Monday, March 23, 2020

Our Portfolio During Tumultuous Times

How did our portfolio fare during the corona crisis?

Sometimes one has to wrestle with the unexpected

The first question is of course to ask what kind of vessel we sit in. We were sitting in a very stable one, in the shape of our permanent portfolio. 

How did it go in February-March 2020?

Like everyone we've been though some interesting weeks.

We suspected that corporate short term bonds could get into trouble, as have happened repeatedly before when cash and risk appetite dries up. We didn't have to much cash in corporate bonds, but this time we were lucky and managed to sell them off quickly.

Lesson Learned 1: Only cash is cash. And when the knives are falling, cash is indeed king.

Another thing we noted was that we didn't get nervous at all. Either we are just very nivilated. Or we trust all the tons and tons of simulations we've done on the permanent portfolio that we have. 

When the dust started to settle, we were down with 11% from the peak. So basically well within the bounds that we expected - bearing in mind that our simulations were on year basis, and this was intra-year.

Lessons Learned 2: We might be more risk tolerant than expected.

What were your thoughts during the worst drop in almost a hundred years?


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