PP is once again positive YTD

[dutchtraffic]

Europe has always benefited from immigration and I see no reason why this time its different. Europe needs immigrants.

Islam.

Calling an islamic invasion in europe a blessing is something I just cannot find any words for to describe the pure insanity.
Luckily most people nowadays agree with me.

[Pet Hog]

Not only that, for the moment it's beating a 100% total stock market index portfolio and a conservative 55% bond Boglehead portfolio. All assets but stocks are once again positive YTD. Could turn around tomorrow, but it's at least a good reminder of how tough a year this has been for investments.

Um... no.  I would like to know what you're basing those results on?  I monitor 3 different iterations of a 4x25 PP on Yahoo! Finance that I set up on 1/1 every year based on the opening price on the first trading day of the year.  I do not rebalance, just to see what happens as the year unfolds.  None of my sample portfolios has been positive for at least 6 months.  Here they are as of 10/31:



Then I thought maybe the PP was briefly positive on the date you posted (10/14), so I went back and checked the closing prices on that day and calculated the PP returns YTD at that point, and the results were even worse:



As you can see, only cash and gold were positive on the date you posted, whereas today (10/31) only cash and stocks are positive on the year.  So again, how did you come up with positive numbers for a PP based on YTD numbers as of 10/14?

I suspect the differences come from three things:

1. You are using the opening prices on 1/1/2015; I suspect PS used the closing prices on 12/31/2014.  I would do the latter, myself.  For example, TLT's close on 12/31/2014 was 125.92, less than its 1/1/2015 open of 126.29.

2. Dividends.  Are you using the adjusted close (technically, the "adjusted open" in your case) on 1/1/2015?  TLT yields about 3% and VTI about 2%, so three-quarters of the way through the year they would have yielded about 2.2% and 1.5%, respectively, adding about 0.9% to the PP.

3. You have forgotten to divide by four in your "worse" figures for 10/14.  You can't just add the percentages together without factoring in that each asset only makes up 25% of the portfolio.  So your worse numbers are actually all on the order of –0.8%; that is, they are better!  And the dividends from TLT and VTI would appear to wipe out that loss, so a positive PP YTD.

[mathjak107]

the pp is at a loss ytd .  dividends and interest are included in these total returns from morningstar as of friday .

vti has ytd of 1.93% dividends included

tlt  minus -.63 including interest

gld  minus  -  3.77

cash figure 1%

pp is at a loss ytd  by less than 1%

[Pointedstick]

For some reason Europe is different from the US. The US had to deal with millions of uneducated Mexicans and it didn't make a difference at all.

It has definitely made a difference. Here are a few of the ways:
1. Lower price of food
2. Lower price of residential construction
3. Diminished employment opportunities for teenagers, blacks, and poor whites, who are outcompeted by the immigrants
4. Greater corruption in immigrant-heavy areas
5. Fewer stifling, European-style laws and bureaucracies in immigrant-heavy areas, and regardless, people just ignore the laws they don't like; less of a law culture and more of a frontier culture
6. Greater corporate profits for firms hiring immigrants--legal and illegal alike
7. More crime and gang activity especially in southern California
8. Worse schools in immigrant-heavy areas; hispanic culture on average does not value education as much as Asian and European-derived white cultures do
9. Changed cultural composition; border towns start to look a lot like Mexico
10. Empowerment of the Democratic party, which has become strongly pro-immigration and openly hostile to the white middle class
11. Decimation of black America as blacks are outcompeted by hispanics for blue-collar work and ignored by their former patrons in the Democratic party, who now focus on the growing hispanic demographic instead. The Black Lives Matter movement is basically a cry for attention and an attempt to stay politically relevant

On point 11, I would not be surprised if we saw a kind of great reversal in which blacks started voting for Republicans a lot more. In many ways, it's only natural. Blacks are harmed by immigration far more than whites are. They are religious and socially conservative. They like the kind of rough and dirty jobs that conservatives favor. They don't like abortion and are really turned off by all this gay and transgender stuff that modern liberalism seems obsessed with. It's not a perfect match because they don't like guns or the police, but it's no worse than their awkward fit within the Democratic party. The prospect of this should absolutely petrify Democrats as it would see them lose most of the midwest, and with it congress and the presidency.

