX & TIBAX
Domestic Equity Sleeve: ANCFX, FDSAX & SVAAX
Domestic Hybrid Sleeve: ABALX, AMECX, DDIAX, FBLAX, FRINX, HWIAX & LABFX
Growth Area (Weighting Range 10% to 20% with neutral weighting being 15%)
Global Sleeve: ANWPX, SMCWX & THOAX
Large/Mid Cap Sleeve: AGTHX, SPECX & VADAX
Small/Mid Cap Sleeve: PCVAX, PMDAX & TSVAX
Specialty & Theme Sleeve: LPEFX, PGUAX & NEWFX
Spiff Sleeve: None at this time.
Total Number of Mutual Fund Positions = 46

I'm not bothered at all by the pitch at the end. Pretty mild. Not a worse ad than so much other. Interesting article. Choice 6, or maybe it's choice 5 modified, is to consider going with the algorithm of CAPE the etn.

I never look at ER particularly unless egregious.
Everyone might want to look at RPV and RPG too, but I understand the MC appeal of RSP. I would take CAPE over any of them. But it offers much less MC of course.

CAPE isn't difficult to emulate with etfs if you have the data to calculate their modified CAPE or you're willing to be off on your timing by about a month. It's just my guess, but because their version of CAPE looks at a sectors CAPE relative to its own history in order to determine whether its cheap or not, I think the chances of longer trends is higher and then being late by a month or so isn't as bad as if the turnover was higher. But that's just a guess.
DSENX is a lot harder to emulate because of the swaps. You can certainly do the same deal with the etfs and buy another bond fund but most people won't be able to do that with the same money. I think the people who can come close to using the same money twice will have to use futures for the equity exposure and then hold a bond fund that you can access very easily if you end up needing to meet a margin call.

I think this was discussed. Was there ever a conclusion about how to emulate (simulate) these with other, close-enough funds? M* is helpless, of course.