Posts filed under ‘Asset Allocation’
Avoid Chasing Your 401k Tail
David Laibson, a professor of economics at Harvard University, has done extensive research on the savings habits of Americans in their 401k retirement accounts. What he discovers is that workers, like a dog chasing their tail, allocate more of their investments to the areas that have done well and sell the underperforming segments. In short, workers attempt to “time the market.”
Professor Laibson demonstrates this pyramiding strategy has not worked out so well and provides the following advice:
“We know that individual investors are terrible in terms of their market timing. They tend to buy at the tops, they tend to sell at the bottoms. So don’t try to time the market. Don’t think about recouping – just think about a long term strategy.”
That long term strategy he advocates entails a diversified allocation of stocks and bonds that reduces exposure to equities as a person gets older. In short, he says, “Hold a diversified portfolio appropriate for your age.”
He advises those aged in their 20s and 30s to allocate nearly 100% of their portfolio to equities, or investments with commensurate risk. Alternatively, if investors don’t want to adjust the allocation themselves, people should consider life-cycle funds or Self Directed 401k options (Read story here). For those in retirement, he recommends a portfolio with the following characteristics:
“30, 40, 50% should be equities, more as you’re younger…simply hold a long term portfolio with less and less allocation to equities as you age.”
Jason Zweig, a journalist at The Wall Street Journal, recently chimed in with similar thoughts on performance chasing:
“…to buy more of what has gone up, precisely because it has gone up, is to fall for the belief that stocks become safer as their prices rise. That is the same fallacy that led investors straight into disaster in 1929, 1972, 1999, 2007 and every other market bubble in history.”
There are many different strategies for making money in the market, but a plan based solely on emotion is doomed for failure – Professor Laibson’s data supports that assertion. So the next time you are considering re-allocating the mix of investments in your 401k, implement a disciplined, systematic approach. That approach should include the following:
1) Invest Your Age in Fixed Income Securities. John Bogle, Chairman at Vanguard Group, has long made this argument, with the balance placed in equities. For example a sixty year old should have 60% of their assets in bonds and 40% in stocks. This rule of thumb is a good starting point, but the picture becomes cloudier once you account for other assets such as real estate, convertible bonds, and income generated from private businesses.
2) Periodically Rebalance. Rather than investing more into outperforming areas, harvest your gains and redeploy into underperforming segments of your asset allocation. There obviously is an art to knowing “when to hold them and when to fold them,” nonetheless I concur with Professor Laibson that chasing winners is not the proper strategy.
3) Diversify. Spread your assets across multiple asset classes, segments, and styles, including equities, fixed income, commodities, real estate, inflation protection, growth, value, etc. Too much concentration in any one category can really come back to haunt you.
The key to successful retirement planning is to implement an unemotional systematic approach, so you don’t end up chasing your 401k tail.
Wade W. Slome, CFA, CFP®
Plan. Invest. Prosper.
*DISCLOSURE: At the time of publishing, Sidoxia Capital Management and some of its clients owned certain exchange traded funds, but had no direct positions in any other security referenced.
Building Your Financial Future – Mistakes Made in Investment Planning
Building Your Dream Future Requires a Plan
Building your retirement and financial future can be likened with the challenge of designing and building your dream home. The tools and strategies selected will determine the ultimate cost and outcome of the project.
I constantly get asked by investors, “Wade, is this the bottom – is now the right time to get in the markets?” First of all, if I precisely knew the answer, I would buy my own island and drink coconut-umbrella drinks all day. And secondarily, despite the desire for a simple, get-rich quick answer, the true solution often is more complex (surprise!). If building your financial future is like designing your dream home, then serious questions need to be explored before your wealth building journey begins:
1) Do I have enough money, and if not, how much money do I need to develop my financial future?
2) Can I build it myself, or do I need the help of professionals?
3) Do I have contingency plans in place, should my circumstances change?
4) What tools and supplies do I need to effectively bring my plans to life?
