Missing the days of Dow 7000?

[Meadbh]

Yeah, it was fun living dangerously when it was "how low can you go?"
The Joy of Stress was thrilling for a couple of days, and that was enough!

[Lusitan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FUEGO I was sort of hoping we would see the Dow (and the broader US and international markets) float along in a malaise in the 7000-8000-9000 range for a number of years before staging any kind of real rally.

Well, buckle your seatbelt and hang on; we may see this yet. I have no idea what's in store, and I'm continuing to invest, but I wouldn't be surprised if the market tanks again. My asset allocation is fine, and I hope everyone take advantage of this somewhat-recovery to get their asset allocation in line.

I don't want to hear any more media stories about 65 year olds who were 100% stocks when the next market crash hits ...

[FUEGO]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound Seriously, the last 10 years weren't kind to "buy and hold" investors. Even at this point, the Dow is still below its average over the last 10 years. So, if a newcomer DCA'ed into the market in the last 10 years, he would still be underwater unless he sold some, er balanced some out of equity at Dow 14000.

I guess that "buy and hold" is superior to trying but failing to time the market correctly. Clearly a successful market timing approach is superior to a "buy and hold" approach, if it proves successful in hindsight. However, lacking a crystal ball, I personally think it is like searching for El Dorado or the Holy Grail. It may exist, but I haven't seen any evidence of it by and large.

I also meant to say Buy and Hold as in passive mutual funds, not actively managed funds (generally speaking). Lower costs, lower expenses sucking on your investment returns.

I'm not sure the Dow is the best metric to look at for 10 year returns. I was using here as a simple yardstick and a common point of reference. I for one have around 13% of my equities allocation in domestic large cap or total market equities, so the other 87% did something else. Also interesting is that the SP500 and Total market index funds have some of the worst 10 year returns of all equity asset classes (versus international, value, small, REIT, etc). So assuming you bought something besides SP500 or total US market, you would almost be guaranteed to have outperformed the SP500 or total US market funds.

This blog posts the 10 year investment performance of different slice and dice or lazy portfolios that I'm sure are similar to many portfolios of those on this board. This was as of 12/31/2008, a point in the market lower than today. All rebalanced lazy portfolios were well into positive territory (from 25-75% total returns), leaving the SP500 in the dust comparatively. Now some of those portfolios weren't in existence 10 years ago, so there may be some hindsight guiding the construction of the model portfolios. But the point is that there are at least a number of reasonable portfolios that did relatively well with a buy and hold approach in what you might think of as a dead decade for investments.

I'd be interested to see some analysis of what DCA'ing into the market over the last 10 years produces versus a lump sum invested 10 years ago, since that is what you are asserting would leave a buy and hold investor under water. It may be true. But we are also just in the beginning stages of what was touted as the worst economic times since the great depression, so in light of that, the 10 year lump sum investment returns don't look too bad. Start the measuring period in 1994 instead of 1999 and you get a much rosier picture for B and H.

If you have found a good market timing strategy based on economic fundamentals, go for it. I kind of feel like I can forecast the future a tiny amount, but I'm not going "all in" on those feelings. Maybe a $5 chip here or there to keep things interesting though (hormones as one poster might say ).

[FIREd]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound Seriously, the last 10 years weren't kind to "buy and hold" investors. Even at this point, the Dow is still below its average over the last 10 years. So, if a newcomer DCA'ed into the market in the last 10 years, he would still be underwater unless he sold some, er balanced some out of equity at Dow 14000. In my view, the people who made out are the ones who "goosed" their rebalancing strategy with a bit of fundamental analysis of the economy. I did go down from 80% equity to around 40%, else would get hurt even worse. Of course my timing was not perfect, and I did not get out all at once. I owned many individual stocks, and optimistically thought that my babies would be so strong to prevail against the global meltdown. Nope, it was a tsunami that sunk all ships. Hence I sold them late. I shudder to think what would happen if I rode them all the way down. I was able to buy them back much cheaper, even if I missed the bottom. My babies are climbing out of their holes. Climb, baby, climb. Anyway, stock AA is at 65% now. Still holding. I am not "rebalancing" yet. Still 17% below my high in Oct 07, but it is improving.

I started investing on 01/27/2000, 9.5 years ago. My annualized return is 3.2%. And I have made plenty of mistakes along the way too! Like hiring a financial advisor (my self-managed portfolio has returned 4.6% -annualized- since 2000 but the FA's performance has really hurt my overall returns, probably because of high fees), investing a large sum of money in REITs and Commodities on 9/26/2007 (performance chasing, oops), and dipping into my emergency funds to invest in stocks when people started talking about DOW 20,000. Maybe I was lucky.

