Remember that post about making an animated Spoke Fund video?

Done.

Courtesy of Gopal Gantayat of The Free Investors…

Pretty sweet, eh?

And Gopal has figured out a way that other spokesters can get the same video as the above – only personalized for you and your fund, too. Email me for details.

And thank you, Gopal!

This weekend FOLIO will be rolling out a serious upgrade to their current performance reporting features. Could change how I’m currently tracking things. As per an email from FOLIO:

- The Performance Reporting Center has been significantly enhanced with pages including an interactive performance graph. This new performance reporting capability includes the ability to compare performance against multiple benchmarks, display returns with or without fees, and download daily returns and market values. Additionally, as a reminder any benchmark you select on the model settings page will be the displayed benchmark for the subscribed folio.

- A Portfolio Summary sidebar has been added, which provides beginning and ending values, summary cash and security movements, and both time-and money-weighted returns.

- This enhancement is also available to your clients through the client website.

– This set of enhancements is the first phase of a multi-phase roll out that promises to offer state of the art performance reporting to those using our platform. At this time, and as part of the roll-out, all features are included for no additional charge. As the full set of advanced features is completed and made available, certain advanced features/modules (or similar) will be made available for additional charges.

Couple of other things they are tweaking with this update, too, from tax lots to IRA withdrawals to overhauling the Filing Cabinet, too. Give me a shout if you want me the full email.

Relaying an idea from another Spoke Fund manager that I thought could be a good one…

If you haven’t heard of the cartoonist Hugh MacLeod, you can check out some of his work at this Tumblr site or his art site here, and Hugh’s blog is also here. And here is one of his recent presentations, too, which gives some context to the paragraph below.

So the question is…how much interest among Spoke Fund managers is there in having Hugh create a 60 second animation video that explains the Spoke Fund concept? It will apparently cost from $8k to $12k to create a really slick animation video, depending on bells and whistles. Think it’s safe to say that cost is too high for any of us as individuals, but we might be able to share the cost as a group if the interest is there. The idea would be to create a cool, high quality vid that individual managers can use however they see fit, ostensibly for their own advertising efforts as well as to educate investors and prospects.

I’ve had some surprising success with the videos on my own site, and would be happy to pay a bit more than equal share to fund the cost of the video. I’ll also devote some resources to some sort of PR push to be timed with the release of the final vid, too, if we get enough interest.

So if you’d be interested, please let me know, and we will go from there. Thank you.

Video #1, also found here.

And the second, originally from here.

So if you haven’t already registered, please click this link and sign up before the price goes up by $100 at midnight this Monday, September 3rd.

Please email me with any questions. Thx.

The second annual FundLaunch conference will be held on September 10 & 11, 2012, at the beautiful Marriott Beach Resort on Marco Island, Florida.

Come on down and learn everything you ever wanted to know about launching your own Spoke Fund®. From compliance to trading to marketing. Meet other value investors, learn from veteran Spoke Fund managers, and hear some great investing ideas. And there’s that open bar thing, too.

Please register for the conference right here before the price goes up this weekend. And here’s the conference agenda:

Monday, September 10th:

- Introduction to Spoke Funds

- How to Prepare for Launch

- Launching your Spoke Fund®

- Productivity and Technology Tools

- Compliance and Administration

- Marketing

We’ll run from 9:00am to 4:00pm that day, with a break for lunch. We’ll also have a killer cocktail reception up in the penthouse suite that night.

Tuesday, September 11:

- Lessons Learned & Pitfalls to Avoid

- High Conviction Ideas

Tuesday will run from 9:00 am to noon, so you’ll have time to catch a flight in the early afternoon. And the High Conviction Ideas session will feature conference attendees giving an overview of one of the highest conviction stock ideas they’re currently invested in.

Please register for the conference here and then see the instructions in this post about reserving a room.

And sign up soon. The registration fee will be going up this Saturday Monday, September 1st 3rd. So lock it in now, knowwhatImean?

Thank you.

Just a heads-up that the block of pre-reserved rooms at the Marco Island Marriott is apparently filling up fast…for the other conference we are riding the coat-tails of, not necessarily FundLaunch. That said, would ask you to call and reserve a room there sooner rather than later if you think you might be coming down at all. The rate you should get is $151 a night, compared to $239 regular. You can also cancel your room reservation by September 1st at no penalty.

So if you’re thinking there’s even a chance you will show up, you can save a few bucks with little risk by reserving rooms now.

To do that, please call Marriott Beach Resort on Marco Island – 1-800-438-4373 – and book your room from Sunday, Sept 9th to Tuesday, Sept 11 – and please tell them you are signing up under “The Hardware Conference.” (Again, we’re getting good rates under that show, which is run by a good friend of mine…easier to explain in person).

And independent of booking your room, here is that link to register for the conference, too.

Thank you.

It. Is. On.

More details coming soon! Here’s the money shot in the meantime. Click the link to embiggen.

FundLaunch 2012