Pension recovery performance 2020

ttree30

I just wondered what sort of performance people were experiencing with their pension investment during this tumultuous year. Mine is currently showing a rise of 5.15% on the calendar year, which has pleasantly surprised me given that at one point it was down more than 20%.

Is this typical, above or below what people are generally seeing?

Albermarle

ttree30 said:

I just wondered what sort of performance people were experiencing with their pension investment during this tumultuous year. Mine is currently showing a rise of 5.15% on the calendar year, which has pleasantly surprised me given that at one point it was down more than 20%.

Is this typical, above or below what people are generally seeing?

It seems pretty typical/within the normal range . Those with a high % of UK investments have lagged behind but will have partly caught up during recent weeks . On the other hand those with a high concentration of US tech stocks have done better.

Joey_Soap

Still about 10 per cent down overall. Due entirely due to being too over exposed to FTSE100 income stocks. Lesson has been learned.

itwasntme001

Up about 15% YTD.  Performance figures over this very short term period of nearly a year is meaningless and "fooled by randomness" comes to mind.  Investments should be for the long term.

Remember retail investors such as those on this forum typically under-perform and a lot of that is due to performance chasing or yield chasing and looking at performance over such a small time period certainly does not help (where luck comes into it much more than actual skill).  It is best to make decisions based on the key variables you can control - diversification, asset allocation, rebalancing method and risk tolerance.

garmeg

Joey_Soap said:

Still about 10 per cent down overall. Due entirely due to being too over exposed to FTSE100 income stocks. Lesson has been learned.

Yes, I seem to be about the same overall. Temple Bar has recovered comparatively well but Aberdeen Standard Equity Income is well down on my purchase price (nearly 40%, but was down 60% at its nadir). Others are still about 2% to 8% down on December 31st. Overall about 10% down on the year or just 3% since June last year. Figures include reinvested dividends.

ISA and SIPP down pretty much the same even though the ISA has more individual holdings.

itwasntme001

Joey_Soap said:

Still about 10 per cent down overall. Due entirely due to being too over exposed to FTSE100 income stocks. Lesson has been learned.

The problem is you don't know that in 5 years time these same FTSE100 stocks won't actually do better than US stocks.  They may.  You need to ask yourself why you chose the stocks you did, if they fit your objectives and if you are honest with yourself, you will come to a decision whether or not you need to change your allocations.

dunstonh

I just wondered what sort of performance people were experiencing with their pension investment during this tumultuous year. 

Apart from one month of falls which were quickly recovered, it has been a good year.  

Is this typical, above or below what people are generally seeing?

It depends on their risk profiles.   Our worst performance, for YTD, is the lowest risk at 4.62% and best performance is the highest risk at 33.85% with medium risk coming out at 18.69%.     The returns almost follow the risk profile levels as you would expect.  I would expect most people to fall within similar bands.

tacpot12

My SIPP is up 5.3% over the last 12 months.
I also have an ISA and a GIA that contain part of my retirement portfolio. The ISA is up 4.6% and the GIA 6.4%.

My SIPP is about 50% UK Equities and 7% UK Commercial Property, so its returns have been particularly hit by the pandemic and concerns for UK economy. The ISA and GIA are relatively recent purchases following a house sale, and these are predominantly invested in funds investing in ex-UK Equities. 

threlkeld53

Mine is an old Allied Dunbar pension which was taken over by Zurich some years ago. This very fund was discussed on here a few days ago in another thread. Anyway....

During February and March of this year its value decreased by 16%. As of 30.11.20 I notice that it has fully recovered the loss and is now at the value it was 31.1.20.

Secret2ndAccount

These threads always seem to be populated by the winners. You won't get many people coming here to tell you they sold everything at the bottom of the market, then failed to get back in as it recovered.

Here is a year-to-date chart of the FTSE 100 index, compared to two popular US indices - the Dow Jones (which is a poorly calculated but popular measure) and the S&P500 which is a much better measure of the wider market.

If you prefer to go for something actively managed, here are some of the most popular funds around this forum:

Baillie Gifford Global Discovery

Fundsmith Equity

Lindsell Train Global Equity

those three are pretty growth oriented (and therefore towards the right hand side of the risk scale). For those seeking to preserve capital with some prospect of growth too, a popular choice is Capital Gearing Trust

Baillie Gifford is a big fan of Tesla, which has distorted the picture somewhat. Past performance is not a guarantee of future returns, although BG has provided good returns over a period of several years to give them their due.

pensionpawn

I'm up around 5.8% (before contributions) in 10 months, equivalent to ~7% pa. Just left everything as it was.