Do you compare your investments to a benchmark?

aroominyork

I do, and when updating my spreadsheet I also update my benchmarks. For equities, my benchmark is 90% HSBC FTSE All World Index and 10% Fidelity UK Index. That is about 59% North America, whereas I am underweight there at about 43%. For fixed interest, my benchmark is 50% Vanguard Global Bond Index and 50% Fidelity Index UK Gilt. I hold a lot of corporate bond funds so they are overweight to my benchmark.

In truth, I am usually more interested in how I am performing against my benchmarks than in the actual value of my investments. Maybe that is because, unless there is a major crash, I can afford to be ego-driven.

masonic

I have done in the past, but don't any more. In the past I had quite a lot of active funds in my portfolio and I needed to ensure I was getting value for money (not seeing this was the reason I no longer hold a lot of active funds). Nowadays, I'm more concerned with achieving my objectives than beating a benchmark, and after a couple of decades of almost uninterrupted growth, that is a fairly low bar.

GeoffTF

I have never compared my investments with benchmark. I do not need to quantify how lucky have I been. That would be a waste of time.

tigerspill

The bench mark I use is based on what I need.

I understand year by year exactly what I need and where it is coming from. And it is this I use for comparison.

InvesterJones

When I do a portfolio analysis (to check weightings, P/E and average fees) it comes with a benchmark which the weightings etc. are compared to. The performance comparison I don't tend to use since it's a projection backwards (i.e. how my current holdings would have performed) but it's occasionally worth some humble pie and gives me a rough idea of how my current portfolio would have fared in previous market conditions (e.g. vs benchmark in the tariff shock, ukraine, etc.) but of course that's no guarantee a future shock would be the same.

kempiejon

As a stock picker I wanted to know how I compared to the market I recorded my XIRR and bought a couple of benchmarks like a UK equity income Investment Trust a FTSE100 tracker and a Global ETF. I was OK/lucky enough beating the market for a few years but the effort was a too much and it could have been dumb luck. What matters really now is how much income to cover necessary spend and capital I've accumulated for indulgences.

I do not bother tracking so much these days having met my basic income level and I'm usually buying index etfs.

Bostonerimus1

I have a vague idea of what I expect from my portfolio based on historical returns and as long as I am beating the return of my personal investment plan then I'm ok. Right now I am way above the historically expected returns which I think is an indicator that we have been in a very long lived equity bubble.

jaybeetoo

As I’m retired and using investments to generate an income, I don’t use a benchmark. I believe most benchmarks assume dividends are reinvested which I don’t do.

DT2001

My growth pot is in a large global ETF which very closely tracks the index. I hold a spread of income focused investment trusts and track expected v actual income. About 2/3rds are what I define as slow but steady - good increasing divs and sometimes a little capital gain if the markets are favourable so their capital value isn’t as important. The other 1/3rd are more volatile with lower dividends and these I occasionally trade if the capital gains equal a couple + years dividends (so maybe my own benchmark) as I know with near cash I can get a reasonable return

[Deleted User]

Only to ensure that the managed funds I own are the right ones.

leosayer

Not systematically.

Occasionally I feel the need to check that my actual performance aligns with a global equity index in GBP but seeing as my only equity holdings are global equity index funds it doesn't really give me any actionable information.