If market volatility is no concern, you could go with a
very aggressive portfolio out of the gate, investing 100 % in a well - diversified equity portfolio.
The
most aggressive portfolio shown, comprised of 70 % domestic stocks and 30 % international stocks, had an average annual return of 10 %.
Other factors which will be taken into account include time until retirement (less time means
less aggressive portfolios) with more of an emphasis on conservative investments such as cash and treasury bonds.
Most advisors would recommend a more
aggressive portfolio at the beginning of an investment with a time horizon of this length, as it is generally considered long - term investing.
Another option is asset allocation funds offer varying exposure to stocks and bonds depending on
how aggressive a portfolio you want.
Of course because long timelines tend to lower risk, many people start out with
very aggressive portfolios — sometimes 100 % stocks.
To my way of thinking, even the
most aggressive portfolio should not have more than 65 % in stocks and most people should stick to somewhere between 50 % and 60 %.
But some robo advisors offer a better rate, such as Schwab Intelligent Portfolio, which charges 0.08 % for conservative portfolios, 0.19 % for moderate - risk portfolios, and 0.24 %
for aggressive portfolios.
While we don't think it's a bad idea, we've often said that we think limiting
aggressive portfolio holdings to, say, 30 % of your overall portfolio is also a good idea.
Sally Brandon — Well we had her retirement account that we were managing and she was in a
pretty aggressive portfolio but there was a little bit more room to take on a little bit more equity exposure.
Since this is a relatively conservative portfolio, with only 40 % in stocks, the return over the last 16 months hasn't been as high as the more
aggressive portfolios presented in my post on Some Real Portfolios, but this is by design.
A too - hot market is one where you have to explain why you are up just 8.5 % and 9.3 % over the last twelve months in our Conservative and
Aggressive portfolios respectively as opposed to a 23.5 % gain in stocks.
If they chose to have a more
aggressive portfolio as they learn more about investing and risk, they can switch to a Vanguard Target Date Fund that better matches their risk tolerance once they save up over $ 3,000 in their IRA.
One of the reasons we're pretty okay with this idea is that though we'd be giving up some of the compounding, the required distributions would still be small enough that a
reasonably aggressive portfolio would outperform it.
If you've got the discipline and the stomach to stick with a very
aggressive portfolio even during market cataclysms — or if your nest egg is so large relative to the amount of money you need to draw from it each year so your chances of running through your savings prematurely are minuscule — then maybe you're a candidate for the Buffett approach.
If your asset allocation will be changing significantly — it's not unusual for mutual fund salespeople to put clients in
absurdly aggressive portfolios — the situation is different.
Assuming you can continue living if you should suffer some loss of principal (i.e., you won't deplete your emergency fund), I would go ahead and invest it in a
fairly aggressive portfolio.
And as you may suspect, even in a room filled with financial planners, achieving a more
aggressive portfolio posture was, perhaps, the farthest from anyone's mind.
The Powerfund Portfolios posted solid gains in May, with both the Conservative and
Aggressive portfolios beating Vanguard's main U.S. stock index and total global fund.
These fees do not compare all that favorably to other robo advisors, such as Schwab Intelligent Portfolio, which charges 0.08 % for conservative portfolios, 0.19 % for moderate - risk portfolios, and 0.24 %
for aggressive portfolios.
Indeed, a finance professor at Spain's IESE Business School published a paper in October showing that in the 86 overlapping 30 - year periods between 1900 and 2014 such a portfolio survived more than 97 % of the time, or about as often as
less aggressive portfolios, assuming annual rebalancing and an initial 4 % withdrawal subsequently adjusted for inflation.
«A rising - equity glide path doesn't work great except in one scenario: you've got a moderately
aggressive portfolio at retirement in a low - return environment where you're going to be spending at a fairly high withdrawal rate, and you're just concerned about getting to the end without running out of money and not leaving a large bequest,» Kitces says.
A similar instance can be found with the
CIBC Aggressive Portfolio being categorized as Canadian Neutral Balanced despite the CIFSC» definition of a Canadian Neutral Balanced Portfolio being:
Since
moderately aggressive portfolios have a higher level of risk than conservative portfolios, this strategy is best for investors with a longer time horizon (generally more than five years), and a medium level of risk tolerance.
DN: Our most conservative portfolio is 70 % fixed income and 30 % equities, and our
most aggressive portfolio is 90 % equities and 10 % fixed income.