That pretty much settles it, yeah? BTC doesn't want to go past $55k, I guess from people taking their money to the hot new thing.
VOO is like the golden goose of index funds. All of my money I have in indexes are in a Vanguard product of some sort, VOO being the majority. During the first months of Covid when all of the sports shut down, I was betting DFS games for all of these oddball sports. Mexican league soccer, Australian basketball, Madden sport simulations, CSGO. They even had DFS betting for The Bachelor, that's how starved people were to bet on things. I could totally see trading, especially with the advent of live streaming, becoming something you could try and monetize as a competition. It's funny how Dogecoin is actually turning into a more useful "currency" then BTC.
So in the interest of a little conversation that's not directly out of wallstreetbets, what's everyone's investment portfolio mix like? I tend to do 4 funds: large cap (e.g. VOO), mid/small cap (e.g. VXF), international (e.g. VXUS) and bonds (e.g. BND). My split is roughly 50/10/25/15 respectively. I have a little bit of cash in various stocks that I'm amusing myself with, or other index funds (e.g. I keep a little extra in VTI to more heavily weight my technology investment) but it's <5% of my total investments.
My current breakdown appears to be: VT 33.03% AAPL 10.74% VONE 9.41% PRGFX 9.36% GAL 7.28% VEA 5.98% ARTKX 3.73% VTI 2.66% VWO 2.57% OAKEX 2.26% AEMGX 2.07% FCASH** 2.07% VNQ 1.87% BSV 1.62% VNQI 1.49% SCHC 1.08% EA 0.83% DIS 0.82% JNK 0.73% MSFT 0.37% MAT 0.04%
I also have a 4-fund portfolio. My split favors bonds slightly more, but overall its about the same, investment-wise.
@Aetius What's your strategy for your index fund selection? The overlap would make it hard for me personally to keep track of what my final allocations look like, e.g. VT and GAL are global (including domestic), VONE and VTI are domestic only, VEA and VWO are both emerging markets...
I see no GME in that list. Clearly your financial planner is terrible. Haven't you heard it's going to the moon? That's a good strategy, I often let that money just languish in the accounts, but it's usually small enough value that I wouldn't mind it going into something a bit more volatile. Do you focus on dividend stocks for your retirement portfolio? I never got into those for my retirement investments, since I don't need the dividends.
Ah got it, have you looked at the fees for the particular fund? Some of them are relatively cheap, but I ended up switching to the aforementioned 4 fund portfolio because the fees were so much lower. By year it wasn't a huge deal, but I rebalance my investments in about 6 clicks, once a year, and for that I'm saving about 0.2% of my total portfolio value every year. Seemed worth it to me.
One nice thing about a Roth IRA is that you can withdraw the contributions without penalty (since you already paid taxes on that money). I wouldn't recommend people do that as a matter of course, but if you're only not contributing to the IRA because you're worried about losing access to that money and might need it someday, it's not gone forever in a Roth. Depends on your goals, of course. Personally I'm saving for retirement like a crazed squirrel putting nuts away for winter. Figure if I actually want to work until retirement age, I'll be able to live comfortably, and if I don't want to work that long (which is likely), I'll peace out early.
I sort of understand why expense ratios exist on index funds but it is making me want to steer away from those funds. Is that nonsense? Can someone explain picking out safe long-term index funds? I have some ideas on the matter but when it comes to pulling the trigger I feel unsure that I am selecting the "correct" thing.
You should look up 3 or 4-fund portfolio strategies. Bogleheads has a lot of information on them. Basically low-risk, diversified strategies have the potential for well-balanced, long-term growth. You won’t see overnight windfalls or anything like that, but compound interest over 30 years will probably net you a decent amount of money with a consistent investment. For retirement savings, the general benchmark is 1x - 2x your income by age 35, 2x - 2.5x by age 40, etc.
I've been maxing out my IRA and 401k my entire career and I'm only at 1.2x income. God damn Uncle Sam cockblocking my retirement.
Expanse ratios are fine, just make sure you know how much they are. If you want to dump your money into something and never think about it again, you can do a Vanguard target retirement date fund. Pick your retirement year and invest in it, e.g. VFIFX for 2050. They have relatively low expense ratios, so you're paying 0.15% in order to not think about your investments. That's okay and it's way better than letting your money sit on the sidelines out of hesitancy or confusion. You're not locked in, you can always move it to different funds later. If you don't mind actively managing your money just a tiny bit (maybe 1-2x/year), you can pick a 3 or 4 fund portfolio and a desired percentage split. You could literally use the one I referenced above (VOO, VXF, VXUS and BND) - it's a stock 4 fund portfolio that gets recommended lots of places. If you'd rather have a 3 fund portfolio, you swap out VOO and VXF for VTI (VTI, VXUS, BND) because VTI includes both large cap S&P 500 and small/mid cap. You don't have to use Vanguard funds, there are equivalent funds for Schwab or Fidelity. My particular bond allocation percentage is a little smaller/more aggressive than some but I'd rather see the additional growth since I don't need the money for a good long while.