“Don’t get down on yourself.” Today, my morning meditation focused on this quote from Gary Vaynerchuk, and it was directly applicable to a recent conversation with my wife about my portfolio management experience.
Yesterday, while speaking with my wife about our portfolio returns over the past 16 months, I made a self-deprecating comment regarding how a fully-invested portfolio would have fared. The cash balance of our “Farm Portfolio” is roughly 19 percent of total assets, and the cash drag has been especially unfortunate during such a prosperous period for the market.
Since early June 2016 through September 12, 2017, the dividend-adjusted return for the Vanguard S&P 500 Index ETF (VOO) is roughly 21.7% (data source: Yahoo! Finance). Over the same period, our portfolio has appreciated 23.7% before applicable taxes. Our small stake in Shopify (NYSE: SHOP) has just become a triple (+200% return), but would have been a four bagger (+321%) had I bought it on June 2, 2016 (data source: Google Finance). Our Align Technologies (NASDAQ: ALGN) position is within arms-reach of a double (up 97%) but would have returned 137% had I bought on June 10, 2016.
Were I to ignore Mr. Vaynerchuk, and lament what might have been, I would be left depressed or defeated. Instead, I will learn from my experiences and move forward as a more rational investor. Going forward, I will do my best to, as GaryVee recommends, leave emotion out of decision-making and maintain a disciplined approach to investing.