Gyroscopic Investing

I am interested to know from those who have been studying this a while, how many of you are still in the traditional vanilla 4x PP vs how many of you have done modifications (adding small caps or momentum etfs) or have changed your percentages entirely?

I've only been using the PP since 2016, and already have had severe doubts about the PP... However I haven't actually changed anything, except maybe added a VP (Variable Portfolio) for about 5% of my total invested capital.

A correct inference is that you initially went 100% Permanent Portfolio?

Could you reveal how you invested each of the four segments (i.e., bought long term bonds or bought long-term bond fund, gold fund versus buying actual gold, and so on)?

Thanks

Vinny

europeanwizard wrote: ↑Sun Oct 27, 2019 8:43 am I've only been using the PP since 2016, and already have had severe doubts about the PP... However I haven't actually changed anything, except maybe added a VP (Variable Portfolio) for about 5% of my total invested capital.

I initially went all in with the PP in 2008 but transitioned to the GB about 3 years ago. The reason I did that was precisely for the reason people often warn about with the standard 4x4 - that it will be hard to stick with in times of prosperity when stocks are outperforming (hello Bud and Mathjak). The GB makes this much more palatable and if Tyler's charts are correct there is very little, if any, downside to it in comparison with the 4x4.

vnatale wrote: ↑Sun Oct 27, 2019 11:46 am Could you reveal how you invested each of the four segments (i.e., bought long term bonds or bought long-term bond fund, gold fund versus buying actual gold, and so on)?

I'm in Europe, where we have to deal with negative interest rates and a rather lackluster economy. So I've got 25% gold ETF, 25% euro govt. bonds 7-10yr, 25% world stock market and 25% cash in a consumer savings account with high yield (and "high" meaning 0.5%).

Thanks for providing the requested information!

Vinny

europeanwizard wrote: ↑Sun Oct 27, 2019 1:55 pm

vnatale wrote: ↑Sun Oct 27, 2019 11:46 am Could you reveal how you invested each of the four segments (i.e., bought long term bonds or bought long-term bond fund, gold fund versus buying actual gold, and so on)?

I'm in Europe, where we have to deal with negative interest rates and a rather lackluster economy. So I've got 25% gold ETF, 25% euro govt. bonds 7-10yr, 25% world stock market and 25% cash in a consumer savings account with high yield (and "high" meaning 0.5%).

Underweight gold because of a rental property (inflation) and underweight US stocks because the rental is sensitive to US economy

jacksonm2 wrote: ↑Sun Oct 27, 2019 1:34 pm I initially went all in with the PP in 2008 but transitioned to the GB about 3 years ago. The reason I did that was precisely for the reason people often warn about with the standard 4x4 - that it will be hard to stick with in times of prosperity when stocks are outperforming (hello Bud and Mathjak). The GB makes this much more palatable and if Tyler's charts are correct there is very little, if any, downside to it in comparison with the 4x4.

Similar story here. I started the PP in 2010 (first using PPRFX then switched to a 25x4 in 2012), then started moving to the Golden Butterfly about a year ago. My reason was different from Jackson's though - it's because historically, the eras where the PP is likely to outperform the GB are all less common historically than prosperity, whereas the GB's underperformance relative to the PP in other conditions is small. No VP. Active retirement accounts are a separate stock/bond portfolio.

I've also been incorporating a slice of individual stock holdings into the GB's stock allocation - not as a VP like dualstow has done. I just decided I didn't want to be 100% into index funds...can't explain exactly why except that because they've become a dominant force in the market, so the likelihood of smart people figuring out how to game the system to my disadvantage goes up. And index funds are not a PP requirement per se; the portfolio works just fine with a basket of individual stocks.

Regardless of the exact variant, it is days like today that make me glad I am in the PP.

There is so much potentially bad news (or findable bad news if that's what you are looking for!) out there that I would probably never be invested. The PP allows me to be, regardless of the market behaving irrationally or not, whether that's stocks, bonds or gold. I don't need to divine what the direction is.

std 4x25 pp here, i have a couple (very) small amounts of shv and edv that i picked up out of curiosity, but they are realistically way to small a percentage to consider them tilt.
i did have a 401k at a previous employer that i had put some small cap in, also due to curiosity(again probably to small to call it tilting) but it got converted to std 4x when i moved it after a job switch.