[NW-Bound]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FUEGO I kind of feel like I can forecast the future a tiny amount, but I'm not going "all in" on those feelings. Maybe a $5 chip here or there to keep things interesting though (hormones as one poster might say ).

Who is going "all in"? I do not have those tungsten carbide cojones!

And you left out a bit of my post, which is essentially many of us have been doing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound In my view, the people who made out are the ones who "goosed" their rebalancing strategy with a bit of fundamental analysis of the economy.

I suspect very few execute their AA rebalancing with no regards to the economic backdrop. To do that, one must turn off all external info sources, and look only at the portfolio numbers. Then, in a way, he is just like one who relies on technical analysis for individual stocks. Head and shoulders. What goes up must come down, and vice versa, or something like that (sorry that I am not versed in their terminology as I am not in their camp).

Anyway, I think most people are doing the same thing, i.e. "goosing" their rebalancing with some economic news. Only one person in this forum is doing it not even by an AA out-of-balance criteria, but on Jan 2, in order to completely remove all personal judgement. It may turn out OK too, but why Jan 2? Why not Aug 14 or whatever?

In a sense, when forced to make a decision where we do not have complete information (when is the last time that we do?), some toss a coin. Most try to "guesstimate". After all, nearly all decisions we make in life are speculations. Some people think fixed-income investment are safe, but they are speculating that inflation will be low. There is nothing for sure. In fact, I would say that too much reliance on any hard-fast rule is also a speculation on the repetition of history. But will it?

The problem with "taking matters" into your own hand is that you have nothing else to blame. On the other hand, history may not repeat but simply rhymes, as they say. So, I take the conventional wisdom and tweak it a bit to my liking. We all do.

[NW-Bound]

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Originally Posted by FIREdreamer I started investing on 01/27/2000, 9.5 years ago. My annualized return is 3.2%. And I have made plenty of mistakes along the way too! Like hiring a financial advisor (my self-managed portfolio has returned 4.6% -annualized- since 2000 but the FA's performance has really hurt my overall returns, probably because of high fees), investing a large sum of money in REITs and Commodities on 9/26/2007 (performance chasing, oops), and dipping into my emergency funds to invest in stocks when people started talking about DOW 20,000. Maybe I was lucky.

Well, I remember that you did put extra into the market during the recent lows, and that helped.

Regarding commodities, yes you were late to the party. I was in early enough to enjoy some nice gains. I did not get out at the top, hence gave back some. Still, I couldn't complain as my portfolio nearly tripled from 2003 to 2007. Well, it halved from 2000 to 2003 first, thanks to tech stocks !

I will try to even things out a bit, going forward. But selling too soon in a bull market does not cancel out the selling too late in a bear market, you know.

[brewer12345]

Eh, not so much. I think I could live without seeing a disaster of these proportions for the rest of my life. But if the equity market wants to hover for a while so that good quality investment grade corporates go back to double digit yields again for a bit, that would be OK by me. Man that was sweet.

[Rambler]

Hindsight is 20/20.

I had a nice payment on a 3 year incentive plan come due in March, was finally paid around April 15. I had been seriously under allocated to bonds, so most of the incentive went to munis, with a little in corporates and a little in equities. I wish I had dumped all or most in equities, and then rebalanced right about now.

Oh well, my inputs now are pretty well in the proper allocations. Do I wish for 7000 again? No thanks. I'm too close to the finish line to wish for that. But if the Dow decided to stall where it is for the next year or so before taking a hike up north I would be OK with the opportunity to continue to DCA and reduce my avg cost basis, and accumulate moderate divvie payers.

R

[W2R]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rambler Hindsight is 20/20. I had a nice payment on a 3 year incentive plan come due in March, was finally paid around April 15. I had been seriously under allocated to bonds, so most of the incentive went to munis, with a little in corporates and a little in equities. I wish I had dumped all or most in equities, and then rebalanced right about now.

I bought bonds (index fund) the first week in April as well. Sure, I would have made more had I had the foresight to buy equities. But you know, I am just glad that I bought *something*. My bonds have gone up nicely since then, even though not as nicely as stocks.

[GoodSense]

Of course I wish I had bought more equities back in March, but no major regrets or mistakes here. I did accelerate my 401(k) contribution from Jan to April then slowed down. Like W2R, I am just glad I bought something and did not miss out entirely.

In the next year, our strategy is just to steadily DCA. In a year or so we should be close to our AA goal. So I am in the same camp as OP, hoping I can get my money in before stocks get too expensive.

Oh yeah, I also bought a bunch of REIT at its peak...

