There is no single best investment opportunity or asset class that can promise consistently high returns all the time. Many argue that real estate has always outperformed and is a good hedge against inflation. But done at the wrong time and real estate investing doesn’t work.

According to the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco report, The Total Risk Premium Puzzle, the annual total return of UK Real Estate averaged at 7.63% for the period from 1963 – 2015 whereas, the annual total return of UK Stocks and Shares for the same period of 8.74%.

Price and Time for Best Investment

There is no good or bad investment but good or bad price and time of investment.

Selecting good companies does not guarantee superior returns. See – Cable and Wireless, Xerox, British Steel, Thomas Cook, and Blockbuster. Best investment decisions are based on two things – Price paid for the stock and the time of purchase. No company is so good that it cannot be overvalued or so bad that it cannot be undervalued.

Discipline

What is most important in investing? It is not knowledge or strategy, but it is the discipline.

The riskiest thing to do is to buy something when everyone else is buying. All the information has already been factored in the price. You want to participate in an auction where there are only 2-3 bidders rather than hundreds. You want to buy something when it is not discovered. The most profitable thing to do is to buy something when no one is keen on buying it.

Also, visit How to value companies with Benjamin Graham Formula?

Be Contrarian

Your best bet is to be a contrarian investor.

There is no undervalued stock that is known by everyone. If everyone knew it, then why the price has not gone up? The bottom line is to buy when no one else will.

If everyone likes it, sell; if no one likes it, buy.

As Warren Buffet said, “the less prudence with which others conduct their affairs, the greater prudence with which we should conduct our own affairs.” When others are afraid, you needn’t be, when others are unafraid, you better be.

After Lehman’s collapse in 2008 in the great financial crash, everyone was afraid of financial stocks. The market rewarded contrarian investors who waited patiently and bought financial companies in 2009. Contrarian investors find opportunities that offer the right balance of return and risk.

On November 17, 2019, a 55-year-old man in the Hubei province was tested positive for COVID-19, a disease caused by a novel coronavirus. His positive result started a series of events that led to lockdown in 50 countries and the biggest stock market crash of the 21st century. Nothing can prepare us for a pandemic, but we can adapt our portfolio and lifestyle to changing times. Below are the three things you can do to prepare yourself. On November 17, 2019, a 55-year-old man in the Hubei province was tested positive for COVID-19, a disease caused by a novel coronavirus. His positive result started a series of events that led to lockdown in a dozen countries and the biggest stock market crash of the decade. Nothing can prepare us for a pandemic, but we can adapt our portfolio and lifestyle to changing times. Below are the three things you can do to prepare yourself.

Embrace for impact

Investors usually overestimate their risk tolerance. In a falling market, I would recommend deleveraging your portfolio and investing only the capital that you can live without for the next ten years. Another good discipline is to review your holdings timely and identify weaknesses within your portfolio. Stocks you do not want in your portfolio are cyclical companies. Cyclical companies (i.e. Airlines, Hotels, Financial Services and Natural Resources) are the worst hit since the outbreak of COVID-19. Defensive stocks (i.e. Retail, Utilities and Healthcare) are more desirable during the current crisis as they provide essential goods and services for the economy to function properly. Ideally, you should create a watchlist of fundamentally strong defensive companies that you would like to buy.

A balanced All-Weather portfolio

Great portfolios are created by fine-tuning the balance between long term financial objectives and risk tolerance levels. One such great portfolio is the All-Weather Portfolio.   All-Weather portfolio is the creation of Ray Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater Associates, one of the biggest hedge funds in the world. According to Mr Dalio, there are only four scenarios that can affect the value of your investments. They are as follows:1. Inflation – The increase in the price of goods and services or rising prices2. Deflation – The decrease in the price of goods and services or falling prices3. Rising economic growth – Flourishing economy or higher than expected economic growth4. Declining economic growth – Shrinking economy or lower than expected economic growth

Ray Dalio suggested constructing a portfolio with assets that would perform well in each of the above scenarios. The result is a diversified portfolio of Stocks, Bonds and Commodities. Performance of All-Weather portfolio in previous financial crashes:

• Great Depression – when back-tested during the Great Depression, the all-weather portfolio was shown to have lost just 20.55% while the S&P 500 lost 64.4%.
• In 1973 and 2002, when S&P suffered some of the worst losses, the all-weather portfolio made money.

Do not time the market but look for clues

I wish I had a magic bullet to protect your investments from market crashes. I don’t. But I want to help you protect your investments. COVID-19 has changed our perception of market volatility, but there are a few things we can look for to prepare ourselves.
Daily infection rate or growth factor of daily new cases: Growth factor is the factor by which the daily new cases number multiplies itself over time. A growth factor of 1.07 means the daily new case is growing by 7%. More than 1 indicates signs of increase, whereas less than one indicates decreasing levels. If the number stays below 1 for an extended period and continue to move towards 0, then there is a high likelihood that the market will improve. During the SARS crisis in 2003, the stock market bottomed a week after the daily infection rate topped out.

Fear Index: The current epidemic is anything like before, but there will be indications of revival. Stock market declines often coincide with VIX index spikes. Previous outbreaks of SARS in 2002-03 pushed VIX to 41. Global Financial Crash in 2008 spiked VIX to 79. As of March 24, 2020, VIX, is at 55. Before buying any stock, I would expect VIX to fall considerably. No one can predict when the market would bottom, but you can look for clues to give yourself a head start in building a better portfolio.

Key to better portfolio performance

The All-Weather Portfolio consists of 30% Stock, 40% Long Term Bonds, 15% Intermediate-Term Bonds, 7.5% Commodities and 7.5% Gold. The portfolio maximises diversification, minimises volatility and improves performance.  Higher allocation of bond in the portfolio is to balance the volatility from Stock and Commodities as bonds are negatively correlated to stocks. Timing the market is fool’s errand. Buying when the valuations are right is key to better portfolio performance.

There is no single investment opportunity or asset class that can promise consistently high returns all the time. Many argue that real estate has always outperformed and is a good hedge against inflation. But done at the wrong time and real estate investing doesn’t work.
According to the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco report, The Total Risk Premium Puzzle, the annual total return of UK Real Estate averaged at 7.63% for the period from 1963 – 2015 whereas, the annual total return of UK Stocks and Shares for the same period of 8.74%.

Price and Time

There is no good or bad investment but good or bad price and time of investment.
Selecting good companies does not guarantee superior returns. See – Cable and Wireless, Xerox, British Steel, Thomas Cook, and Blockbuster. Great investment decisions are based on two things – Price paid for the stock and the time of purchase. No company is so good that it cannot be overvalued or so bad that it cannot be undervalued.

Discipline

What is most important in investing? It is not knowledge or strategy, but it is the discipline.
The riskiest thing to do is to buy something when everyone else is buying. All the information has already been factored in the price. You want to participate in an auction where there are only 2-3 bidders rather than hundreds. You want to buy something when it is not discovered. The most profitable thing to do is to buy something when no one is keen on buying it.

Be Contrarian

Your best bet is to be a contrarian investor.
There is no undervalued stock that is known by everyone. If everyone knew it, then why the price has not gone up? The bottom line is to buy when no one else will.
If everyone likes it, sell; if no one likes it, buy.

As Warren Buffet said, “the less prudence with which others conduct their affairs, the greater prudence with which we should conduct our own affairs.” When others are afraid, you needn’t be, when others are unafraid, you better be.

After Lehman’s collapse in 2008 in the great financial crash, everyone was afraid of financial stocks. The market rewarded contrarian investors who waited patiently and bought financial companies in 2009. Contrarian investors find opportunities that offer the right balance of return and risk.