Investment Returns 2020

LHW99

Unitised portfolio is unchanged, but dividends received slightly increased on last year, and now within a whisker of the level aimed for at this point (to my surprise, I thought dividend cuts would have pulled it down badly).

High UK bias at ~25% (deliberate). Europe and Clean Energy were the best performers over the year.

Averaged 7% pa increase over the last 6 years, which I would be happy to maintain going forward

BananaRepublic

My SIPP and ISA funds grew about 9% so I’m happy and no IFA fees. I don’t have much in the US markets, which hit growth, but I suspect that the US tech stocks are in a bubble. 

Secret2ndAccount said:

The Vanguard LifeStrategy range

I think I would be a bit disappointed if I was in their 100% equity product.

I would be disappointed if I was invested in their cautious products, as they’vecorivided no benefit and the VLS100 will soon outpace them. 

I researched historical data for a wide range of funds and concluded that whilst more volatile funds went down further in a crash, they soon recovered and then outpaced their cautious siblings. The above seems typical. That’s why I bought into more volatile funds. 

pensionpawn

Up 9% before contributions. 10% in cash.

Ceme3000

I ditched all my VLS funds back in the early Summer apart from a bit of VLS20 in favour of Baillie Gifford.  I just wasn't comfortable with the excessive UK bias which was holding it back.  Glad I did.... Will keep an eye on it though and rebalance if the UK starts to out perform.

eskbanker

Ceme3000 said:

I ditched all my VLS funds back in the early Summer apart from a bit of VLS20 in favour of Baillie Gifford.  I just wasn't comfortable with the excessive UK bias which was holding it back.  Glad I did.... Will keep an eye on it though and rebalance if the UK starts to out perform.

VLS has bettered many of its peers in recent times, probably aided by sterling's strengthening, so it's not necessarily something to be pleased about if you're measuring your shift in like-for-like performance terms, although obviously it's perfectly valid to change horses for strategic reasons....

[Deleted User]

Vanguard justifies some home bias on the basis of risk/return relationship: https://static.vgcontent.info/crp/intl/auw/docs/literature/research/role-home-bias-global-asset-allocation-decisions.pdf?20130819%7C151400

UK underperformed market cap weighted global portfolio in the last decade but outperformed in the prior decade.

Jumping from one domestic allocation to another and back displays “recency bias” and is a good way of hurting long term returns. 

michaels

Not too many people on here saying 'my UK focussed default pension company fund is flat/down a bit' for some reason.....

Prism

michaels said:

Not too many people on here saying 'my UK focussed default pension company fund is flat/down a bit' for some reason.....

Probably because many people don't even know that their pension is an investment. Anyway my wife's default pension fund in Scottish Widows is up 3.7% for the year. Luckily she swapped out of that and is up 33%

mark55man

My return on my company SIPP was 14.3% (using XIRR on value and contributions) .  My asset allocation is 

• Far East Equity - 5%  (Japan)
• Bonds - 20% (Blend of corporate, index, and government)
• Resource - 15% (50/50 Gold and Natural Resources)
• UK Equity - 15% (Vanguard FTSE Income)
• Smaller Companies (UK and Europe) - 20% 
• Global Equity (ex UK) - 25%

I repositioned in the week after Christmas - with a view to reviewing in April as I'm not quite sure I shouldn't just put all the large cap into a single global fund for more passive US representation - but I think UK and Euro will do well post Brexit so will play this "bet" for a bit.

• Far East Equity - 10% 
• UK (Equal - Large and Small) - 30% 
  
• Euro (Equal - Large and Small) - 20%
• US Equity - 10%
• Bonds - 20% (Blend of corporate, index, and government)
• Resource - 10% (Blackrock Gold)

billy2shots

I messed with my Sipp far too much this year. I had a spell of thinking I could time the market. I think I convinced myself that the volatility was my big chance of making big money. 
With 20 years until I can touch my pension I could have made a costly mistake by tryiy to make big profit in a singly year. 

My holdings of ETFs and ITs at a total cost of 0.32%, I managed to switch back and forth at different weights between

VWRP

CGT

Cash

and this past month, a little Gold (iShares physical). 

Escaped 12.5% up for the year which I will take all day long. Sure a number of BG holdings would have been lovely but I'm not greedy.