Flagpole wrote: Excellently-written, really cool and factual stuff.
The chances of beating the Dow with "random mutual fund picks" in 32 of 33 years are almost precisely equal to zero. Either you are lying (and I know, I KNOW, you keep telling us, you never lie) or you don't understand how to calculate returns, which is, admittedly, very difficult when you are adding to your portfolio throughout the year.
Here's the scenario I imagine in which you "beat the Dow" in any given year:
- you start the year on 1 January with $100k
- in February, May, June, August, October and November, you add $1.5K, $0.5k, $3k, $1k, $2k and $0.5k (for a total of $8.5k new purchases of "random mutual finds" into your portfolio that year)
- on 31 December your portfolio is worth $118k
- the Dow produced 16% returns that year
- your portfolio is 18% higher at the end of that year
- deeply satisfied with yourself, you declare that, once again, by some strange mathematical miracle, having nothing to do with your investing prowess and OBVIOUSLY not worthy of kudos, you've "beat the Dow"
Well, NOPE! Some of the wins came because I invested extra during a down part of some years in there, but even without those few, I still would have beaten the Dow more than you silly people here would allow.
And no, you are not correct in how I determine my annual gains. Get serious.
I have had different investing philosophies over the years since I started investing in 1989, and they have pretty much all benefitted me as a measure against the Dow...well, except for that one year and then this year.
I'm sorry that you apparently aren't doing as well as I have done.
Also, I will let other weigh in, but I suspect that everyone else who has read your ludicrous claim believes, like me, that you are either ignorant / innumerate or lying. Somebody should start a poll…
Also, I will let other weigh in, but I suspect that everyone else who has read your ludicrous claim believes, like me, that you are either ignorant / innumerate or lying. Somebody should start a poll…
LOL Well, it is not IMpossible, although the chances are vanishingly small.
The chances for Flagpole, however, given his commentary, are absolutely zero😁LOL
Also, I will let other weigh in, but I suspect that everyone else who has read your ludicrous claim believes, like me, that you are either ignorant / innumerate or lying. Somebody should start a poll…
When he first told that whopper I was inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt that he had mistakenly counted his yearly contributions as part of his returns but at this point it's clear he's just lying.
Also, I will let other weigh in, but I suspect that everyone else who has read your ludicrous claim believes, like me, that you are either ignorant / innumerate or lying. Somebody should start a poll…
LOL Well, it is not IMpossible, although the chances are vanishingly small.
The chances for Flagpole, however, given his commentary, are absolutely zero😁LOL
The probability of one beating the market 32 out of 33 years I have calculated before are roughly 1 in approx. 4.5 billion. So out of everyone in the world Flagpole managed to beat the market 32 out of 33 timtes and he is one of a class of 1. The probability of that is way beyond the scope of many here. What is so crazy is that Flagpole is so clueless on probabilites that he actually thinks he doing that feat is not so far-fetched. The guy lives in Cleveland. Not the most sophisticated there. They think Waffle House is fine dining.
Also, I will let other weigh in, but I suspect that everyone else who has read your ludicrous claim believes, like me, that you are either ignorant / innumerate or lying. Somebody should start a poll…
When he first told that whopper I was inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt that he had mistakenly counted his yearly contributions as part of his returns but at this point it's clear he's just lying.
I don't think flagpole is lying...he is making some kind of a fundamental error in judging performance, and likely we will never know what that error is. I think he believes he is telling the truth. Could be adding in contributions....my best guess is some weird math he does with dividends or cap gains. Maybe he counts capital gains as return, without understanding NAV of his fund goes down when he gets the cap gains.
A test will be how his 2022 % return falls out after December 2022 cap gains payouts. Those payouts will be massive and if Flagpole gives himself some kind of performance boost from them we'll know that is the culprit.
When he first told that whopper I was inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt that he had mistakenly counted his yearly contributions as part of his returns but at this point it's clear he's just lying.
I don't think flagpole is lying...he is making some kind of a fundamental error in judging performance, and likely we will never know what that error is. I think he believes he is telling the truth. Could be adding in contributions....my best guess is some weird math he does with dividends or cap gains. Maybe he counts capital gains as return, without understanding NAV of his fund goes down when he gets the cap gains.
A test will be how his 2022 % return falls out after December 2022 cap gains payouts. Those payouts will be massive and if Flagpole gives himself some kind of performance boost from them we'll know that is the culprit.
I don't think flagpole is lying...he is making some kind of a fundamental error in judging performance, and likely we will never know what that error is. I think he believes he is telling the truth. Could be adding in contributions....my best guess is some weird math he does with dividends or cap gains. Maybe he counts capital gains as return, without understanding NAV of his fund goes down when he gets the cap gains.
A test will be how his 2022 % return falls out after December 2022 cap gains payouts. Those payouts will be massive and if Flagpole gives himself some kind of performance boost from them we'll know that is the culprit.
Nope.
Well maybe you want to tell us how you calculate portfolio returns? Do you get annual numbers from Morningstar or use quicken or what?
Well maybe you want to tell us how you calculate portfolio returns? Do you get annual numbers from Morningstar or use quicken or what?
Inquiring minds want to know.
Give us example of a year's holdings and transactions also (you can make the numbers proportionally bigger or smaller, as you wish, so we don't know the true value of your holdings that year), if you really want to defend your claim. You must know by now that nobody here believes you on this.
Well maybe you want to tell us how you calculate portfolio returns? Do you get annual numbers from Morningstar or use quicken or what?
Ha! No freakin' way am I going to spell out anything to you yahoos. The last time I got into minutia with you people, I was ridiculed, called stupid, etc. by Sally and others until they discovered that I was right and they were not. Sally didn't even know how to properly look up a Fund return. I'm not about to have a pointless discussion with a bunch of idiots on this topic again.
You can just have a bee in your bonnet about it.
Maybe the rest of my investing life will even it all out.
This year so far, here are the approximate answers:
Dow YTD: -8.62%
Flagpole YTD: -18.16%
I am almost for sure going to lose to the Dow this year.
