Sam (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
l33tminion) wrote2009-11-13 04:17 pm
l33tminion) wrote2009-11-13 04:17 pm
Placing My Bets for the End of '09
I adjusted my investments today, since I'm worried about bad things happening to the market in the near future (especially two weeks from now). Relevant facts:
1. My YTD yield on my 401k is 28.2%, which exceeds the YTD on the DOW or the S&P. That's a little misleading, though. Since I put in quite a bit of that money since the beginning of the year, much of that wasn't around for the early 2009 decline. Don't know whether I did well relative to the market when you weight it properly.
2. Previously, my 401k was divided into 30% growth stocks, 25% contrafund (a fund focusing on stocks going against market trends), 30% overseas and multinational stocks, and 10% intermediate bonds. I underestimated the magnitude of the market rebound this year; if I hadn't I could have ditched some of those stock-backed funds for funds focusing on small and undervalued companies, which did better this year. Still, my choices seem to have been all right.
3. I moved 40% of my current funds into four stock funds that were more resilient than average to the previous downturn. I moved 40% to bonds (half of that in a fund designed to protect against inflation), 20% I moved to a money market fund (to give me a bit more flexibility after the post-holiday-season dust settles).
4. I changed where I'm assigning new contributions to a similar allocation, except putting slightly less in bonds and none in cash, directing that to value stock funds.
Hopefully with these changes, I'll do fine if the market continues to do well, and better than I would have previously if the market crashes again (especially if there's a subsequent bounce back up). The problem is, I have no idea what I'm doing (there's a reason I didn't go into finance), and all my investment decisions still feel rather like gambling (even though I'm trying to mitigate risk, not "win big"). On the other hand, with that attitude, I at least avoid the shock of those who viewed their 401k as "safe" and thought the first decade of the 21st century would be a good time to retire.
1. My YTD yield on my 401k is 28.2%, which exceeds the YTD on the DOW or the S&P. That's a little misleading, though. Since I put in quite a bit of that money since the beginning of the year, much of that wasn't around for the early 2009 decline. Don't know whether I did well relative to the market when you weight it properly.
2. Previously, my 401k was divided into 30% growth stocks, 25% contrafund (a fund focusing on stocks going against market trends), 30% overseas and multinational stocks, and 10% intermediate bonds. I underestimated the magnitude of the market rebound this year; if I hadn't I could have ditched some of those stock-backed funds for funds focusing on small and undervalued companies, which did better this year. Still, my choices seem to have been all right.
3. I moved 40% of my current funds into four stock funds that were more resilient than average to the previous downturn. I moved 40% to bonds (half of that in a fund designed to protect against inflation), 20% I moved to a money market fund (to give me a bit more flexibility after the post-holiday-season dust settles).
4. I changed where I'm assigning new contributions to a similar allocation, except putting slightly less in bonds and none in cash, directing that to value stock funds.
Hopefully with these changes, I'll do fine if the market continues to do well, and better than I would have previously if the market crashes again (especially if there's a subsequent bounce back up). The problem is, I have no idea what I'm doing (there's a reason I didn't go into finance), and all my investment decisions still feel rather like gambling (even though I'm trying to mitigate risk, not "win big"). On the other hand, with that attitude, I at least avoid the shock of those who viewed their 401k as "safe" and thought the first decade of the 21st century would be a good time to retire.