This is the only portfolio where you don't market time

[Indices]

I think the permanent portfolio is the only portfolio where there is literally no market timing. Even a Boglehead overweighting of stocks is a form of market timing. You are basically hoping that stocks go up dramatically over the course of your life time, which is a big if considering what happens to advanced economies with declining populations like Japan (decades of low to no growth). I just read several threads on the Boglehead forum advocating market timing for bond purchases, and I realized that a standard index portfolio is also hoping that a period of high inflation will end at some point so that the bond portion of your portfolio is worth something.

[Coffee]

Doesn't pretty much any portfolio that is set up along the lines of a modern portfolio allocation strategy not depend on market timing? Since it's keeping all components at a predetermined percentage?

[Indices]

Doesn't pretty much any portfolio that is set up along the lines of a modern portfolio allocation strategy not depend on market timing? Since it's keeping all components at a predetermined percentage?

I've never seen a widely used indexed portfolio with fixed asset allocations. The so-called "60-40" portfolio I thought was only used as a theoretical portfolio. I'm sure there are misguided people who have 100 per cent in a stock equity fund, but this isn't advocated by anyone.

[Coffee]

Pick up a copy of Bernstein's "Four Pillars".  I'm pretty sure he describes the same type of non-timed asset allocation approach.

[SanMiguel]

I think the permanent portfolio is the only portfolio where there is literally no market timing. Even a Boglehead overweighting of stocks is a form of market timing. You are basically hoping that stocks go up dramatically over the course of your life time, which is a big if considering what happens to advanced economies with declining populations like Japan (decades of low to no growth). I just read several threads on the Boglehead forum advocating market timing for bond purchases, and I realized that a standard index portfolio is also hoping that a period of high inflation will end at some point so that the bond portion of your portfolio is worth something.

And by default that also means it's a "the market always goes up" type of investment - that may eventually have it's shortcoming as well but for now...

[MediumTex]

I think the permanent portfolio is the only portfolio where there is literally no market timing. Even a Boglehead overweighting of stocks is a form of market timing. You are basically hoping that stocks go up dramatically over the course of your life time, which is a big if considering what happens to advanced economies with declining populations like Japan (decades of low to no growth). I just read several threads on the Boglehead forum advocating market timing for bond purchases, and I realized that a standard index portfolio is also hoping that a period of high inflation will end at some point so that the bond portion of your portfolio is worth something.

And by default that also means it's a "the market always goes up" type of investment - that may eventually have it's shortcoming as well but for now...

Not exactly.

It's more of a "some market is always going to go up, we just don't know in advance which one it will be" type of investment.

[Gumby]

In can be deceiving. A large percentage of the growth in markets (and portfolios) is often due to inflation. If there was no inflation, the markets would have much smaller nominal growth over time. You really have to look at the real growth.