# Manulife mutual fund performance



## none (Jan 15, 2013)

I got my last Manulife mutual fund statement. Funny, like most people, I had never looked at it that closely.

I thought it had been doing fairly well.

I made a whopping 1.1% over the last 6 years.

Geez I'm looking forward to selling those dogs. woof.

Future indexer.


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## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

That performance isn't too unusual. The TSX Composite is pretty much flat for the last 6 years and some sectors (like energy) are negative. So even if you had chosen a stock index fund you would not necessarily have done much better.

The primary reason for your poor return is that the stock market hasn't been steadily going up in the last decade. The secondary reason is that the high mutual fund fees were probably killing any money you would have made


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## doctrine (Sep 30, 2011)

If you had bought stocks that had 3-4% yields back in 2007, at least 6 years later you'd have 20-25% return in cash, even if the stock price was the same.


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

6 years is 2007 to 2012. 2008 crash followed by a long, arduous climb back.

Indexed portfolio returns, 6 years, 2007-2012

40/20/20/20 mix: +2.55%
25/25/25/25 mix: +1.54%

These are pure index returns, no fees.

You can play with the numbers here:
http://www.ndir.com/cgi-bin/downside_adv.cgi


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## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

> made a whopping 1.1% over the last 6 years.


doctrine makes a good point about the value of dividends. They certainly shine in a sideways market.

But the real kicker is how much better you would have simply been in cash & GICs. Easily could have been a 25% total return in the same period.

I know I'm being a broken record on this topic, but I think the love for stocks out there is somewhat undeserved. They were great until the late 90s, but ever since Y2K they've been a pretty crappy place to be. Don't be too quick to ignore what cash and GICs can do for you!


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

james4beach said:


> But the real kicker is how much better you would have simply been in cash & GICs. Easily could have been a 25% total return in the same period.


100% Short Canadian Bonds returned 4.56% annualized. 31% total for the period.


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## none (Jan 15, 2013)

doctrine said:


> If you had bought stocks that had 3-4% yields back in 2007, at least 6 years later you'd have 20-25% return in cash, even if the stock price was the same.


Thanks for rubbing it is  EVERYBODY


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## none (Jan 15, 2013)

Well the global couch potato made 4.76% over the last 5 years.


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

I'm not sure if you got my point. Indexed portfolios didn't do much better. From that point of view, there is nothing to rub in.


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

none said:


> Well the global couch potato made 4.76% over the last 5 years.


Moving the start date forward by one year brings you closer to 2008 crash, so that makes a big difference.

EDIT: not sure where you got that number. 40/20/20/20 mix, 5 year return for 2008-2012 is 2.99%.


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## james4beach (Nov 15, 2012)

none said:


> Thanks for rubbing it is  EVERYBODY


Don't feel bad... again, we're pointing out that the (stock) indexes performed about the same. Basically you're in good company, if that makes you feel any better.

Why was 6 years ago such a popular time to get into stocks? Just today I was giving advice to a friend who came to me with the same story, she has a fund with a DSC and has been locked in for the last 6 years. I also have a family member who begged me to set up a stock portfolio for them in 2007, almost right at the market peak. If you ignore the gold investment (which saved the whole portfolio), the total return to date is only +1%. Same as yours.

There's something amazing about stock market tops that seems to suck a lot of people in, right near the top. This is a reason I'm very nervous about the market right now, since everyone is chasing yield and buying bank stocks right near all time highs.


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## Uranium101 (Nov 18, 2011)

Your portfolio is doing actually pretty well.
Someone I know has been investing in mutual funds for over a decade and still under water.

You got in in 2007 (the height) and now you are breaking even, congrat.
Trust me on this one, you are doing a lot better than other people I know who invested in mutual funds.


Disclosure: Shareholder of Manulife Financial. So take my comments with a grain of salt lol.


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## pwm (Jan 19, 2012)

Interesting discussion. 

I went into Quicken and did some reports. I just updated my prices this morning so the numbers are current. I still have 4 mutual funds from TD, Dynamic and PH&N. All are canadian dividend or balanced funds. If I use a start date of Jan 01, 2007 their average annual return is *3.01%* If however I change the report start date to "Earliest" the return is *13.59%* I've held these funds for many years; since 1996 in the case of PH&N. So this confirms that the last 6 years have been very bad, but it also shows that was probably a worst case time period. Over longer time periods things look much better. It also shows that not all mutual funds are so terrible. I'm still holding my 4 funds and the average MER for these funds is only 1.46%. That's probably only a little bit more than 1% higher than similar ETFs would be. 

