2015 portfolio performance

[Palantir]

2.6% for me. Thanks SUNE. Assholes.

[Martian]

up 9.53 %. So voted fro 0-9%. From the graph it looks like 10% + is an elite club. Anyway, learned a lot this year..especially not to put money in retail  ::)

[enoch01]

+5%

 

Happy New Year everyone.

[orthopa]

This might be a stupid question but how do you figure out your return if you add funds everything month? I suppose it makes sense to just look at the total commited funds at year end which sorta compares to being in cash thoughout the year, ie it lowers the returns on both the upside and down side. I think I did 15-20 percent but will have to check the numbers.

 

Was going to ask this myself. Couldn't you just subtract total funds added and calculate percent chance from there? any money you make or lose from funds you have added should count for or against total returns right?

 

What's interesting from the poll is as much as we try to beat the market the great majority of portfolios on the website seem to have returns very close to the market. And this site is full of very smart people.

[Uccmal]

This might be a stupid question but how do you figure out your return if you add funds everything month? I suppose it makes sense to just look at the total commited funds at year end which sorta compares to being in cash thoughout the year, ie it lowers the returns on both the upside and down side. I think I did 15-20 percent but will have to check the numbers.

 

I operate on the KISS principle.  Try doing it this way:

 

As in: (2015 End - 2014 end + inputs)/2014 year end + inputs

Then: (2015 end - inputs - 2104 end)/2014 end

Take the average of the two.  Does this makes sense? 

 

I just try to be consistent from year to year.  Its mostly for my own purposes anyways. 

[simplefocus]

I use an iPhone app called Total Return and it does the irr calculation for you.

 

This might be a stupid question but how do you figure out your return if you add funds everything month? I suppose it makes sense to just look at the total commited funds at year end which sorta compares to being in cash thoughout the year, ie it lowers the returns on both the upside and down side. I think I did 15-20 percent but will have to check the numbers.

 

I operate on the KISS principle.  Try doing it this way:

 

As in: (2015 End - 2014 end + inputs)/2014 year end + inputs

Then: (2015 end - inputs - 2104 end)/2014 end

Take the average of the two.  Does this makes sense? 

 

I just try to be consistent from year to year.  Its mostly for my own purposes anyways.

[EliG]

9% in Canadian dollars. Nothing to get excited about given currency tailwind. S&P 500 is up 21% priced in CAD.

[Jurgis]

This might be a stupid question but how do you figure out your return if you add funds everything month? I suppose it makes sense to just look at the total commited funds at year end which sorta compares to being in cash thoughout the year, ie it lowers the returns on both the upside and down side. I think I did 15-20 percent but will have to check the numbers.

 

Was going to ask this myself. Couldn't you just subtract total funds added and calculate percent chance from there? any money you make or lose from funds you have added should count for or against total returns right?

 

Not really. It depends when exactly you added the funds. You can see this if you do the math for boundary conditions:

 

1. Start with $0 portfolio. Add $1M on December 29th. Let say it earns $1000 in one day it was in your portfolio. What is your IRR?

2. Start with $0 portfolio. Add $1M on January 2nd. Let's say it earns $1000 each month in your portfolio. What is your IRR?

 

BTW, example 1 or some variations on it shows that even IRR is not a perfect answer. ;) It also shows that IRR can be manipulated if you have cash "on the side" and you put it into investments at the right time.

 

But yeah, the best way to handle this is to use Quicken (or similar software) or your brokerage. And even then they might be doing it incorrectly.

[writser]

Up approximately 12% in EUR (so ~flat in USD terms). I am quite disappointed actually. My portfolio resembles Hielko's one but he somehow manages to squeeze out an additional 8% of alpha. Makes me feel stupid. On the other hand, I was quite heavily invested in emerging markets & commodities so I guess I shouldn't complain too much.

[John Hjorth]

Minus 2.7 percent for me for 2015. This for all accounts of the family that I manage, on consolidated basis. In my personal accounts it was minus 3.6 percent. It's the family ["consolidated"] figure that matters to me personally, and I have voted according to that - not that it matters for the outcome of the poll as it is set up.

 

Cash added during the year amounts 260.8% calculated on the basis of the opening balance on overall basis for all accounts, and cash at year end on overall basis is 35.6 percent, so there will be at lot for me to do in 2016 also - I expect to get my private life back in 4^th quarter of 2016, at least to some extent. I actually like this as a second full time job, but there are other things in life that matters, too.

 

The above figures need some fine tuning with regard to Danish withholding taxes on dividends from Danish stocks, however it won't move the needle.

 

I will try to find time to prepare some files in EXCEL to upload in this topic for the purpose of doing calculations of ROIC for a given year, based on what I have already read from fellow board members in this topic.

[thepupil]

Taxable    +1.9%,    4.7%  ann. since June 2013

Roth        +12.4%    13.4% ann. since Oct 2013

IRA          +27.2%    21.0% ann. since Oct 2013

 

Taxable has lots of shorts/options/etc. that have significantly detracted from performance.

 

IRA's are long-only and VERY concentrated

 

pretty much the same story as last year with different names

 

 

Roth IRA: +17.9% (100% invested, long only, 3-5 stocks at a time)

 

IRA        : +20.3% (100% invested, long only, 3-5 stocks at a time)

 

Taxable : +0.12% (50-80% net exposure long/short, substantial options & lottery tickets component)

 

Reasons for disappointing year in taxable: short UVE (-430 bps), short XBI (-540 bps); these two shorts took me to the woodshed. Also had significant options/lotto ticket burn of 400 or so bps. Longs did fine.  At least all the stuff on which I lost money was in my taxable account.

