dunno if anyone is interested but thought it would be interesting to see what everyone is in if people posted their portfolio by % of each position. i'll start off:

long term(holding for 1 year+): 45% hte, 40% dvn, 15% chk
short term: 55% cash, 10% gs, 8% goog, 14% aapl, 3% gld, 10% uso

pretty boring, lots in cash because still not numb to big swings yet like in poker, getting there tho! obv only thing im bullish on is energy, wouldn't be all that surprising if in a year we are still under dow 10,000 but oil supply crunch b/c of stalled investment keeps the energy stuff growing. gonna add lots of energy trusts to long term when i get the time to research more

100% SPY

So who won?

Definitely interested to see if this thread can get some traction/discussion, so I'll play. Here's my allocation as of January...

US Stocks - 26.4%
- Large Cap - 11.1%
- Mid Cap - 7.4%
- Small Cap - 7.9%

International - 59.9%
- Developed Index - 25.0%
- Developed Small Cap - 3.2%
- Emerging Markets - 31.7%

REIT - 8.2%
- US REIT - 3.8%
- Intl REIT - 4.4%
(Obviously my REIT allocation is higher than 8.2% because of index funds above)

Play Money - 5.5%
- Individual Stocks

You guys doing any calcs to get your weights or just putting in some arbitrary amount that sounds good to each asset?

The idea that picking mixes of broad indexes makes more sense/is less market timing or trying to make picks than stock picking is pretty hilarious.

Emerging markets is a riskier bet than most US stock picks long term, for lower return.

Wait, are you arguing that picking individual stocks isn't more volatile/risky than customizing an allocation to broad indexes? We can agree to disagree....but if you think it's the 'same', I think THAT is hilarious. I will also easily admit that you can do WAY better stock picking, but you can also do WAY worse. You won't find any argument from me that what I'm doing is an attempt at timing the market / responding to macro trends, particularly on valuation.

Responding to your second point...do you feel the same way about International stocks/EM in the short/medium term? Because my tilting international/EM is definitely about the short/medium term.

Additionally, I should probably point out that the majority of my net worth is in my business ownership. My portfolio isn't insignificant, but it's not the majority of my 'nest egg'.

For me, somewhat arbitrary and general goals.

I want to be about 60/40 Intl vs. US right now.
I want to be about 30% EM right now.
I want to be tilted to small/medium cap value stocks.
I want to be effectively 100% equity right now.
I want to have increased exposure to REIT's vs. straight indexing.

US 49%
~small cap 14%
~mid cap 14%
~large cap 14%
~REIT 7%

International 51%
~developed small cap 11%
~developed large cap 11%
~emerging small cap 11%
~emerging large cap 11%
~REIT 7%

Per morningstar xray, the allocation results in:

50/50 US/int'l split (same for REIT split)

33.3/33.3/33.3 small/mid/large cap split for US

20/40/40 small/mid/large cap split for int'l

55/45 developed/emerging market split for int'l

Bought the market. Even weight. Unlimited risk tolerance. Zero bonds. Dunno why I bought any REITs. Probably should've bought VT only. Or VOO. Don't really give a ****.

How do you figure?

All equities exposure via low cost index funds

About 85/10/5 equities/bonds/rando junk bond type stuff like p2p lending

80/20 us/intl

I recently decided to keep a decent chunk of my net worth (20%ish) in cash which is hugely minus EV but a hedge against some catastrophic event bc I’m close to FIRE (4%) and sorta wanna buy up a bunch of land if RE takes a hit soon

I'd say around 30% permanent cash is optimal, except when equities are dirt cheap or have just crashed 30+%. When people do up their little models, they never take into account the decent odds of getting rich from picking up bargains.

I get the impression you are vastly over estimating how diverse your portfolio actually is. All of your assets are highly correlated

For example, we have had extraordinarily easy financial conditions and synchronized global stimulus. Everyone is pretty transparent that they are going to unwind and given a rough schedule. All of your assets are incredibly sensitive to rising interest rates

I haven't thought about how i would compose it but an allocation of "cash" that included a basket of USD, Euro, Yen, Gold, Silver, or a commodity fund makes sense. I have no issues with passive investing but IMO even passive investing should pay attention to the fact we have expansion and contractions. After massive expansion and rising rates on the horizon, it makes sense to have more "cash" and after a contraction (2003, 2009) it makes sense to have less "cash".

Picking individual stocks is significantly less volatile/risky and has a higher return. If you pick garden variety solid US businesses at low P/Es (below 12 or so), then you're gonna crush your emerging markets bets and the high P/Es which are included in the index, by all the historical data we have. Besides which, plenty of US business have large international components, and are best-in-class, which makes it even more stupid to buy international markets with second best in class. You want to own the companies with diversified global revenue streams that employ the world's best people with the largest moats at cheap prices. That's the core generator of reliable ultra low risk wealth and resilience. The rest is nonsense and comes with a lot of risk.
It just all seems frustratingly dumb, hence the post. This much of US small cap and large cap and this much of this type of international and this much of another type of international..what's the point? Go do something fun instead of thinking about reallocating, you'll be more productive. There's close to zero alpha in the process imo. As juan says, they're all highly correlated and You Gonna...Get gently reminded not buy correlated assets the next time we have a global recession. If you want to diversify away from risk, you buy solid companies. Look at how low P/Es did in the 2001 crash vs the index. They killed it.
If you've been in for a while, congrats on the run off lows, that's a nice return, although not much more than QQQ (perhaps with lower risk?). Beyond that I don't really study international macro so I have nothing intelligent to say on short to medium term trends.
Sure.

Here is one approach from some pros at this:

CalPERS Asset Allocation

Quote:

50% in Global Equity
28% Fixed Income
13% Real Assets
8% Private Equity
1% Liquidity

.....


As part of the Asset Liability Management (ALM) process, the Board examined four potential portfolios and their impact on the CalPERS Fund. Each portfolio represented different distributions of assets based on varying rates of expected return and risk of volatility. Ultimately, the staff recommended the portfolio with expected volatility of 11.4 percent and a return of 7 percent, which matches the December 2016 decision to lower the discount rate to 7 percent over the next three years. For comparison, the Fund's net rate of returns since 1988 is 8.4 percent.

When constructing a portfolio not making some estimate of risk and return is a major mistake in my view. Juan's post about correlation is valid and what it all boils down to is that people often accept more risk than is necessary for the expected returns on their portfolio. FWIW if you want to beat the market significantly use leverage pretty much.

Check out these over the last 5 years:

SOXL
TQQQ
TECL

He's buying index funds. Where are you getting that he's trying to generate alpha? Maybe if he bought country specific indexes, or sector funds - but not broad market domestic and international.

There's a disconnect between international funds and the index, like how China has a gazillion equities that aren't captured in EM (VWO) or total international (VXUS) or those stupid China etfs with absurd fees; but that's the nature of the beast and out of his control.

Also, please list all solid US companies with international presence with a PE of ~12, thanks that'd be great. (i know you'll say GM or Ford)

I should clarify in my post that it's all ETFs, hence the morningstar xray portion of it.

I have days where I wonder why I am simply not 100% AGO, regardless of what Einhorn thinks.

Holding cash is still a mistake though. Just buy on margin if you think there are bargains to be had after a crash.