The Vanguard Blog for Advisors has a recent post about how we’re now in the 3rd biggest bull market since 1929, which followed the 2008 financial crisis, also known as the 3rd biggest bear market since 1929. The takeaway is that none of us know the future, so advisors need to convince their clients to rebalance their portfolios both in good times and bad.

Remember, rebalancing is not about maximizing returns, reversion to the mean, or market forecasts—it is about maintaining the risk-and-return characteristics of the portfolio an investor selected based on his or her unique time horizon, risk tolerance, and financial goals. In contrast to market predictions, rebalancing is within your clients’ control.

That’s all well and good, but included was this curious chart with the title “Rebalancing: Asset allocations show trend following”:

This chart confuses me. I assume it is supposed to show that when stocks go up, people buy more stocks and when stocks go down, people sell off their stock allocations. But if for every trade there is both a buyer and a seller, then who is taking the other side of all these trades? For instance, if everyone is buying stocks now, who are they buying it from? Is this only retail investors and the other buyers are institutional investors? Or is this chart mostly just showing changes in overall market-cap?

The general consensus behind target-date retirement funds is often “They’re okay… but here’s something better!”. Any all-in-one product will be imperfect. But I still like them on the whole and have written previously about how Vanguard’s target-date retirement funds are underrated. If you’re invested in them, this Bloomberg article and Morningstar data should make you feel even better about it.

Most mutual fund investors actually do worse than market returns due to poor behavior, termed the “behavior gap“:

But target-date funds have one big advantage over other kinds of mutual funds, the data show. The average mutual fund has a flaw, which is that the average investor hardly ever does as well as his or her funds. Investors tend to jump in and out of funds at the wrong time. They buy high, choosing funds only after they’ve done well. And they sell low, dumping underperforming funds just as they’re about to take off.

However, owners of target-date fund actually did better:

On average, target-date fund investors are doing 1.1 percent better per year than their funds. Investors in almost every other fund category lagged their funds over the past decade, including a -0.98 percent underperformance for U.S. equity funds and -1.3 percent for municipal bond funds.

The outperformance may be a temporary anomaly, but I do think there are unique features of these all-in-one funds (and their investors) that will persist:

1. Self-selection. If you buy a target-date fund, you desire simplicity. You have a degree of humility. You don’t overestimate your skills as an investor, otherwise you’d buy something else.
2. Optical illusions. If you own an all-in-one fund that holds both stocks and bonds together, you don’t have the problem of seeing one investment drop while the other rises. It’s all mixed together in one pot, so the impact is usually dulled. This is the benefit of buying a “balanced” fund.
3. Automatic rebalancing. Anything that makes you look at your investments is an opportunity to make an emotionally-driven choice. Since these funds even rebalance their holdings for you automatically, you’re not even required to rebalance, which can be hard to do. Right now, a portfolio would probably have to sell stocks and buy some bonds while the media keeps talking about rising rates.
4. Tweaking is difficult. If you have one stock fund and one bond fund, it’s very easy to buy little more of one or a little less of the other. With an all-in-one fund, it’s harder to tweak your mix.

So you don’t have to do anything, and if you want to do something besides just buy more, it’s a pain. All this means less trading, which over the long run is a good thing.

So don’t be ashamed of buying a diversified, low-cost Target Date fund like Vanguard 20XX or Fidelity Freedom *Index* 20XX funds. The article ends with a good reminder that costs still matter. Don’t overpay for one of these funds either, and maybe even raise a little stink if you are being asked to.

Here’s a reader question that arrived this week:

I know you write a lot about investing, but can you write a little more about ComputerShare as a way to save money vs buying stock with online brokerages. I just read in WSJ how its cheaper if you are a buy and hold kind and its just as good as someone holding your paper stock certificates.

I am assuming that the WSJ article in question is the one about Ronald Read, the maintenance worker and janitor who saved up $8 million using DRIP plans.

A thrifty lifestyle, solid investing acumen, plenty of patience and the benefits of compounding were at the center of the story of Ronald Read—the quiet and simple-living Vermonter who enjoyed playing the stock market and left behind a nearly $8 million estate when he died last year at the age of 92.

Dividend Re-Investment Plans (DRIPs) traditionally refer to companies that let individuals to buy their shares directly from them and then allow them to automatically reinvest any dividends into more shares. Reinvesting those dividends increased the number of shares owned, and when combined with per-share price appreciation often leads to significant gains over time.

