Fund Evaluator:

Covered Bridge I Overview

Covered Bridge I (TCBIX) is an actively managed Nontraditional Equity Derivative Income fund. Covered Bridge launched the fund in 2013.

The investment seeks current income and realized gains from writing options with capital appreciation as a secondary objective. The fund seeks to meet its investment objective by investing, under normal market conditions, in dividend paying equity securities of domestic and foreign large capitalization companies. The advisor expects to invest up to 20% of the fund's assets in foreign securities and the remainder in domestic securities. It is expected that the fund's strategy will result in high portfolio turnover.

About Covered Bridge I (TCBIX)

There are 2 members of the management team with an average tenure of 12.84 years: Michael Dashner (2013), John Schonberg (2013). Management tenure is more important for actively managed funds than passive index funds.

The fund has 1 primary benchmark: CBOE S&P 500 BuyWrite BXM TR USD index with a weighting of 100%. Covered Bridge I has 107 securities in its portfolio. The top 10 holdings constitute 32.0% of the fund’s assets. The fund meets the SEC requirement of being classified as a diversified fund. The fund is not considered to have an ESG focus with its investment selection and management.

Covered Bridge I is part of the Equity global asset class and is within the Nontraditional Equity fund group. Covered Bridge I has 1.7% of its portfolio invested in foreign issues. The overall assets allocated to domestic stock is 86.2%. There is 1.7% allocated to foreign stock, and 0.0% is allocated to preferred stocks. The bond allocation as a percentage of total assets is 0.0% (0.0% domestic bond, 0.0% foreign bond and 0.0% convertible bond). Covered Bridge I has 12.2% of the portfolio in cash.

Assets Under Management

The fund has $119 million in total assets, which is below the $233 million average for the Derivative Income category. Normally, lower assets under management translates to higher average expense ratios, and greater total assets are desired. However, for some investment categories, such as small-cap investing, it may be difficult for the manager to fully employ the desired active strategy if assets grow too large or too quickly.

TCBIX Performance and Fees

The expense ratio measures how much of a fund’s assets are used for administrative expenses and operating expenses, including adviser fees and fees for the transfer agent and custodial services. The Covered Bridge I expense ratio is high compared to funds in the Derivative Income category. Covered Bridge I has an expense ratio of 1.51%, which is 35% higher than its category average, making the fund expense ratio grade a F. While it is difficult to predict returns, it is known that high annual expense ratios reduce your rate of return, and excessive fees are difficult to overcome. Active management normally comes with higher expense ratios than passive index management. Certain investment categories such as small company and foreign also normally have higher expense ratios. It is best to compare fund expense ratios against the category averages for meaningful assessments.

High portfolio turnover can translate to higher expenses and lower aftertax returns. Covered Bridge I has a portfolio turnover rate of 121%, indicating that holds its assets around 0.0 years. By way of comparison, the average portfolio turnover is 114% for the Derivative Income category.

Recently, in the month of July 2026, Covered Bridge I returned 3.2%, which earned it a grade of A, as the Derivative Income category had an average return of 1.7%. The letter grades of A, B, C, D and F are based upon relative rankings within the investment category. A grade of A, for example, would indicate that the return is in the highest 20% for that time period compared to all funds in that category.

Covered Bridge I has a trailing yield of 1.20%, which is below the 4.47% category average. The fund normally distributes its income quarterly and its capital gains quarterly.

It’s natural to seek the best-performing investments, but you must consider the relationship between risk and return and the impact of costs and taxes on your realized returns.

Covered Bridge I Grades

Year to date, the fund has returned 10.9%, 2.9 percentage points better than the category, which translates into a grade of B. The fund has returned 18.5% over the past year (grade of B), 10.6% over the past three years (grade of D) and 7.7% per year over the past five years (grade of C) and 8.0% per year over the past 10 years (grade of C).

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