Leaderboard

So ASHGEQ will suspend trading on 9 September and the ETF will be replaced with the Ashburton Global 1200 Equity Fund of Funds ETF (ASHEQF) (also launched on 9 September). This is the new feeder fund discussed in the previous post. (Source: ASHGEQ SENS announcement 1 September 2020) We shouldn't notice any immediate difference in our portfolios, I guess, except the change of code from ASHGEQ to ASHEQF.

I'm curious if you've reviewed your rationale recently now that the waters have temporarily calmed. Do you still think you were thinking clearly or do you recognize a little bit of the recency bias and nihilism that drove the choices you made here? I'm speaking with regards to: 1. Cashing out your pension (!) 2. Panic selling from a passively managed portfolio (As an aside, who exactly was "trying to take your money"? 3. Staying invested (due to admin inertia) in the RA while thinking there was no way it could recover (I'm curious to know if it did and if so/not what exactly is your RA invested in and have you looked to tighten up there?) 4. Not wanting to add more to your RA while everything was on sale For the sake of fairness, I'll be transparent that I did nothing during the crash. Literally nothing. Everyone around me was tinkering and saying that I was crazy continuing with business as usual but I just couldn't understand why an investment plan that I made when I was calm and rational, specifically to whether the longterm (a longterm that EXPECTED crashes and "once in a lifetime" global events) needed to suddenly be abandoned. I don't regret that decision. A part of me wishes I'd taken on more shifts so that I could buy more during the dip, but again that wasn't part of my longterm plan so I felt silly even considering it. Even excluding rand weakness, my portfolio is essentially where it was precrash. My RA is shining too... with its 70% local. I think the financial consequences of the last 9 months are far from over but my plan remains the same. If there's anything this storm taught me it's that you have to build a plan that matches your risk tolerance or you'll be prone to making decisions in the heat of the moment that contradict that plan. I'm curious if yours has changed at all with a bit of the tailwinds behind us and a bit more perspective? I think it would be a useful update.

For cellphones, you can download the free version of the TrueCaller App (from Google Play Store) that has very effective spam and advertising blocking capabilities. I've been using it for a few months now and I hardly get spam calls anymore on my cell phone.

I've had the same problem with DialDirect. They post me hard-copy adverts nearly every week, and almost daily spam in my inbox, with no unsubscribe option in their mails. I once e-mailed them and asked them to stop, but that simply (seemingly) increased the amount of spam I received. And this has been going on for years!

Knowing what I know now I would do it again. Make no mistake, it could've ended badly but for some reason I had very little doubt that it will work out in my favour. Still scary. 1. Cashing out pension Still happy I did it. We have plans to cash out my wife's as well. We are planning to move offshore for a bit (permanently?) but even if we didn't I have do not have enough faith in our government and Reg 28 to provide us with a retirement. Retirement is still 30 years away though. I'd rather sort it out myself. I would never suggest to anybody to cash out their pension (it could be the worst mistake you ever make) but personally I have no love for reg 28. 2. Panic selling This wasn't panic selling. I saw an opportunity and took a calculated risk. All the money was reinvested. Yes I took the opportunity to rebalance but I invested in the same "philosophy" - not in SA. Panic selling implies that one has no plan and making rash decisions. *I bought back in over a couple of days but that's the rough idea. When I bought back in I thought we hit bottom already, but obviously not. 3. RA So I moved my RA to Allan Gray in 2018. As a result the fund is split in two exact same funds - one that just sits there and one for new deposits. This is the lump sum with no additional deposits' performance: Since inception: -0.49% 4. Not adding anymore to RA I've stopped all deposits to my RA btw. Investing that money into my own investments. My new portfolio is up 6.59% over the last 6 months which is not spectacular but the investments are diverse and not bound to reg28 constraints.