The Sun's Financial Diary

Several years ago, I invested in a mutual fund called Arbitrage Fund (ARBFX) for a short period of time (less than two years). The reason for me to get into this fund was that the fund’s investment strategy is different from any other funds I invested in and I was looking for an investment with [...]

Unlike our taxable investments which consist of quite a large number of mutual funds, ETFs, and stocks, I try to maintain a small number of funds in our IRA accounts and use mostly Vanguard index funds to keep the expenses low. Among the total of 10 funds in our IRA investments, we own Vanguard Total [...]

As I stated before, my investment objective is to generate passive incomes from investments. To reach that goal, I am trying to build a portfolio with dividend-paying stocks and mutual funds/ETFs. Among my dividend generators, one that I particularly like is Alpine Dynamic Dividend Fund (ADVDX). I started investing in ADVDX in April 2006 and [...]

have doubled When I checked with Quicken last night, I found that our investments in Dodge & Cox International Fund (DODFX) have gained 100%, the first fund in my collection that has posted triple digits return. I purchased my first share of DODFX on June 9, 2003 at $17.41. Since then, I have been making [...]

I moved one step further in achieving a simple financial life early this week when I eliminated one fund from our mutual fund holdings, reducing the total number of funds we own to 10 (still quite a large number). The fund got dumped was T. R. Price Emerging Europe & Mediterranean (TREMX), which I have [...]

A couple of days ago I provided a guest article to Jeremy at Generation X Finance when he was away on a business trip. The article, Mutual Fund Distribution Explained, gives some general ideas on what kind of distributions mutual funds usually pay their investors and the tax sequences of each distribution. It also talks [...]

According to Morningstar, Buffalo Small Cap Fund (BUFSX) will re-open to new investors for a short period of time. On Buffalo Funds website, there is some more information on Effective June 28, 2007, the Buffalo Small Cap Fund will re-open to purchases made through broker-dealers. The Fund will remain open for such purchases until the [...]

In the July issue of Financial Planning magazine, there’s an article about including alternative investments such as energy, precious metal, real estate, etc, in portfolio and how they will impact the overall returns of portfolios with and without these assets. This isn’t the first time I read papers that argue the case of having commodities, [...]