Gyroscopic Investing

iwealth wrote: According to the experts at CNBC, everyone should be stock picking. I say that mostly tongue-in-cheek, but who decides what is highly regarded and what isn't?

I see articles on the Fidelity home page like "Is now a good time to invest in ABC" or "should you have these 3 stocks in your portfolio right now" and I have to wonder who the hell they are talking to. Are there really a substantial number of investors out there that do their own stock picking? Personally, I don't know any but maybe I travel in the wrong circles.

dualstow wrote:

dragoncar wrote: In fact I was in a BH portfolio and switched to PP so it's not a wild fantasy

Me too, but the fantasy part is the specific timing you gave:

Yea I would prefer to have been in stocks the past three years up to and including today

As has been pointed out in another thread this morning or yesterday, stocks took a big plunge before they started coming up. Of course it's hard to compete with a specific range.

If I hadn't switched, I'd be in a BH portfolio for the last three years.  So the specific timing is not fantasy.  I could very well have decided to keep my present allocation, and was pretty much on the fence.

Not to beat this thing to death, but you wrote

Yea I would prefer to have been in stocks the past three years up to and including today

Now if you had said, "I wish I'd never abandoned Bogleheads",
that's different.

BTW, I am out of stocks now.

dualstow wrote: Not to beat this thing to death, but you wrote

Yea I would prefer to have been in stocks the past three years up to and including today

Now if you had said, "I wish I'd never abandoned Bogleheads",
that's different.

Both statements are factually correct.

Well, at least the dividend yield on this crappy asset is up lately.

US stocks to the far right... they have been racing ahead for so many years, and non-US have been sucking for a long time. Maybe time for a reversal?

Its all in the timing.

ochotona wrote: BTW, I am out of stocks now.

Yikes.

good timing

Only big caps recovered.  Everything else is struggling.  Don't let the mirage of cap-weighted confuse you!  The question at this point is whether investors are going to go risk-on with broader participation or is this the false calm before the storm as it always is at market tops?

[img width=800]http://i.imgur.com/ONJWer7.png[/img]

this year has been even more of a stock pickers market then the last 7 years have been .

managed funds in the mid cap and small cap areas have been all over the place .
you have  managed funds like fidelity small cap growth up over 6% , fidelity small cap stock up over 6% ,  fidelity midcap growth strategy's  up over 5% , fidelity nasdaq composite index up over 8%

The Meb Faber Ivy-10 ETF portfolio is back in US Large Caps and US REIT as of today. And bonds.

US Small Cap, all non-US stocks, non-US REIT, commodities are all not in play.

mathjak107 wrote: this year has been even more of a stock pickers market than the last 7 years have been .

ugh, it's sad to see these novice words on the pp forum.

get used to it , you could have almost thrown a dart at any fidelity large cap fund the last 6 out of 7 years and beat the s&p 500 .

as we were saying in another thread , the more popular indexing becomes the more money the herd throws in to the same exact stock making them even more over valued .

the value is every where else lately .

reuters reported that fidelity's  large cap funds not counting the land slide this year have brought in an extra 35 billion to share holders in large cap funds compared to the s&p 500 performance .

i own both index and managed and the managed have been out performing for a long long time . funds like fidelity contra , growth company , capital appreciation and blue chip growth all have excellent long term records and continue to do so .

when you look at the handful of managed mega funds that hold the bulk of  of investors money ,indexing isn't the winner  most of the time .

it is only when you consider the thousands of tiny funds with little investor money , most of which we never even  heard of  because  they have so little of investor money that indexing looks like a no brainier .  it isn't the fact that many of the managers of these small funds are not good stock pickers either  that hurts them . it is the fact that expenses run higher because they have relatively little investor money .

once you actually follow investor money the odds are very different .

in fact today you have high fee index funds in 401k's so stock picking ability and fund expenses are really two separate issues .

put  danoff from contra fund in to one of these tiny funds and even with his suburb stock picking ability the fund likely would lag because of expenses being so high so don't confuse the two parameters .

ochotona wrote: The Meb Faber Ivy-10 ETF portfolio is back in US Large Caps and US REIT as of today. And bonds.