[audreyh1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound I suspect very few execute their AA rebalancing with no regards to the economic backdrop. To do that, one must turn off all external info sources, and look only at the portfolio numbers. Then, in a way, he is just like one who relies on technical analysis for individual stocks. Head and shoulders. What goes up must come down, and vice versa, or something like that (sorry that I am not versed in their terminology as I am not in their camp). Anyway, I think most people are doing the same thing, i.e. "goosing" their rebalancing with some economic news. Only one person in this forum is doing it not even by an AA out-of-balance criteria, but on Jan 2, in order to completely remove all personal judgement. It may turn out OK too, but why Jan 2? Why not Aug 14 or whatever?

All of my stuff is done by rebalance criteria. How can I do it while I am inundated with economic data, etc.? Simply this - I realize that not matter what the data says I cannot predict the future, that things often turn far different from what everyone expects, that my attempts in the (distant) past to predict the future and invest accordingly had often had pretty miserable results. So I trust a system that ignores the future and spreads its bets according to a fixed allocation. It's the only way I know how to do it, so it's the only thing I do.

No attempts to "goose" here, just normal rebalancing when criteria is met. Many folks I know who have tried to be "clever" have gotten burned instead.

Audrey

[unclemick]

Hmmm - I have wondered out loud whether those Vanguard Computers rebalancing my Target Retirement have personaliies/hormones/get emotional - you know tongue in cheek wise.

Then I ran across a Bogle comment - Target type funds suffer from 'pressure to adjust asset allocation to stay competitive.'

Ah say it ain't so! But I do believe equities were upped back when the future were considered brite - in time for the last downturn.

heh heh heh - man them pesky hormones is everywhere. . Saint's preseason Aug 14 against the Bengals..

[NW-Bound]

Quote:

Originally Posted by audreyh1 All of my stuff is done by rebalance criteria. How can I do it while I am inundated with economic data, etc.? Simply this - I realize that not matter what the data says I cannot predict the future, that things often turn far different from what everyone expects, that my attempts in the (distant) past to predict the future and invest accordingly had often had pretty miserable results. So I trust a system that ignores the future and spreads its bets according to a fixed allocation. It's the only way I know how to do it, so it's the only thing I do. No attempts to "goose" here, just normal rebalancing when criteria is met. Many folks I know who have tried to be "clever" have gotten burned instead. Audrey

And you appear to have done well in the past 10 years, so there is something to be said about that method. Trying to be "clever" can certainly burn one, as I have often described how friends of mine went to 100% gold in the early 90s. It was really an extreme case, as they were trying to predict doomsday, and some people are still doing it today. Maybe doomsday will come some time later, who knows, but it appears not this month or not this year (knock on wood).

In an up-and-down market like the past 10 years, rebalancing beats buy and hold because it forces you to buy low and sell high, despite an investor's tendency to gloat and hang on in up periods, and to flee in the bear period. In long bull markets like 1990 to 2000, I would think rebalancers kicked themselves for selling out while the market kept rising.

On the other hand, what criteria do you choose for rebalancing? I remember some posts by some members describing efforts to "tweak" the criteria so it would work better, i.e. the % of imbalance, and how to space the rebalance apart, or something like that. It appeared to me that such tweaking is done by looking in the rearview mirror, which I am not convinced is better than trying to look ahead. I have seen technical analysts trying to back-test their "algorithm" to fit past data, and frankly, their efforts are not very convincing to me.

How do you chose your rebalance criteria, and how often do you change them, if ever? To follow a rigid criteria, would it be better to allow the computer to do it, e.g. psst Wellesley like Uncle Mick likes to say? Thanks in advance for the reply.

[FUEGO]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NW-Bound In an up-and-down market like the past 10 years, rebalancing beats buy and hold because it forces you to buy low and sell high, despite an investor's tendency to gloat and hang on in up periods, and to flee in the bear period. In long bull markets like 1990 to 2000, I would think rebalancers kicked themselves for selling out while the market kept rising. On the other hand, what criteria do you choose for rebalancing? I remember some posts by some members describing efforts to "tweak" the criteria so it would work better, i.e. the % of imbalance, and how to space the rebalance apart, or something like that. It appeared to me that such tweaking is done by looking in the rearview mirror, which I am not convinced is better than trying to look ahead. I have seen technical analysts trying to back-test their "algorithm" to fit past data, and frankly, their efforts are not very convincing to me. How do you chose your rebalance criteria, and how often do you change them, if ever? To follow a rigid criteria, would it be better to allow the computer to do it, e.g. psst Wellesley like Uncle Mick likes to say? Thanks in advance for the reply.

I consider rebalancing to maintain your target asset allocation a key component of buy and hold investing. Is that not the consensus view?

