The markets got you on edge? This post is for YOU.

THE SITUATION

The current economy, marked by the combination of high and rising inflation, low unemployment, and the near-zero interest rate policy by the Federal Reserve is like none that investors have experienced, at least over the past 40+ years.  The uncertainty of the situation has resulted in falling prices of both stocks and bonds at the same time–also a first in a very long time.

 At this writing the aggregate U.S. Bond market (AGG) is down nearly 12% year-to-date, Treasury Inflation Protected Securities (TIP) down 8.4%, and U.S. stocks as measured by the S&P 500 (SPY) are down 22.4%, what is known as correction territory, defined as -20%.   

THE PROBLEM

If you are feeling uneasy about your investments, rest assured that you are not alone.

Now, most investors, and many professionals, follow the routine that has been popularized as asset allocation. You likely know the drill: own a basket of individual securities and / or funds of traditional asset classes such as cash, stocks, and bonds.   Allocate the entire portfolio across those asset classes and periodically rebalance the portfolio back to those prescribed allocations. In this strategy, you wash, rinse, repeat and your investment portfolio will be safe, or so it goes. The portfolio objective of this strategy is to achieve market-like returns within the particular asset classes while reducing volatility of the entire portfolio by holding securities that move counter-cyclically with each other. In other words, the theory assumes that total upside and downside volatility, not loss of capital, is the chief risk that we investors face.  But let me ask, won’t we accept, even desire, all the upside volatility we can find?  It’s the downside that keeps us awake at night, right?  But what happens when all the usual asset classes are declining at the same time?  Turn to cash?

Thanks to Federal Reserve policy, the interest rate on cash remains at nearly zero.  With inflation running rampant at about 8%, holding cash while we wait for the markets to settle down means that purchasing power is evaporating. 

Remember that the Fed only controls short term interest rates.  The bond market controls the rates of longer-term bonds.  The interest rate on a bond is fixed at the time it is issued. The bond market fulfills its function by bidding up or down the price at which it is willing to buy bonds.  As interest rates that the bond market considers attractive increase, the price of the bond must fall to provide that rate. That is why your portfolio of bonds decreases in value as interest rates rise.

I am sure that you probably think the current market only presents a problem.  However, we invite you to join us in seeing it as an opportunity.  Please look at your portfolio performance (both the percentage return and the number of dollars gained or lost) for the trailing twelve months.  Assess how you feel about that.  There is a strong chance that current stock and bond losses will get worse before the markets turn around.   If you are losing sleep now, just know that although not guaranteed, things can get worse and that you have a wonderful opportunity to accept or adjust your risk tolerance. Now is a good time to assess your risk tolerance and to inform your advisor so that he or she can take steps to align with reality.

OUR SOLUTION

In 2002, while still attending to the tenets of traditional asset allocation, we began to select stock and bond mutual fund investments based, in part, on momentum. Each asset selected for the portfolio was growing at a faster rate than its peers. We likened our analysis to watching a horse race and seeing a particular horse moving through the pack toward becoming the leader. (Just to be clear, we don’t invest in race horses or advise that our clients do that, despite being from Kentucky.) Often we found the need to get on a fresh horse (investment) at the quarter-mile pole. Initially, we invested in this way without imposing risk controls of selling those securities that lagged the others.  We called it our Momentum Growth Strategy. This subjected the portfolio to drawdowns consistent with the market.

In 2007, we became aware of the work of Dr. Mordecai Kurz at Stanford University.  Dr. Kurz posited that most of the risk in the market is endogenous to the market and not to some outside forces. This discovery has far-reaching significance. We then asked our clients with which they were most concerned: a) failing to achieve market returns or b) losing their capital.  Many responded that they were more concerned with the latter.  In response, we developed the Wealth Preservation Strategy just in time to prevent significant losses in the 2008 downturn for those clients who chose that strategy over the Momentum Growth Strategy.  This strategy also worked very well to protect capital in the downturns of 2011 and 2018.    

One aspect of the Wealth Preservation Strategy has been the use of technical analysis to determine the entry point for adding new securities to the portfolio mix. Attention to risk controls for each individual security and position sizing are other aspects of the strategy designed to control drawdown. We did not allow small losses to turn into big ones. The strategy also usually carried a rather significant allocation to cash. This works as long as inflation remains low or non-existent. But now we are at a different place and a different time.

As the markets’ access to free capital via the Fed’s zero interest rate policy kept driving up the stock market, it was quite normal for some investors to totally abandon Wealth Preservation for the sake of seeking higher returns. 

At times like the present, when all the usual asset classes are turning down, we instead hear investors clamoring for more Wealth Preservation. By the way, when it comes to investing, any inclination to either “throw in the towel” or “to go all in” is usually a mistake.