Vanilla PP here. My VP is all stocks at this point.

Fairly vanilla PP here.

A small sliver of silver in the precious metals portion. I also have factor tilts in the equity portion. That's about it. Everything else is by the book.

Very satisfied with the PP strategy.

sophie wrote: ↑Mon Oct 28, 2019 6:41 am

jacksonm2 wrote: ↑Sun Oct 27, 2019 1:34 pm I initially went all in with the PP in 2008 but transitioned to the GB about 3 years ago. The reason I did that was precisely for the reason people often warn about with the standard 4x4 - that it will be hard to stick with in times of prosperity when stocks are outperforming (hello Bud and Mathjak). The GB makes this much more palatable and if Tyler's charts are correct there is very little, if any, downside to it in comparison with the 4x4.

Similar story here. I started the PP in 2010 (first using PPRFX then switched to a 25x4 in 2012), then started moving to the Golden Butterfly about a year ago. My reason was different from Jackson's though - it's because historically, the eras where the PP is likely to outperform the GB are all less common historically than prosperity, whereas the GB's underperformance relative to the PP in other conditions is small. No VP. Active retirement accounts are a separate stock/bond portfolio.

Golden Butterfly indeed looks intriguing. What rebalance bands do you GB folks use?

Stocks 27% (mostly ITOT)
Bonds 23% (all 30 year T-bonds)
Gold 23% (mostly SGOL and IAU)
Cash 27% (divided between FDLXX /STTs/US savings bonds)

-No VP
-Annual Roth IRA conversions.

My IRA is a 4x25 in ESGV, VGLT, VUSXX, GLDM, and some individual gold coins (since lost at sea )

My 401k is essentially the same but uses the plan sponsor's cash and S&P500 funds.

Taxable cash is in an online savings account.

Juicy PP:

http://www.tightwadweb.com/customportfolio.html

I started PP in 2010, first it was all in PRPFX, then I moved to the classic PP, but eventually ended up with with a modified cashless version of GB:

25% FZROX
15% IJR
5% SCZ
5% DGS
30% FNBGX + individual LTTs
20% SGOL

jalanlong wrote: ↑Sun Oct 27, 2019 5:14 am I am interested to know from those who have been studying this a while, how many of you are still in the traditional vanilla 4x PP vs how many of you have done modifications (adding small caps or momentum etfs) or have changed your percentages entirely?

Classical 25x4 HBPP

Regular PP for 9 peaceful years.

[deleted]

40 Stocks
40 Long Bond
20 Gold

Vanilla PP here. One PP for each tax regime.

escafandro wrote: ↑Thu Oct 31, 2019 7:43 pm 40 Stocks
40 Long Bond
20 Gold

May I ask what drew you to that portfolio?

jalanlong wrote: ↑Fri Nov 01, 2019 7:43 am

escafandro wrote: ↑Thu Oct 31, 2019 7:43 pm 40 Stocks
40 Long Bond
20 Gold

May I ask what drew you to that portfolio?

It’s a very good mix historically.

Kbg wrote: ↑Fri Nov 01, 2019 9:05 am

jalanlong wrote: ↑Fri Nov 01, 2019 7:43 am

escafandro wrote: ↑Thu Oct 31, 2019 7:43 pm 40 Stocks
40 Long Bond
20 Gold

May I ask what drew you to that portfolio?

It’s a very good mix historically.

Yes, that is the main reason.
As a foreigner from a peripheral country I cannot put together a local PP and I don't like the idea of ​​being overexposed to the dollar either.
Notice that I am quite improvised as an investor so my reasoning surely has some flaw, but I think that the PP has a low correlation to the dollar. Not always but in general my currency moves in positive correlation to gold.
Thereby when the dollar strengthens in my country my portfolio is probably going down and vice versa.
So I like this portfolio for its return prospects and for the correlation it has regarding the dollar and gold (a little softer in both cases than the PP and a little less reactive to exchange rate variation).