Personally, I have yet to sell anything to rebalance into another asset class. I periodically check the current asset allocation and see which asset classes are under their targets. Then add new money to those underallocated asset classes. Right now the only real standout that is a candidate for getting partially sold and reinvested elsewhere is my Emerging Markets that is around 11% of the portfolio vs a target of 9%. That is about 20% more emerging markets than I want, but I'm letting it ride mainly because I don't have any kind of rebalancing rules (yet). I probably need to come up with a plan though... If the allocation gets much more out of whack, I'll probably do some rebalancing.

[DblDoc]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FUEGO I consider rebalancing to maintain your target asset allocation a key component of buy and hold investing. Is that not the consensus view? Personally, I have yet to sell anything to rebalance into another asset class. I periodically check the current asset allocation and see which asset classes are under their targets. Then add new money to those underallocated asset classes. Right now the only real standout that is a candidate for getting partially sold and reinvested elsewhere is my Emerging Markets that is around 11% of the portfolio vs a target of 9%. That is about 20% more emerging markets than I want, but I'm letting it ride mainly because I don't have any kind of rebalancing rules (yet). I probably need to come up with a plan though... If the allocation gets much more out of whack, I'll probably do some rebalancing.

I consider rebalancing as part of the buy n hold strategy.

I use the "bands" method rather then a particular date or time frame. Any holding that is outside 5% of target gets rebalanced. This is for slices that are >/= 20% of my holdings. Smaller slices get rebalanced when they are off by 25% - ie REIT's are 5% of my AA so they are rebalanced when < about 4% or > then about 6%. This has been mostly with adding new money but when we had that wild ride down I was forced to rebalance twice from bonds to equities.

My take on rebalancing is that it is NOT a technique for boosting yield but rather a method to control risk.

DD

[Lusitan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FUEGO I consider rebalancing to maintain your target asset allocation a key component of buy and hold investing. Is that not the consensus view?

I agree with you that a proper asset allocation is fundamental to a successful buy-and-hold strategy. I guess it really should be called buy-properly-allocated-investments-and-hold but that's too unwieldy.

[ERD50]

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Originally Posted by NW-Bound In an up-and-down market like the past 10 years, rebalancing beats buy and hold because it forces you to buy low and sell high, despite an investor's tendency to gloat and hang on in up periods, and to flee in the bear period.

It would seem so, but if you have any data to back it up, I'd be very interested. I did a rough & tumble stab at a spreadsheet to back test the effects of rebalancing, and the results seemed inconclusive to me. But I'm sure there are better studies out there than my weak attempt.

There have been wide swings in the past ten years, so you can still end up buying on the way down (so some is bought at relatively high levels), and selling on the way up (so some is sold at relatively low levels, and you miss out on some of the remaining bull).

One thing in my study made me very suspicious - I analyzed with incrementally increasing % delta points to trigger the re-balance, and the results did not vary smoothly at all. Instead of steadily increasing, and then decreasing at some point, the returns jumped one way or the other at certain "magic numbers". So I really suspect that was just data-mining (the bad kind), and it told me which % points hit the optimal peaks/troughs that occurred in that particular data set.

I still do rebalancing, but just because it just seems consistent to pick an AA and stick with it, and there is no clear pro to *not* doing it. I'm just not counting on rebalancing to boost (or hurt) my gains.

-ERD50

[FUEGO]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DblDoc I use the "bands" method rather then a particular date or time frame. Any holding that is outside 5% of target gets rebalanced. This is for slices that are >/= 20% of my holdings. Smaller slices get rebalanced when they are off by 25% - ie REIT's are 5% of my AA so they are rebalanced when < about 4% or > then about 6%. This has been mostly with adding new money but when we had that wild ride down I was forced to rebalance twice from bonds to equities. My take on rebalancing is that it is NOT a technique for boosting yield but rather a method to control risk.

This sounds like a sensible approach and sensible thresholds for rebalancing. Something like if the allocation becomes greater or less than 25% of the target amount, then rebalance. My 9% emerging markets allocation would trigger rebalancing when it was out of whack by 2.25% either direction (6.75% or less and 11.25% or more).

I think the rebalancing can add less than a percent (and potentially very little) to performance, given that many of the equities asset classes remain fairly highly correlated. Risk control is a bigger benefit, especially as between equities and fixed income.

[TromboneAl]

I'm missing the days of Dow 14,000.

[audreyh1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FUEGO I consider rebalancing to maintain your target asset allocation a key component of buy and hold investing. Is that not the consensus view?

No. I personally consider buy-and-hold to be kind of the opposite to rebalancing. In buy-and-hold, you let your winners run. In rebalancing, you trim from your winners and add to your losers.

Rebalancing usually beats buy-and-hold during rollercoaster/secular bear markets. Buy-and-hold beats rebalancing during secular bull markets.

But I notice that a lot of folks lump them together. I never understood that, but it does seem to be prevelant.

So, consensus is probably not my view. But I thought I should explain how I see it.

Audrey