US Small Cap, all non-US stocks, non-US REIT, commodities are all not in play.

Ehhh, I wouldn't call 10-year T-Notes, "bonds".  And REIT isn't a separate category from equity, but I digress.

ochotona wrote: The Meb Faber Ivy-10 ETF portfolio is back in US Large Caps and US REIT as of today. And bonds.

US Small Cap, all non-US stocks, non-US REIT, commodities are all not in play.

phew , after we already went up 1700 points it is first  back in  today ?   

mathjak107 wrote: phew , after we already went up 1700 points it is first  back in  today ? 

Oh yes. The plan is to trade no more often than once a month. Whipsaws are pretty much guaranteed every few years.  And, you will underperform during bull markets. But you will never be in for a true bear. The risk adjusted return is really good over a complete market cycle.

dualstow wrote: ugh, it's sad to see these novice words on the pp forum.

Are you being facetious?  Stock picking has outperformed the S&P 500 for the last 15 years...

All trades Buy&Hold (~SPY)
Initial capital 10000 10000
Ending capital 42750.44 19839.61
Net Profit 32750.44 9839.61
Net Profit % 327.50% 98.40%
Exposure % 63.40% 99.66%
Net Risk Adjusted Return % 516.57% 98.73%
Annual Return % 9.73% 4.48%
Risk Adjusted Return % 15.35% 4.49%
Total transaction costs 423.16 2

Max. trade drawdown -898.92 -6969.75
Max. trade % drawdown -52.73 -55.26
Max. system drawdown -5598.44 -6966.46
Max. system % drawdown -16.37% -55.08%

mathjak107 wrote: phew , after we already went up 1700 points it is first  back in  today ? 

Thats the price paid for avoiding 1700+ points to the downside.  Worry less about the gains and more about the losses.  The gains will take care of themselves.

MachineGhost wrote:

mathjak107 wrote: phew , after we already went up 1700 points it is first  back in  today ? 

Thats the price paid for avoiding 1700+ points to the downside.  Worry less about the gains and more about the losses.  The gains will take care of themselves.

I just keep wondering if we're really in a QE / ZIRP pumped secular bear market that began in 2000, with massive sucker rallies...

ochotona wrote: I just keep wondering if we're really in a QE / ZIRP pumped secular bear market that began in 2000, with massive sucker rallies...

It does have that feeling.  Burned once, shame on me.  Burned twice, shame on you.  Burned thrice, kill 'em all.  Retail is very skeptical about the stock market after getting burned twice, but I don't think sentiment is where it would be at a true secular bottom.  Stocks have to be completely reviled, loathed, cause people to puke and not be acceptable for polite dinner table conversation first.  I wonder if that's even possible anymore in this day and age of defined contribution pensions?

MachineGhost wrote:

ochotona wrote: I just keep wondering if we're really in a QE / ZIRP pumped secular bear market that began in 2000, with massive sucker rallies...

It does have that feeling.  Burned once, shame on me.  Burned twice, shame on you.  Burned thrice, kill 'em all.  Retail is very skeptical about the stock market after getting burned twice, but I don't think sentiment is where it would be at a true secular bottom.  Stocks have to be completely reviled, loathed, cause people to puke and not be acceptable for polite dinner table conversation first.  I wonder if that's even possible anymore in this day and age of defined contribution pensions?

Russian equities. Brazilian equities. Now we're talking!!!

Burned once, shame on me.  Burned twice, shame on you.  Burned thrice, kill 'em all.

- Staff Sergeant MachineGhost

MachineGhost wrote:

mathjak107 wrote: phew , after we already went up 1700 points it is first  back in  today ? 

Thats the price paid for avoiding 1700+ points to the downside.  Worry less about the gains and more about the losses.  The gains will take care of themselves.

it doesn't look like the ivy-10 avoided it though . it still shows down . if you went to cash on 8/31  with that signal  vti was at 102.21 , if you bought back in yesterday you bought in at 107.93. a loss of about 5%