Thursday, January 05, 2006

Mutual funds

...And here's a look at some of the mutual funds I'll have to consider selling. These have mostly done so well I don't really want to get rid of them, but some of them seem like they might just be teetering at a peak after big gains in the last couple of years, so perhaps I'd be locking in the best returns I could get. Of course if I actually had any way of really knowing that, I'd be a millionaire by now...


current price % change since I bought
BRSIX $ 18.23 112.89%
ICENX $ 34.12 65.83%
RYTRX $ 12.82 58.47%
RYVPX $ 12.35 31.38%
VEIEX $ 20.02 14.97%
TIVFX $ 15.71 7.50%

8 comments:

Hazzard said...

Wow,
You didn't have any dogs in your portfolio? Those are impressive gains.
Hazzard

bored said...

very impressive perfomance, indeed!

Its no surprise to me that your top four funds on the list are either small cap or energy related, both of which have performed well recently.

Some things to consider before you sell...

1) Tax consequences. Unless they are in a tax deferred account (roth, 401k, etc...) be prepared for the tax consequences!

2) Why not just rebalance? It is impossible to predict the future perfomance of these two sectors, and I dont know what you hold in the rest of your portfolio, but rebalancing should be considered.

my $0.02! :)

good luck!

Anonymous said...

You say, "These have mostly done so well I don't really want to get rid of them," when actually SELLING HIGH IS GOOD. Of course you never know how much higher something will go, but don't talk yourself out of free money by waiting for the funds to drop before you sell them.

Madame X said...

I did have some funds that were not doing very well (this post from July mentions them) but I sold them in November, basically breaking even. They were tax free bond funds, so I didn't think there was much potential for them to do better any time soon.

cashmoneybrother said...

were the tax free bond funds double tax free? (i.e. NY state tax free muni funds). If so, the interest free feature may have obviated the negative returns of the fund itself. Moreover, due to the recent announcement re: interest rates, rate hikes are at or near the end. i would not be surprised to see tax free muni funds hold their own this year. That, coupled with the tax free nature ramps up the yield and they should be a portion albeit small, say 10% of your portfolio, particularly at your age. Personally, I'm about to dip into a NJ tax free fund. good luck,

Amdollar said...

Nice work! Your returns have been phenomenal! Im curious to know how you came across those funds? My mutuals have only gained 10% on average with my 401k. no complaints though :) could be worse

Madame X said...

I use a highly technical analytic method when picking mutual funds. I use the fund screener in E*Trade and check the star ratings and returns over the past few years, as well as expense ratios. I then attempt to consider portfolio balance and try to buy an international fund if I don't have one, or a small cap one if I haven't tried one of those yet.
Then I say "uh, this one looks nice" and I buy it.

bored said...

hehe,

your advanced mutual fund anaylsis system sounds familar... ;)