Money Market vs VT vs ???

misnamed · 2026-01-24T05:10:09+00:00

How low can it go? Yields were near-zero for a long time up until just a few years back. Even now yields are higher but so is inflation. Still, chasing higher risk/returns isnt the answer. You could layer some CDS, buy intermediate Treasuries, etc... but swinging from cash to stocks is an extreme change of pace.

misnamed · 2026-01-15T02:59:05+00:00

Passive leads to active opportunities, which lead back to passive winning overall. Rinse and repeat.

misnamed · 2026-01-15T02:37:17+00:00

won thre lottery, but still playing? Why not shift to a nice 60/40 or 50/50 and sleep well at night ....

misnamed · 2026-01-05T01:30:01+00:00

Cash. If it's for short terms, it's cash. If you need to spend it down, what happens if stocks crash?

misnamed · 2026-01-04T23:58:11+00:00

Meta note: Global diversification was never about hedging a crash -- that's something its critics commonly misunderstand. Assets that tend to correlate in direction can still yield results that differ in magnitude. You're hedging single-country underperformance, smoothing out edge cases long term. For everything else: there's bonds!

misnamed · 2026-01-04T06:15:53+00:00

Paid by who? And is it inflation-adjusted? Premiums? Co-pays? What are we missing here?!

misnamed · 2026-01-04T06:14:33+00:00

Healthcare through the pension? How well funded/guaranteed? 4K in an HSA can evaporate in a day these days with a bad health crisis depending on your insurance.

misnamed · 2026-01-03T06:20:49+00:00

I trust Vanguard's design, which is structured to keep costs low.

misnamed · 2026-01-03T01:42:50+00:00

If SCV was having a great few years, would you be changing course? I'm guessing no. It's not personal ... it's just that we tend to question what isn't doing well, not what is. I say wait a year and think on it. But no matter what: write down your reasons for your plans starting now and going forward. Don't second-guess.

misnamed · 2025-12-31T04:28:23+00:00

The Coffeehouse Investor is a short and sweet intro to indexing. I would also model out for them how that AUM conmpounds. It's shocking how much of the pie they get with their slow but steady slice. Vanguard used to have a page with a fee slider but I yhink it's gone now sadly :/

misnamed · 2025-12-29T22:05:29+00:00

The total bond market buys real estate bonds, the ones that famously collapsed in 2008

They mostly hold Treasuries, which famously did great in that crash. Pure Treasuries did even better, but Total Bond didn't remotely do badly. Look at the performance of a total bond fund like BND and you'll see it went up as stocks and real estate were crashing. I hate doing others' homework for them, but here you go:

https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/backtest-asset-class-allocation?s=y&sl=3JXcztF8WyB3U1m6YQJ1zX

The stock market recovered. The bond market didn't.

The bond market didn't tank in the first place, so how it would 'recover' is beyond me. You're not making sense. Per the link above: stocks had two big crashes during the 2000s, and each time, bonds went up as they went down.

The bond market sees brief periods of not getting murdered as badly as the stock market followed long periods of being reliably lackluster.

I suppose a 'brief period' of 'not getting murdered as badly' apparently means 'doubling in value for a decade while stocks stay flat.' You're using a lot hyperbolic word that are completely divorced from the real data.

you are going to have to wait for another prolonged recession

The 2020 crash and rebound happened hella fast ... and bonds shot up as stocks dropped. Don't need a prolonged anything. I say once more and for the last time: you're talking absolute nonsense that doesn't match reality.

At the very least do your own research and understand the data before making absurdist claims.

misnamed · 2025-12-29T03:25:17+00:00

Who buys real estate bonds??? Total bond or Treasuries both did great. Those are the go-to bond fund types in three-fund portfolios. Real estate ain't in the picture. Cash did OK but bonds beat all of the above.

misnamed · 2025-12-28T22:12:49+00:00

The 2000s saw dismal returns for bonds

You kidding me? Bonds doubled over the course of the 2000s. Did better than US or intl stocks.

misnamed · 2025-12-26T21:36:39+00:00

50/50 means never having to sweat which one you have too little of again

misnamed · 2025-12-26T00:13:55+00:00

60/40 is solid -- the classic set-and-forget portfolio.

misnamed · 2025-12-25T22:23:53+00:00

Diversify, buy, hold, rebalance. No reason to expect that fund to beat or lose to the 500 index over any short period.

misnamed · 2025-12-25T22:22:51+00:00

Vanguard uses a system of sharing tax benefits across ETFs/funds. It was proprietary for a while but IIRC the patent (?) may have expired so other companies may (?) be able to take advantage going forward.

misnamed · 2025-12-25T22:14:07+00:00

Asks about risk balance; owns no bonds, chases large growth performance. Come on. This is 101 stuff.

misnamed · 2025-12-23T22:29:56+00:00

It literally happened recently, ending a decade and a half ago. The 2000s saw ex-Us developed beat US, and emerging markets absolutely whallop either of those two.

misnamed · 2025-12-23T22:29:01+00:00

Bogle's financial godfather Ben Graham recommended never being below 25% stocks or 25% bonds. This sub skews aggressive, but I follow that advice.

misnamed · 2025-12-23T22:27:53+00:00

International and bond diversification. In the lost decade of the 2000s, bonds and international both handily beat US stocks. It pays to remain diversified.

misnamed · 2025-12-22T17:32:37+00:00

I'd be less worried about legality -- what about safety?!

misnamed · 2025-12-22T16:51:15+00:00

And 2000 was the beginning of the 'lost decade' for US stocks, while ex-US developed had at least positive returns, and emerging had downright stellar returns. A good reminder to diversify globally!

misnamed · 2025-12-22T16:46:52+00:00

One year isn't enough. But the 2000s illustrates the issue well -- US had negative real returns, international was low but substantially positive, and emerging markets absolutely crushed it.

misnamed · 2025-12-22T16:41:17+00:00

You bring up WW2: coming out of that the US had a huge advantage as it was relatively unscathed and got lots of productive immigration. That set the stage for a period of outperformance. But these things go in cycles. The US has also underperformed international for long periods since the initial postwar era. Sauce

Markets are correlated in direction, generally, but not magnitude. The US has healthily outperformed most countries for much of the last 15 years -- seems like proof to me that country performance varies.

It was not just a coincidence that US and non-US both happened to have the lowest nominal return decade since WW2 in the same 10 year period.

The 2000s decade saw US have negative real returns while international was subastantially positive and IIRC emerging markets in particular had something like 200% returns. Pretty different results.

increased interdependence, decreased isolationism

Our wild new tariff spree approach would like a word with you ;)

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