[rmitz]

Both time weighted and regular returns come out to 11.5% this year (USD).  This is the only account where I invest without restrictions.  This brings down my long term annualized return to about 13% since 2006.

[merkhet]

Roughly flat to down a percent or two.

[BG2008]

Many have mentioned that it's hard to calculate IRR.  I've created a template.  Just change the dates and the dollar amount and the IRR figure will update itself.  The figures in the spreadsheet aren't my numbers.  It's just for illustrative purposes. 

XIRR_Template.xlsx

[Guest Schwab711]

After-tax, no less than 19.7% but will probably be 20.1%. MON was my only negative position but it was negligible. I averaged ~17% cash over the year and I have ~30% now (probably 15% when I rebuy FICO in 31 days). I outperformed my underlying business performance so multiple expansion helped some.

 

I think my portfolio IV/P, relative and absolute, is higher now than this time last year.

[wknecht]

1.4% for the year in USD. Not too pleased with the result. I have ~25% in BRK, so it could have been worse. Averaged 26% in cash.

[TwoCitiesCapital]

I haven't tried to figure out what my return is for the year, but abysmal comes to mind.

 

I'm down some 30% in my passive low-P/B portfolio which is largely U.S. resource companies. I was helped by quite a few options sales which probably increased returns by 5-7%.  Probably somewhere close to -20% in my regular accounts due to heavy allocations to Altius and Santander paired with near-total losses in some much smaller positions in Eurobank and drybulk shipping.

 

All in all, a very disappointing year. Was heavy into Europe and EM going into the year and added heavy commodity exposure around March. Ultimately, what was already cheap got significantly cheaper and I continued to add to exposure through the year. We'll see if next year proves to be a rebound for commodities and emerging markets, but otherwise I'll probably be in the tank again.

[Uccmal]

I didn't really want to know: 

 

2015: -20.1%

2014: -2.9

2013: 59%

 

11 yr. cagr average: 32%

9 yr. cagr average (kicking out top and bottom): 22%

Total cagr from 2005 start to 2015 end: 22% (approx.)

 

Contribution to these stellar results: SSW, RUS, MTL, Pwt actually helped this year, a little bit. 

 

Not many realized losses or gains. 

All results post tax - I Pay the taxes directly from my margin account.

 

This could reverse so rapidly my head would spin or it could get worse...

[innerscorecard]

I just finished updating my spreadsheet and I returned -10.4% in 2015 on a dollar-weighted basis. I lost money, and this was a big failure. What would be a complete failure would be if in 2016 I actually started to lose more than the amount I made in 2013 and 2014.

[finetrader]

2015 results: +13.5%. Thanks to USD/CAD appreciation.

 

 

[muscleman]

I didn't really want to know: 

 

2015: -20.1%

2014: -2.9

2013: 59%

 

11 yr. cagr average: 32%

9 yr. cagr average (kicking out top and bottom): 22%

Total cagr from 2005 start to 2015 end: 22% (approx.)

 

Contribution to these stellar results: SSW, RUS, MTL, Pwt actually helped this year, a little bit. 

 

Not many realized losses or gains. 

All results post tax - I Pay the taxes directly from my margin account.

 

This could reverse so rapidly my head would spin or it could get worse...

 

 

That looks like a solid long term track record!

[innerscorecard]

I wonder why others don't simply use the XIRR function, given how easy it is to do. I wonder how much internet stock performance is rather inaccurate because of this.

[bennycx]

Using the XIRR function, you get the compounded return while depositing and withdrawing cash in between.

 

How would you compare against a benchmark return similarly, i.e. DCA / monthly payments into S&P, instead of point to point return?

[Jurgis]

I wonder why others don't simply use the XIRR function, given how easy it is to do. I wonder how much internet stock performance is rather inaccurate because of this.

 

It's not easy. I've got ~10 accounts in total (me, my wife, IRAs, Roth IRAs, ESPPs, 401(k)s, externally managed, etc.) across multiple brokerages/institutions. Some of these have biweekly additions.

 

Sure, I could type this all into Excel to do XIRR from websites/reports/Quicken. It would take me tons of time.

 

Quicken theoretically does the right thing.

Practically, it's questionable. It has some weird programming because it can subtotal by account, by month, by category, by stock. These should not influence the ultimate IRR, but sometimes somehow they do. That's why I am not 100% confident that Quicken does the right thing. Plus I've seen unexplainable results if I start from saved reports/graphs and seemingly do exactly the same things compared to "standard" reports/graphs and get very different results.

 

Fido also seems to start from per-account IRR and then somehow creates the overall IRR. Not sure this works correctly either.

 

Edit: before someone asks why I don't report a return from one account: I don't do it, because I am managing the whole shebang. One account might have very different return from others. It's the overall result that matters. I do look at the number "excluding accounts where I cannot buy anything I want - like 401(k)s" but that's still 6 accounts or so.

[Viking]

+19%; pretty much all due to CAN$ appreciation. I did OK with JPM, offset by being too early back in Apple (closing Dec 31 at 105 did not help). :-)