[MachineGhost]

For some reason Europe is different from the US. The US had to deal with millions of uneducated Mexicans and it didn't make a difference at all. But for some reason a couple of million Syrians will basically end the European Union. I don't see why. Europe has always benefited from immigration and I see no reason why this time its different. Europe needs immigrants. Even if only half of them finds a job it will be positive as only about 50% of europeans have jobs anyway...  Short term there will be problems but long-term there's a good chance the current crisis will turn out to be a blessing.

Europe is a big place, so I guess it depends exactly on which part.  Let's take France, for example.  That place is different because its a socialist basketcase, not just in practical reality, but mentally (they're all depressed).  There's simply not enough vibrant, rich, wealthy people and economically successful corporations to soak with taxes to pay for all the expected welfare benefits without taking on ever increasing amounts of unpayable sovereign debt, especially when it is on top of a culture that overglorifies the needs of the worker instead of the consumer.  The USA -- like all Anglo-Saxon heritage countries -- responds to the demands of the consumer instead of the worker.  That is what makes those countries so economically dynamic and flexible, so long as there's not too much innovation-stiffling socialism and overregulation.

Immigrants are great in concept if they assimilate into the landed culture and don't expect to maintain their own original culture while simultaneously living off the generosity of the welfare state and not engaging in continual self-improvement.  There are also very ingrained cultural factors in Europe that prevent cultural assimilation of immigrants compared to the anything goes policy of USA.  The most we have is one generation not speaking English and not assimilating, Europe by contrast is cultural balkanization.  No different from putting the Jews in the Warsaw ghetto.  What do you expect will happen?!!

[MachineGhost]

On point 11, I would not be surprised if we saw a kind of great reversal in which blacks started voting for Republicans a lot more. In many ways, it's only natural. Blacks are harmed by immigration far more than whites are. They are religious and socially conservative. They like the kind of rough and dirty jobs that conservatives favor. They don't like abortion and are really turned off by all this gay and transgender stuff that modern liberalism seems obsessed with. It's not a perfect match because they don't like guns or the police, but it's no worse than their awkward fit within the Democratic party. The prospect of this should absolutely petrify Democrats as it would see them lose most of the midwest, and with it congress and the presidency.

LOL!  I think you're dreaming.  Blacks are always going to be eternally grateful to the Democratic torchbearers for getting them their civil rights.

But, it would be really cool if it ever happened.

[dualstow]

~
Immigration is just hard to get right. I'm a member of a multinational, immigrant-heavy team at work and pretty much the only reason it functions is because the non-Americans are nearly all (regardless of ethnic background) Western Europeans or Canadians who have been carefully selected for their high skill and cultural compatibility
~

For some reason Europe is different from the US. The US had to deal with millions of uneducated Mexicans and it didn't make a difference at all. But for some reason a couple of million Syrians will basically end the European Union. I don't see why.
~

Dare I say it: at least in this era it's more beneficial to have Mexicans than Syrians. I realize that your post was largely in response to PS's, but mine is about nations, not any particular company or work team. Even the Mexicans whose only plan is to send money back to Mexico are working their butts off.

Despite what one sees on Fox News about crime and job stealing, Mexicans are good for the U.S. They're not making waves of any kind. Not shouting "Jews to the gas" in the streets. Not burning tires because they cannot find jobs. Not waging jihad.

Is this really the 'PP is once again positive YTD' thread?

[Pointedstick]

LOL!  I think you're dreaming.  Blacks are always going to be eternally grateful to the Democratic torchbearers for getting them their civil rights.

But, it would be really cool if it ever happened.

Stranger things have definitely happened. If you're talking about the Civil Rights Act of 1964, nearly all the Republicans voted for it and about half of the "Yea" votes were cast by Republicans. The vast majority of "Nay" votes were cast by Democrats.

Senate:
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/88-1964/s409
[img width=500]http://i.imgur.com/6obxgtx.png[/img]


House:
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/88-1964/h182
[img width=500]http://i.imgur.com/rOkN8rs.png[/img]

[MachineGhost]

Really, what were the objections that Democrats had?  Perhaps we're talking about the Southern Dixie Democrats?  Those were a different beast than the Democrats of today.

[Pointedstick]

I realize that my second-to-last post probably came off as pretty anti-Mexican but I largely agree with Dualstow. It is a different kettle of fish. Most of the Mexicans who come here like the USA and want to be here. They are hardworking and gravitate towards difficult, shitty jobs. In my opinion refugees are bigger problems because most of them did not want to leave their homes and will work much harder to replicate the conditions they left than economic migrants. If New Mexico is any indication, there are definitely problems with more petty lawlessness compared to docile northern European folks but it's not an insurmountable problem.