So, what is a person to do?

  1. Invest the Wealth Preservation strategy to minimize volatility and in such a manner that will preserve purchasing power with capital appreciation at least as much as inflation.
  2. Adjust Momentum Growth Strategy to a higher risk / higher return portfolio using technology and market trends along with fundamental analysis designed to pick top performers.
  3. Blend the two strategies in proportions that will attend to your individual tolerance for drawdowns while seeking a return that addresses your objectives.

Rather than mandate the allocation to particular asset classes, i.e., stocks and bonds, we might allocate a portion of assets to each of the two strategies. The amount to allocate to which strategy will solely depend on one’s risk profile that has been mathematically determined i.e. tolerance times capacity. Regular rebalancing is also important and should be done quarterly or quantitatively when the total portfolio gets out of balance.  The more risk tolerant you are, the greater percentage of your overall portfolio should be invested in Momentum Growth.  Wealth Preservation will protect from further drawdowns. We have made a concerted effort to ascertain our clients risk tolerance on a 1-5 scale of Conservative, Moderately Conservative, Balanced, Moderately Aggressive, or Aggressive. 

We will also choose assets that we believe will perform well in the current economic environment.  Consequently, you will likely be able to retain some of your current investments, but we may also invest in ETFs that track commodities, precious metals, and real estate, rather than exclusively in traditional stock and bond ETFs. We may also recommend that, at times, you invest in a reverse-index ETF that moves in opposite direction of its index. Hopefully, these are not long-term investments as they are expected to perform well while the market is going down and inflation / interest rates are rising.  We can only hope that policy makers will soon get our economy back on track for sustainable growth.  Meanwhile, we must all dance to the music we hear.

You are likely to have questions about this and, as always, we welcome them.

May 25, 2022 and updated June 20, 2022

Cybersecurity is a must

Data security is a must these days. Protecting yourself is a personal responsibility

If you have never looked at your credit report, you are not alone. If that is the case, now is certainly the time to do so. At a minimum, take advantage of the once a year free credit report. You need to know that your report contains the most intimate details of your financial life. The Equifax hackers likely stole social security numbers, birth dates, current and prior addresses, perhaps driver’s license numbers, and even nicknames.

In short, the stolen information is enough to impersonate you. I regard that as the chief risk from this attack. The hackers themselves are likely to sell your data to other criminals who want to do just that.  The criminals can then open new accounts in your name, obtain a driver’s license, or worse.

There are steps that we believe you should consider taking now.

1) Freeze your credit with all three credit reporting agencies:

Equifax                866-349-5191                 www.equifax.com

Experian              888-397-3742               www.experian.com

TransUnion        888-909-8872               www.transunion.com

Each of them has a slightly different process for implementing the freeze, and you must do it with all three. The downside to a freeze is that you will need to have the freeze lifted if you apply for new credit.  Keep in mind that it may take a few days for a request to lift the freeze to become effective.  There may be nominal fees associated with this service, usually $5-$10 each time you put it on or have it lifted.

2) Put fraud alerts on your credit bureau accounts.

This can usually be done directly with one of the reporting agencies, and I have been told by an Experian rep that putting it on one bureau will spread it to all three.  It is free but is only good for 90 days before it has to be renewed.  The fraud alert works differently than the freeze or other monitoring services. The credit bureau will notify the credit issuer that a fraud alert exists. It is up to the creditor to take further action.

3) Utilize a membership Credit Check & ID monitoring service.

Equifax is offering their service for free for a limited period due to this breach. Originally, they required customers to waive legal rights to sue, but that has since been lifted. Experian and TransUnion have similar services.  The downside to credit monitoring, in my opinion, is that it reports an incident after-the-fact. Granted, the more robust services offer near-immediate alerts, but it is still after-the-fact notification.  It is also not inexpensive to have all three bureaus monitored on a daily basis.  Your financial institution may offer such a service on a discounted basis. It is worth checking with your bank.

4) Utilize a spending planner / monitor that provides alerts.

Downloading into Quicken or Mint.com and reviewing transactions frequently can also help you detect anomalies in existing accounts.  For those who are using the spending module of the D. Scott Neal, Inc. website, alerts can be set to monitor large expenditures. The amount that constitutes “large” is user defined.

Like credit and ID monitoring, these are also after-the-fact and require considerable attention and fast action when something shows up.

Even if this breach of Equifax never results in your data being used fraudulently, it is a wake up call for all of us to be on alert. Cybersecurity should become a very high priority for all of us. I will publish more about how to hack-proof your life in future editions of the blog. Meanwhile, scroll down and leave a comment or question.