Portfolio critique requested

sg1000

Thanks, Gadget, I appreciate what you are saying...and yes, the "IFA" was laughing.

Anyway, moving on...There have been peaks and troughs over the period I have been investing, but I am still up. The funds I have picked have been recommended, albeit through my own reading of Trustnet / Morningstar / HL (I know they have a reputation for punting what will be best for them).

But the fact is that I am 23% up, which I am happy with. I realise that I would have achieved more if I had put the whole lot into First State at the beginning, but I didn't have the cash, or the forward projectory.

Would I really be better cashing it all in and going with the tracker(s)?....I am appreciating that the mattress option isn't really sensible,

SG

brasso

sg1000 wrote: »

Only up 23% due to the fact that I started with very small amounts......

OK, fair enough, but don't feel self-conscious about the size of your fund, we all started somewhere. I began with £3K that was part of a redundancy payment and bought 6 funds.

I can totally understand the desire to spread your investments around but you'll know that fees can become very high as a proportion of the investment when buying tiny parcels.

I'd suggest looking at simplifying things, perhaps by going for one of the Vanguard Lifestrategy funds which are well diversified, low cost and get rebalanced frequently. The different funds allow you to choose the ratio of equities to bonds from 100:0 down to 20:80 in 20% stages.

gadgetmind

sg1000 wrote: »

Would I really be better cashing it all in and going with the tracker(s)?....I am appreciating that the mattress option isn't really sensible,

It depends on your time scale and your crystal ball. If the sector and funds you have chosen do well, then happy days. Until it all crashes and you panic and sell.

You need to diversify or it really could all go very wrong.

sg1000

OK, I'm getting the message that I need to "diversify", or am I? Some think my allocation is pants....some think it is ok (funds, rather than percentages). Some think it is a tragedy waiting to happen.

I am split between emerging markets (a lot), UK (a lot), building up my USA (low), Europe (very, very low) Emerging Markets (a lot), Russia (low).

How to I diversify......bonds, property, or what.

This is when "under the mattress" becomes a good option when you have information overload.....or does it?

gadgetmind

The usual books recommended are "Smarter Investing" by Tim Hale, and "The Intelligent Asset Allocator:" by William Bernstein.

These two books are *very* different, and maybe start with Hale. The other book really shows that the principles work across the continents and multiple decades, which is a key message.

Mistermeaner

Ok. How's about;

10% global bonds
10% direct property
20% us equity
5% us small comps
15% uk equity
5% uk small comps
10% Euro equity
5% Euro small comps
10% Asia Pacific
10% emerging markets

Then adjust to suit.

sg1000

Thanks, Gadget and GPP

I'll check out the books, although i have seen synopsis in the past.

I'll look at the spread advised, but may take me a while to get there with my current £250 per month.

I'm not going to "cash in" anything I have already, but will look at diversifying with future funds.

Thanks again to everyone!

TakeCareOfThePennies_2

sg1000 wrote: »

I'll check out the books

sg1000,

see also :

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=68199214&postcount=18

Totton

Hi sg1000,
I think you wrote that you had about 20k invested, if so then I would't bother trying to split it by those 10 allocations, simply get 1-3 global funds and perhaps add some satellite holdings if you want a bit of security or spice, up to you which way to jump :-)

If you want the full amount to be equity based then consider opting for a global Investment Trust such as Witan or similar, take a look at the AIC site for what is on offer http://www.theaic.co.uk/aic/find-compare-investment-companies

If the 20k is also your savings then you need to carefully consider this, I would ensure a decent savings pot outside of this or go for more cautious though still risky holdings such as the VLS 60 or 40.

With 20k all for equity holdings you could just run a single holding or split it up but I wouldn't use more than perhaps 3 or 5 at most. If you want funds rather than Investment Trusts then perhaps consider Fundsmith, the manager (Terry Smith) recently put out a video which is quite interesting, apparently he holds 90% of his investment in Fundsmith and the other 10% in his Investment Trust 'FEET' (Fundsmith Emerging Equities)

His video is at http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=fundsmith+video&form=VIRE2&first=1#view=detail&mid=1CC9291A729828E11B511CC9291A729828E11B51

My personal preference is for IT's so I do not hold Fundsmith, some commentators have recently mentioned that it may be over-valued though Terry Smith covers this in the video when he answers audience questions.

Best of luck,
Mickey

brasso

Thanks. Terry Smith of Fundsmith is always good value in his speeches. FYI, the 2015 shareholders meeting video has just recently been posted: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbEqRyIISTU

It's longer than usual but, while ostensibly aimed at Fundsmith investors, contains plenty of general wisdom about investing principles that is well worth listening to. And all the usual jokes -- some of which he's been recycling for a while. In fact, he seems to be as careful with his joke deployment as he is with his fund investments.