[Pointedstick]

Really, what were the objections that Democrats had?  Perhaps we're talking about the Southern Dixie Democrats?  Those were a different beast than the Democrats of today.

You're right, and those Dixiecrats became Republicans over it, but my point was that the Republicans of the era were pretty much on board with civil rights for blacks. The narrative that the Democrats were 100% responsible for it seems a little thin.

[MachineGhost]

You're right, and those Dixiecrats became Republicans over it, but my point was that the Republicans of the era were pretty much on board with civil rights for blacks. The narrative that the Democrats were 100% responsible for it seems a little thin.

They why do the overhwhelming majority of blacks vote Democratic?  Even Carson can't budge them worth a damn.

[Pointedstick]

You're right, and those Dixiecrats became Republicans over it, but my point was that the Republicans of the era were pretty much on board with civil rights for blacks. The narrative that the Democrats were 100% responsible for it seems a little thin.

They why do the overhwhelming majority of blacks vote Democratic?  Even Carson can't budge them worth a damn.

(This is just my opinion; I am by no means an expert on the subject)

I think it was the influx of explicitly racist Dixiecrats to the Republican party, Democratic pandering, and conventional narrative manipulation. The Dixiecrats are pretty much all dead at this point and the Republican party is really no more explicitly racist than the Democratic party is. But the baby boomers are stuck in the past and still see Republicans as racist KKK lynch mobbers. I think that eventually something will jolt blacks out of their Democratic reverie and they will realize that the Democrats have at best done nothing for them. Some already realize this. Hillary Clinton was cornered by some Black Lives Matter people who confronted her about the effect that Bill's 1994 crime bill had in incarcerating blacks en masse:

https://www.ncjrs.gov/txtfiles/billfs.txt
The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 represents
the bipartisan product of six years of hard work.  It is the largest crime bill
in the history of the country and will provide for 100,000 new police
officers, $9.7 billion in funding for prisons and $6.1 billion in funding for
prevention programs which were designed with significant input from
experienced police officers. The Act also significantly expands the
government's ability to deal with problems caused by criminal aliens.
The Crime Bill provides $2.6 billion in additional funding for the FBI, DEA,
INS, United States Attorneys, and other Justice Department components,
as well as the Federal courts and the Treasury Department.

Hillary was defensive and hostile, and really didn't like the implication that she and her husband threw blacks under the bus to get a gun control bill passed. It was all caught on camera, too. Oops. The Black Lives Matter people are starting to revolt and are crashing Democratic events to make their points. That's not something you do if you feel you're well-represented.

[rickb]

On point 11, I would not be surprised if we saw a kind of great reversal in which blacks started voting for Republicans a lot more. In many ways, it's only natural. Blacks are harmed by immigration far more than whites are. They are religious and socially conservative. They like the kind of rough and dirty jobs that conservatives favor. They don't like abortion and are really turned off by all this gay and transgender stuff that modern liberalism seems obsessed with. It's not a perfect match because they don't like guns or the police, but it's no worse than their awkward fit within the Democratic party. The prospect of this should absolutely petrify Democrats as it would see them lose most of the midwest, and with it congress and the presidency.

LOL!  I think you're dreaming.  Blacks are always going to be eternally grateful to the Democratic torchbearers for getting them their civil rights.

But, it would be really cool if it ever happened.

do i have my history confused? weren't the democrats the south during the civil war and the KKK during the civil rights movement? i cant recall the exact record of who voted for what, who sponsored which bill off  the top of my head, but i could have sworn it was republicans that largely got it done and dems who swooped in and offered welfare for votes afterward and ended up getting the civil rights credit...

the above could just be the contrarian version of events and the truth lies in-between somewhere... but i have always had doubts about the whole everybody switched sides Dixiecrats went republican, republicans became progressives story, its just takes too much of a one dimensional false narrative view of the political spectrum to not be suspect, much less to be worthy of forever loyalty to the Democratic party.,

Wikipedia says it was basically an "everybody else" vs. the South issue, with strong support from both parties except in the South (which, at the time was largely Democratic).  Both Houses were controlled by Democrats, so ultimately it was Democrats who got it done - knowing it might cost them the South.  The South indeed switched to the Republican party, and has stayed there ever since.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964

[Pointedstick]

the south switching to the republicans doesn't equal the republicans became racist or racist politicians switched party's.. (both party's do/have done horrible stuff due to the nature of political party's)

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/386257/myth-republican-racism-mona-charen i will remain undecided on the actual history of "switching sides - republicans became racist" for now... the national review is undoubtedly a biased source, and its been a long day... i will try to find better sources another day perhaps..