Most investors I run into have no investment plan in place, do not know the costs (fees) of the tools and strategies they are using, and if they are using an advisor (broker) they typically are in the dark with respect to the strategy implemented.
For the “Do-It-Yourselfers”, the largest problem I am witnessing right now is excessive conservatism. Certainly, for those who have already built their financial future, it does not make sense to take on unnecessary risk. However, for most, this is a losing strategy in a world laden with inflation and ever-growing entitlements like Medicare and Social Security. There’s clearly a difference between stuffing money under the mattress (short-term Treasuries, CDs, Money Market, etc.) and prudent conservatism. This is a credo I preach to my clients.
In many cases this conservative stance merely compounds a previous misstep. Many investors undertook excessive risk prior to the current financial crisis – for example piling 100% of investment portfolios into five emerging market commodity stocks.
What these examples prove is that the average investor is too emotional (buys too much near peaks, and capitulates near bottoms), while paying too much in fees. If you don’t believe me, then my conclusions are perfectly encapsulated in John Bogle’s (Vanguard) 1984-2002 study. The analysis shows the average investor dramatically underperforming both the professionally managed mutual fund (approximately by 7% annually) and the passive (“Do Nothing”) strategy by a whopping 10% per year.
Building your financial future, like building your dream home, requires objective and intensive planning. With the proper tools, strategies and advice, you can succeed in building your dream future, which may even include a coconut-umbrella drink.
Your Investment Car Needs Shocks
Smooth Out the Bumpy Ride
Investing can make for a bumpy ride. What can investors do to smooth out the rough financial journey? The simple answer: diversification. If you consider your investment portfolio as a car, then the process of diversification acts like shock absorbers. Those shocks make for a more comfortable ride while preventing potential disasters – like accidentally driving your investments off a cliff.
People generally understand the concept behind, “not putting all your eggs in one basket.” However, once introduced to financial theory terms such as correlation, covariance, and the efficient frontier, people’s eyes begin to glaze over…and rightfully so!
So what are some of the key points one should understand regarding diversification:
- Lunch CAN Be Free! There are very few free lunches in life, but with “diversification” you can indeed get something for nothing. For example, let’s assume you are approached with two investments, ski hats and sun visors, and each investment is expected to deliver a 5% annual return. Furthermore, let’s suppose that zero ski hats are sold in Spring and Summer (and zero sun visors in Fall and Winter). If you merely own one investment, that investment will be more risky (volatile) than a combo portfolio for half the year. Although any combination of two investments will create a 5% return, by diversifying (owning both investments), you can smooth out the ride. There’s your free lunch – the same return achieved for less risk (volatility)!
- Gravity Holds True For Investments Too! Nothing goes up forever, so do not concentrate your portfolio in sectors that have wildly outperformed other sectors/asset classes for long periods of time. Lessons learned over the last 10 years in the areas of technology and real estate highlight the dangers of over-exposure to any one sector in the economy.
- Vary Your Investment Diet! In the Oscar-nominated documentary Super Size Me, Morgan Spurlock decides to eat McDonald’s fast-food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for thirty days. As a result, his cholesterol levels sky-rocket, he gains over 24 pounds, and his liver function deteriorates significantly. When it comes to your investment portfolio, you should balance it across a wide range of healthy options, including domestic and international stocks and bonds; large and small capitalization stocks; growth and value styles; cash and low-risk liquid investments; and alternative asset classes, such as real estate, commodities, and private investments.
The benefits of diversification will fluctuate under different economic climates. During our recent financial crisis, especially in late 2008, the correlation ratio (the degree that different asset classes move together) unfortunately was very high. However, those investors who were exposed to areas such as Treasury securities, gold, cash, and bonds generally fared better than those who did not. Subsequently, in the early part of 2009, the benefits of diversification shined through as outperformance in emerging markets, technology, consumer discretionary and growth stocks balanced the weakness suffered in banking, transportation, healthcare, bond and value segments.
Diversification helps on the rough roads of investing, so make sure to check those shocks!
Investing Caffeine 
