Critique My Fund Portfolio

mike88

Coeus. Your expectations are now more realistic. As you know my suggestions have been geared towards reigning in your expectations and preserving your existing capital. The level of risk is of course entirely a matter for you.

Your lump sum investments are now more conservative than hitherto but I guess a financial advisor might still take the view that your initial investment stocks are still vulnerable to a market downturn given your investment timescale. To this end I note you have reduced your holding in Newton Real Return which is the one fund that was intended to help preserve capital.

You asked about the origins of my previous post. It came from this site here where various portfolios are suggested:

http://www.bestinvest.co.uk/investment-research/asset-allocation/index.aspx

They suggest conservative selections for short timescales such as yours. James' post mentions the house deposit issue mentioned by me previously. The importance of your future housing requirements cannot be overestimated. My comments have been largely influenced by your need to get early access to your money and I apologise for banging on about it.

Leaving that aside, overall you have chosen excellent funds with rated managers. I must confess that your initial lump sum suggestions in particular were conducive to sleepless nights and your portfolio now looks a lot less scary and better balanced. I hope things work out to enable you to get on the property ladder in 3 to 5 years time.

Are you still proposing to scan the funds into TrustNet?

Coeus

Thank you both very much for your posts! I am quickly getting used to Trustnet - a VERY useful tool especially the Fundwire - will keep me up to date Having a bit of trouble saving the pdfs as pdfs but will figure it out I'm sure.

JAMESU

I will ignore ETFs for now but must admit am quite interested in it - the FT books is next on the list once I've read the first book your recommended - not arrived yet however

As for the house I could wait another two years - I am in early 20s so is not particularly that big of a deal if there was a downturn (however I would like to avoid one!). I will continue to invest in both Cash ISA and regular savings over this period with any raises in salary (due once I complete my training - hopefully quite significant) re-inforcing this cash position i.e. not topping up S&S ISA - to this effect I will only be investing the ISA limit a year and hopefully in a wise fashion.

MIKE88

The latest allocations and historical performance graph against CPI + 1%. I have adjusted my weightings post allocation to the Newton Real Return (Class A) (Income) (Absolute Return) to 30% - was manipulating figures after removing the riskier funds.

INITIAL INVESTMENT



REGULAR INVESTMENT

Coeus

Quickpost - figured out the issue with pdfs and TrustNet. Was actually an issue with pdfs and Google Chrome. Appears Google had their own plugin Adobe pdf viewer which was messing up. Disabled so now can utilised TrustNet's pdf ability all I want - GREAT SUCCESS.

Coeus

Hi all!

Hope all is well

Been looking into depth at some of my funds would like any insights into whether my thoughts on some of them are reasonable?

ABERDEEN EMERGING MARKETS FUND EMERGING MARKETS

I have been considering substituting this with the First State Global Emerging Markets Sustainability fund. Citywire research shows for 1 year First State beats Aberdeen in return, loss, risk and sharpe. Over the last 3 month period Aberdeen has been performing fairly poorly 46/52 46/52 33/52 47/52 in return, loss, risk and sharpe respectively. It seems First State has been a clearly better performer however there is a downside. Over a 3 year period Aberdeen is one of the best performers however First State only launched in Apr 09. I am leaning towards changing to First State however thought I'd consult with you helpful people first

In terms of TER there is an immaterial difference (1.88% Aberdeen : 1.87% First State - bonus point for First State!)

I also have the First State Global Resources on my investment list - a strong performer in it's own 'Global Growth' category. Encouraging to see other funds in similar categories by First State performing well over the long term (reviewed 3 year performance) however - possible overlap? Would be similar for Aberdeen anyway though thus not really relevant when comparing the two.

PRUDENTIAL GROWTH ACTIVE MANAGED

I have also been considering substituting Prudential Growth with Unicorn Mastertrust B. Firstly, the fund manager of Unicorn is focused entirely running this 1 fund, whereas Prudential is running 3. Over a 3m and 1y period Unicorn beats Prudential in return, loss, risk and sharpe. However the opposite is true for a 3 year period - struggling more with this one.

The downside of Unicorn is a high TER of 1.98%. Given this I do not think the 1 year performance warrants a move from Prudential (with a TER of 1.71%). What do you guys think?


Thanks for any and all replies, hope you have all had a good weekend!

Coeus.

mike88

Can't really offer much of an opinion I'm afraid. One observation is that Graham French who manages the Prudential Fund also runs several M&G funds including Managed Growh and Global Growth.

I have been invested in the Aberdeen Fund in the past. It was one of the best then the worst in its sector in the 90's but a lot of water has passed under the bridge since then.

I've looked at this Unicorn fund previously but have not been able to invest as Unicorn are not available through Funds Network with whom I'm invested. The same goes for the CF Ruffer funds which I also like especially their Total Return Fund. That is not a recommendation by the way.

Limited fund choices are the penalty I have to pay for getting 100% trail commission rebated through Cavendish.

Coeus

Hi all!

Just to let you know the investment has gone ahead and I've opened a new post - a diary of such - to pass on my knowledge and experienced gained over the next few years!

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3069918

THANKS FOR ALL YOU INPUT

Coeus.