Don't misunderstand; I'm not trying to extoll the virtues of MFs. I'm not buying any new MF units. Any new money goes into ETFs or direct shares, but I think It's a bit unfair to claim all MFs are bad. One definitely need to be aware of the MER and if the fund is not beating an appropriate index by at least that much then get rid of it.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

One thing that is bad is paying way too much in fees. MFs, to the extent they have low fees, can be useful. The vast majority of MFs are high fee mechanisms for transfering investor wealth to managers.


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## The Financial Blogger (Apr 4, 2009)

none said:


> I got my last Manulife mutual fund statement. Funny, like most people, I had never looked at it that closely.
> 
> I thought it had been doing fairly well.
> 
> ...


Look at your MER's, the fund probably made 4% BEFORE fees ;-)

never trust an insurance broker selling mutual funds. The only guys making money in this story is your broker.


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## cman2 (Jan 14, 2011)

My wife invested in MFs at about the same period. As of yesterday, total return was 0.15 %. We haven't decided what to do with the windfall yet. Fortunately, mine are doing better.


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## Uranium101 (Nov 18, 2011)

The Financial Blogger said:


> Look at your MER's, the fund probably made 4% BEFORE fees ;-)
> 
> never trust an insurance broker selling mutual funds. The only guys making money in this story is your broker.


There is this hidden TER too.
I hope the disclosed MER includes TER.
Funds with high turnover rate tens to have higher TER.
Just some food for thought.


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## My Own Advisor (Sep 24, 2012)

The value of dividends in sideways and down markets is huge. 

In a great bull market, they become less important but then again, the stock prices of those dividend paying stocks tend to appreciate in bull markets as well. Anyone been watching how much the CDN bank stocks have been rising over the last 3 months? 

@none,

You might be surprised to see the returns of a simple bond ETF over the last 5 or 6 years.
http://ca.ishares.com/product_info/fund/performance/XBB.htm

5 year perf. = 6%, 10 year perf. is almost 6%.

Unfortunately my company DC pension plan only has Manulife MFs. I picked the lowest cost funds for my wife's portfolio. It's all I can do, with that account anyhow...


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

That's what happens when 5 year bond yields fall from 5% to 1.5%.


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## My Own Advisor (Sep 24, 2012)

For sure andrewf.


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## Cal (Jun 17, 2009)

Willing to bet that Manulife made more than 1.1% on your investment.


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## Eclectic12 (Oct 20, 2010)

james4beach said:


> ... But the real kicker is how much better you would have simply been in cash & GICs. Easily could have been a 25% total return in the same period.


Maybe for the GICs but I'm not sure about the cash ... though I don't have at hand what the "high" interest rates on cash were to figure this out.



james4beach said:


> ... I know I'm being a broken record on this topic, but I think the love for stocks out there is somewhat undeserved. They were great until the late 90s, but ever since Y2K they've been a pretty crappy place to be. Don't be too quick to ignore what cash and GICs can do for you!


Of course the flip side is if one had cash and moved it into a Canadian bank stock in early 2009, both capital gains and dividends have been quite nice.

Or if one wants a stellar return, buying Teck B in Feb 2009 at $5, selling around Feb 2011 at over $60 and then going back to GICs would have been a good return as well. :biggrin:

Never mind the cycles for something like the MFC common stock between around $9 and $15 or better. If the cycle took longer than expected, there's the $0.54 per year dividends being paid.


Cheers


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## Moneytoo (Mar 26, 2014)

none said:


> I got my last Manulife mutual fund statement. Funny, like most people, I had never looked at it that closely.


It's very interesting to read this thread 3 years later  My husband signed up for group RRSP in January'15 and just received his first annual statement. Their provider is Manulife, so our choices were limited to a handful of funds. I didn't want to complicate the rebalancing of two DIY RRSPs and TFSAs by adding an extra account, so picked "the best" balanced (North-American equities, fixed income and REITs) and international MFs with a goal to keep this account stand-alone and self-balanced.

The initial allocation was 80/20, but now looking at 1 year performance - and thinking if it's too late to go higher/all in Mawer (I don't know how they do it, year after year - and wish Manulife was offering other Mawer funds as well, not just international...):


*Fund code and name**Percentage of investments**Personal rate of return**Balanced*5132 ML MMF Monthly High Income k479%0.9%*Int'l Equity*8452 ML Mawer International Eqty b921%17.1%*Total**100%**4%*


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