…Especially since those explicit racists who became Republicans are all dead now. That only leaves the "implicit," "hidden," or "unintentional" racists which I have seen in roughly equal number on both the left and the right, just for different issues.

[mathjak107]

how did the pp being positive turn in to a political discussion ? 

[l82start]

how did the pp being positive turn in to a political discussion ? 

i don't have any back testing to predict the future rate of thread drift in a PP topic, or the raw data necessary to compare its drift to the drift of topics about other portfolios, but perhaps one of our data gurus can whip up some charts for us... 

back on topic...  so what are today's YTD results, working from a start date randomly chosen based on the global dominance of the Gregorian calendar and the fact that we are not Chinese?

[Pointedstick]

back on topic...  so what are today's YTD results, working from a start date randomly chosen based on the global dominance of the Gregorian calendar and the fact that we are not Chinese?

The PP is once again slightly negative YTD:

[img width=600]http://i.imgur.com/h0W2j0F.png[/img]

It's performed more or less the same as a conservative Boglehead portfolio, which is the blue line (55% bonds 45% stocks). Gold has been the component dragging down the PP this year, but no asset has done particularly well. Cash runs the risk of being the winning asset.

[mathjak107]

i don't know about the boglehead portfolio performing the same but in my thread i posted the results of the 3 insight models and all three  are  up ytd

[Pointedstick]

i don't know about the boglehead portfolio performing the same but in my thread i posted the results of the 3 insight models and all three  are  up ytd

Sure… but your actively-managed portfolio bears no relation to a portfolio of stock and bond index funds.

[mathjak107]

exactly . they are all manged funds with managers going where the value is  instead of following the herd in to the same exact  over valued stocks as happens when to many start indexing .

but that is a another subject . .

[dutchtraffic]

You are not just stockpicking...worse than that, you are betting on people who you hope pick the right stocks.
Do you understand all 'fund managers' together ARE the market...? They don't add any value, that's been proven hundreds of times by now.

Comparing stockpickers to a passive portfolio makes zero sense, and i assume everybody understands that.

[MachineGhost]

You are not just stockpicking...worse than that, you are betting on people who you hope pick the right stocks.
Do you understand all 'fund managers' together ARE the market...? They don't add any value, that's been proven hundreds of times by now.

Comparing stockpickers to a passive portfolio makes zero sense, and i assume everybody understands that.

That's a loaded question.  There's no truely passive portfolio.  All indexes are actively managed to one degree or another.  Tilting is active management.  Would you not have preferred to avoid the energy sector over the past year or biotechs more recently?  I don't know how Fidelity fund managers claim to do it but I am extremely skeptical of them outperforming anything long-term unless they had a relatively concentrated portfolio of 50 stocks or less which does exist in a few factor ETF's.  True talent doesn't go into the mutual fund management business anyway.  The fact that the vast majority of Wall Street can't get it done doesn't mean it can't be done in reality, however.  Wall Street has entirely different array of incentives than an independent investor does.  Their first priority is everywhere and always selling you a product, not giving you the best return.

[mathjak107]

You are not just stockpicking...worse than that, you are betting on people who you hope pick the right stocks.
Do you understand all 'fund managers' together ARE the market...? They don't add any value, that's been proven hundreds of times by now.

Comparing stockpickers to a passive portfolio makes zero sense, and i assume everybody understands that.

it has been decades now the funds we use have been a head of their index . it is more marketing then reality once you  look under the hood if you follow the money  as far as indexing goes .
while there are thousands of funds out there that go from the top to the bottom  they have little investor money . 80% of investor  money is in only 20% of the funds , usually those are the big mega funds that have been doing well for years .

once you follow the money  you find compared to indexing there is little difference or you find many of those managed meg funds are a head of indexing

[MachineGhost]

once you follow the money  you find compared to indexing there is little difference or you find many of those managed meg funds are a head of indexing

Sounds like Pareto's 80/20 rule.  80% underperform, 20% outperform?  I've yet to see that in mutual funds, however.  What are some example of mutual funds that have outperformed for 25 and 30-years?