bulkquote...

I got into cef's as alternative to oefs for distribution and strategy..such as options trading and market specification...my portfolio is down 18 pct from last year...these things really suck.  

I've said several times in this forum that there is little logic to the cef market...they go down twice as fast as the market and up half as much...the trade discounts the distributions/dividends as return of capital or being at risk and not as valuable as other income producing investments...and the trade generally discounts the portfolio currently reasoning all cefs have some financial equity positions so all cefs are being discounted now because they are considered "financials.

There is more b/s on this forum about the technical aspects of cefs than I can usually stand...I laugh at the comments about being able to stand volatility...I was in the commodity business I know and understand volatility...cef's have irrational price movement that's unrelated to fundamentals or other market forces.

Another problem is the trade in discounts...because there exists an expectation of discounts there is a large body of trade on the nav/market price rather than the fundamental portfolio, or portfolio strategy...thus as discounts narrow to nav buying drys up or selling increases which produces price fluctuation.

I finally came to grips with the b/s after reading a couple dozen "studies" on pricing of cef's by academics...they all had seperate and distinct theories which they all proved to be true...since they can't all be true I suspect that none are true...and that trading in cef''s is a study in chaos. By example, cef studies report volatility and abnormal price movement is a result of the fixed supply of shares...low float...but that only accounts for price declines according to the study...in most arenas it would count on both sides.

I am no longer a buyer of cef's...I use the capital generated by the distributions to buy other investment vehicles that are priced rationally. According to my calculations I only need the market to advance by 10000 points to get back to even. Never had a better place to lose money. 

Sorry about the rant

rar