Morningstar X-Ray

[FreeAsTheBreeze]

Anybody use this? Does it do a good job critiquing portfolios? Thanks.

 

[Leonidas]

Anybody use this? Does it do a good job critiquing portfolios? Thanks.

I use it to help me track my exposure to different sectors and industries. As for critiquing - I'm not sure how it does that. You see the countries, sectors, industries, valuations, types of holdings, etc. It just collects the information about your portfolio and spits it back to you. You have to apply your own standards and critique what you've got based on that.

 

[FreeAsTheBreeze]

I use it to help me track my exposure to different sectors and industries. As for critiquing - I'm not sure how it does that. You see the countries, sectors, industries, valuations, types of holdings, etc. It just collects the information about your portfolio and spits it back to you. You have to apply your own standards and critique what you've got based on that.

Thanks for the info, Leonidas. I guess this is not going to help me, I was looking for an overview of my portfolio with suggestions on how to improve it.

 

[LOL!]

There are two similar, but different M* X-ray tools: Instant X-ray and Portfolio X-ray. The Portfolio X-ray tool is superior with additional tabs and analysis. I think it is the only free online tool that will give you a mostly legitimate 9-box style grid for equities and bonds which is important to help know if you are tilted to small-cap and to value stocks. It gives you the average market cap of your equity portfolio.
It gives you some idea of US, foreign (developed and emerging markets) for your equities.
It gives you some idea about duration and credit-quality of your fixed income assets.
It gives you an idea of your costs.

As for "critique", it really doesn't do that. It simply presents the data. It is up to you to do your own critique.

If you want a critique, then the Vanguard Portfolio Watch tool will tell you things like, "You are overweighted in domestic small caps. You have more foreign than usual. You are underweighted in large cap. Etc."

 

[samclem]

Thanks for the info, Leonidas. I guess this is not going to help me, I was looking for an overview of my portfolio with suggestions on how to improve it.

You could post it here, you'll get suggestions. You can use percentages instead of dollar values if you prefer. The suggestions will be more useful if you provide info on what the portfolio is intended to do, what your time horizon is, any insights into your tolerance for risk, and maybe why you picked the things you picked.

 

[LOL!]

If you want suggestions on how to improve your portfolio, the best place is Bogleheads Investing Advice and Info and in particular Bogleheads :: View topic - Asking Portfolio Questions

But you will have to post your portfolio in the format they request over there. Expect to have all your actively-managed funds dissed and get proselytized about index funds.

 

[FreeAsTheBreeze]

You could post it here, you'll get suggestions. You can use percentages instead of dollar values if you prefer. The suggestions will be more useful if you provide info on what the portfolio is intended to do, what your time horizon is, any insights into your tolerance for risk, and maybe why you picked the things you picked.

We have a sizable portfolio (relatively speaking! ha) that we have accumulated through saving and living below our means. I would love to have some of the knowledgeable folks here take a look and give us some advice on how to improve it. Should I start a new thread with a title like, "Help fix this haphazard portfolio!" or just post in on this thread?

 

[samclem]

We have a sizable portfolio (relatively speaking! ha) that we have accumulated through saving and living below our means. I would love to have some of the knowledgeable folks here take a look and give us some advice on how to improve it. Should I start a new thread with a title like, "Help fix this haphazard portfolio!" or just post in on this thread?

Probably starting a new thread would be best. I second LOL's advice about requesting a look from the Bogleheads, you'll get good feedback there, too.

 

[MasterBlaster]

One comment about the morningstar tool. It uses data that may be month (or three) old depending on when each fund publishes holdings.

So an x-ray analysis may be somewhat stale - depending...

 

[jIMOh]

Thanks for the info, Leonidas. I guess this is not going to help me, I was looking for an overview of my portfolio with suggestions on how to improve it.

What one person wants help with another person is happy with.

I have an allocation desire of 45% large cap, 15% mid cap and 15% small cap (plus 15% foreign large and 10% foreign small).

I own funds in all 3 market caps (a large cap fund, a mid cap fund and a small cap fund). All 3 funds are managed.

I know my large cap holds a few mid caps
I know my mid cap holds both large caps and small caps, in addition to being 60% mid caps
I know my small cap fund holds both mid caps and small caps. I believe 40% of its holdings are mid cap.

What is a small cap? What is a mid cap? I think small caps are anything below $2 Billion in market cap, and mid caps are between $2 billion and $12 billion in market cap.

But there is no guarantee morning star is using the same standards.
And there is no guarantee my fund manager uses the same criteria (the prospectus does not spell out the exact cutoff between mid and small or mid and large).

What I do know is the total market is 75% large cap, about 15% mid and 10% small. As long as I have more mid+small than the total market, I am happy.

So all analysis in xray for me is based on getting information, and comparing it to my baseline.

You are different, you might want less small cap and less mid cap than total market, so you use different criteria for making changes than I do.

No way xray would know what I am looking for, it is just giving me information.