Perhaps you should check more often so that you can empathize with those of us that are concerned. If you look once or twice per year and the portfolio is down 15-20%, what, if any, action would you take? I am concerned that I would capitulate. I can't imagine a scenario short of nuclear war where ...

What are your... impurities? 

Yeah once you start folding in a bunch of assets it gets really messy. I have contemplated allocating some of the equity piece to HY debt or emerging market bonds before, but it is kind of overcomplicating things and those funds have higher expense ratios. Also industrial commodities are more equity...

Budd,

You might enjoy a copy of Zvi Bodie's book "Worry Free Investing." You might be an investor that should be 100% short-term TIPS.

Now I kind of want to party with Burt.

I think wbern's article is quite timely:
http://www.efficientfrontier.com/ef/0adhoc/harry.htm

The PP is doing what it has always done. The real risk is not within the PP, but within yourself.

What about total market, FSTMX?

I would probably just go for whatever index fund has no transaction fee. Also, if you are sold on the idea of total market investing, keep in mind that the "total" bond market indices exclude TIPS! If you are not holding gold in a portfolio I think TIPS are better than no TIPS. Another thi...

For me it would be VT. Owning a slice of the world's capital assets is very appealing to me. I think global equities are one of the most resilient long term asset classes out there. Even the PP could potentially lose everything in a currency/bond collapse because you would be rebalancing into a blac...

Another great thing to keep in mind is human capital. Spikes in unemployment often occur at the same time as huge market declines. For most of us, the market value of our human capital has a positive correlation to the stock market. Harry Browne put human capital front and center, stating that the m...

I don't disagree that indexing is a wise path to take compared to investing by the seat of your pants.  I disagree with settling for being just average with the storms that are coming.  Thats what I feel a lot of people are doing, especially those with the time to be above average.  But maybe I'm p...

At this point TSLA might just be undergoing a REALLY fat short squeeze. Can you imagine being short TSLA? I would have nightmares about the stock becoming a microcosm of the tech bubble all over again. If this is true, a lot of shorts still have to cover (40% of the float!) so it could still skyrock...

Utah the 10th freest state?  Aren't their liquor laws ridiculous?  State-run stores and all that? Not that alcohol regulation is the best measure of freedom, but I think one person's inconvenience is another person's inexcusible offense... measuring freedom has to be somewhat difficult when differe...

TennPaGa wrote:
It has seemed to help a bit.  Sadly, I have far more stressful things going on in my life at this time.

I hope everything works out for you. There a lot of things more important than missing out on a stock rally.

As an aside, I think many people are more afraid of being "wrong" relative to their peers than they are of losing money.  When things go poorly while following the crowd, they can at least take mental comfort that "we're all in the same boat" and look for someone else to blame. ...

TIL that new jersey has a happy hour ban 

If gold was up a lot and the PP was flat would that bother you? If LTT were up a lot and the PP was flat would that bother you? If the answer to those questions are both yes, then there is nothing really to do about it. However, if lagging stocks is the only emotionally challenging scenario than you...

Yes. The PP has had a couple of brutal drawdowns in the past, but they are hidden when looking at nominal annual data. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/oimg?key=0AhyXQ0o4HKEqdDhTTTZnMXp3UExmbVVFYmw3TGVVVmc&oid=6&zx=vlnqw9yusk0d Aggressive fed tightenings combined with high inflation were ...

I have a couple of friends who have been super bearish on the stock. Good thing they didn't short it! I have no idea how to value companies at this stage in their growth... Although perhaps the stock market doesn't know either 

Personally, I would focus on taking balanced risks between bonds, stocks, and gold. That is basically what the PP attempts to do but with some cash tossed in. If I were in your boat I would look at the volatility of stocks, a 5 year Treasury fund, and gold over a decade long period and weight them s...

Well it was less about explicitly chasing vol and more about the anomaly that SCV has strong risk adjusted returns. It also has happened to have higher volatility than the stock market so it could work from a volatility harvesting standpoint. I am not sure about the breakdown of what contributes to...

What do you mean? I was saying that small cap value instead of total stock market makes more sense to me than going high beta. Backtest away... It was a failed attempt at humor.  And I meant do you believe the higher volatility will come from the small component or from the value component, or in o...

I think SCV would be a more compelling way to get extra volatility. High beta could actually just be a proxy for the amount of speculative fervor associated with a stock which is kind of a shaky foundation for an equity portfolio. The fact that MG found that high beta was associated with tech in th...

I think we are entering a low return environment for all asset classes. I am not counting on the PP being that strong for the next couple of years. I am bearish on gold, ambivalent on bonds, and slightly bullish on stocks (which funnily enough roughly corresponds to their recent performance, maybe I...

I think SCV would be a more compelling way to get extra volatility. High beta could actually just be a proxy for the amount of speculative fervor associated with a stock which is kind of a shaky foundation for an equity portfolio. The fact that MG found that high beta was associated with tech in the...