Investing in Funds & ETFs: A Monthly Analysis --- As Storm Clouds Massed, A Bond Manager Decided It Was Her Time to Retire
For successful financial professionals, the toughest decision sometimes is when to quit.</br></br>The bond-market outlook made the choice easier for Margaret "Didi" Weinblatt, who retired in 2012 after a dozen years as a bond-fund manager at San Antonio-based USAA Investments. Ms. Weinblatt fears that fixed-income investors generally now face a very difficult bear market in bonds as the Federal Reserve eventually pares back its economic stimulus.</br></br>"Your fund might do well relative to other funds, but when the bond market goes down, all funds could go down," she says. "That can be very stressful for a fund manager."</br></br>Ms. Weinblatt, who is 69, worked in funds management for nearly three decades. At USAA, she managed the $4 billion-plus USAA Income fund and the $500 million USAA Government Securities fund. The funds rank, respectively, in the top quarter and top third of their Morningstar Inc. categories for the past decade -- performances that she says resulted from "being careful to not take on too much risk."</br></br>The Income fund's only stumble during her tenure was a negative 5% return in 2008.