DCA?
http://www.moneychimp.com/features/dollar_cost.htm
"Does Dollar Cost Averaging Work?
Dollar cost averaging means investing a fixed amount at fixed intervals of time. That's a sensible approach, for example, if it means committing yourself to investing a fixed amount of your salary every month toward your retirement.
However, some people also think you should dollar cost average a lump sum. For example, if you had $12,000 that you wanted to invest in a stock index fund, they would tell you to invest $1000 per month over a year, rather than investing the whole amount immediately. The rationale is that market volatility should then work in your favor, because you will automatically be purchasing more shares when the price is low, and fewer shares when the price is high.
As appealing as that theory is, its advantage looks like a myth, as this calculator shows. It uses market data to let you compare dollar cost averaging with lump sum investing for the start date you specify.
. . . (A calculator is included with this link)
Each strategy wins at least some of the time, but after a few runs you'll see that DCA is the statistical "dog", losing about two times out of three.
Of course, dollar cost averaging will win if your start date falls right before a dramatic crash (like October 1987) or at the start of an overall 12 month slump (like most of 2000). But unless you can predict these downturns ahead of time, you have no scientific reason to believe that dollar cost averaging will give you an advantage.
So why do so many people persist in believing that this old dog really knows how to hunt? Maybe because it has a psychological appeal: if the market dips, people will be happy because DCA will be saving them money; and if the market goes up, people will be happy regardless. "
https://customers.directadvice.com/adviceforum/newsletter/fullarticle/ar mstrong_LumpSumJumpInNow.htm
" Lump Sum? Jump In Now.
By Frank C. Armstrong, CFP
Last in a series
Congratulations! You won the lottery, inherited some money from a distant relative, sold your company or rolled your pension into your IRA. You have designed an asset allocation plan that meets your needs and have selected the funds you want to invest in.
But just how should you invest that large sum? Should you invest it all in one fell swoop? Or should dollar cost averaging be part of your strategy - investing your money in small bits and pieces over time?
In this case, don’t use dollar cost averaging. While it works well in many circumstances, as we’ve pointed out during the past couple weeks, it actually works against you when you have a large lump sum to invest. Here’s why.
Looking ahead
The market’s upward bias is so strong that it’s unlikely that market prices will be more favorable at some future point than they are today. No matter how you measure it, the market has more good periods than bad ones, and the good periods are better than the bad periods are bad."
This article goes on to show a table of S&P500 performance since 1926 and discusses the implications of using DCA.
"Based on past history, and depending on the period we selected, we would have been right between 62% and 90% of the time had we invested the entire sum immediately rather than waiting until the end of the period to invest part or all of it.
Stalling for time
It may feel good (or more prudent) to delay making the commitment with all or part of your lump sum in hopes that tomorrow’s prices will be more attractive than today’s. Especially in unsettled times, the temptation to "wait and see what happens" or other excuses to delay making a commitment to the market can be overwhelming.
But these delaying tactics are nothing more than thinly disguised attempts to time the market. And delaying investing like that actually decreases your chances of success. Dollar cost averaging with a lump sum is an attempt to "split the baby," and that has historically been a losing strategy. . ."