DRIPs were one of the first low-cost, buy-and-hold investment strategies. Stock commissions used to run over $30 per trade, whereas many DRIP plans let you buy shares for free or just a few bucks. This allowed mom-and-pop investors to put away as little as $25 a month without the entire nut being eaten by fees.

I started learning a tiny bit about investing in the late 1990s, which was near the rise of the online broker and the beginning of end of for DRIP plans. I still remember buying a book about DRIPs from Moe’s Books (used book store that is still going!) and being very fascinated by the idea. These days, paper certificates are pretty much gone and transfer agents like ComputerShare manage DRIP plans for most companies electronically. ComputerShare manages plans for Procter & Gamble, ExxonMobil, Coca-Cola, Johnson & Johnson, Wal-Mart, AT&T, Verizon, and several more.

For the most part, there are better low-cost, buy-and-hold options out there now. Let’s take a look at the Coca-Cola DRIP plan. It costs $10 to set up, $2 per automatic purchase plus a $0.03 per share processing fee. Reinvestment of dividends cost 5% of amount reinvested up to a maximum of $2.00. You need $500 to start and there is a $50 ongoing minimum investment.

Every company has different rules, and sometimes there is a purchase price discount. However, you are still buying individual stocks so what happens when you end up holding a Enron, MCI Worldcom, or even a Kodak or Sears? You could juggle 30 different stock plans like Ronald Read did – one of his stocks bombed too but his diversification protected his portfolio – but that gets to be a lot of work and paying $2 times 30 starts adding up.

Now consider that you can buy an ETF like the Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF (VTI) with zero commission and zero setup fees from Vanguard or TD Ameritrade and holds 3,800 stocks for you all at once for an expense ratio of $5 a year per $10,000 invested. If you like the dollar-based simplicity of DRIPs (all of your $50 a month gets invested in partial shares), you can buy the mutual fund version (VTSMX) at Vanguard which supports fractional shares and free automatic dividend reinvestment.

Even if you still wanted to buy individual stocks, many discount brokers including TradeKing and TD Ameritrade offer low commissions and free dividend reinvestment. Hold one stock or 100, all on a single statement. The Robinhood app lets you buy stocks with zero commission if you have a smartphone. You can buy up to 30 stocks at once for $9.95 at Motif Investing.

Many people feel more comfortable with someone else helping them with their finances. A common piece of advice these days is to find a fee-only advisor that doesn’t work on commission. Many times this leads to a recommendation of the National Association of Personal Financial Advisors (NAPFA), whose members must promise to be fee-only and act in a fiduciary manner (putting your interests first). They are regularly mentioned in Kiplinger’s magazine, and I’ve even referred a few readers to their website myself. You’d think that putting your money with the president of NAPFA would be a sound idea, right?

I was surprised to read the following warning from Phil DeMuth in his book The Affluent Investor:

The National Association of Personal Financial Advisors (NAPFA) will happily refer you to a fee-only advisor. Despite their lofty mission, no fewer than two of its recent presidents have been investigated for kickback schemes (one for defrauding clients by secretly putting $47.5 million of client money in a start-up he founded). Several years ago, I referred someone who was looking for an advisor to this group. When I followed up to ask how it went, he said, “The guy they sent me to tried to sell me a variable annuity.” This is exactly what fee-only advisors are not supposed to do: push high-margin commissioned products. This organization is a useful idea and I wish I could endorse it, but the execution leaves something to be desired.

Naturally, I had to learn more about these former NAPFA presidents. Here is a good summary excerpted from Wikipedia (emphasis mine):

Two former presidents of the NAPFA, Mark Spangler (serving in 1998) and James Putman (serving in 1996 and 1997) were charged by the SEC with fraudulent behavior: Putman in 2009, for accepting $1.24 million in kickbacks related to unregistered investment pools, and Spangler in 2011, for secretly investing $47.7 million of client money in two technology companies that he or his firm owned. […]

On April 24, 2012, a Wisconsin federal court awarded summary judgment to the Commission on its claims against James Putman (“Putman”), a defendant in an action filed by the Commission in May 2009 and orders Putman to pay disgorgement and prejudgment interest in the amount of $1,530,129 and a civil money penalty of $130,000, for a total amount of $1,660,129. […]

Spangler, a Seattle investment adviser, was found guilty 11/7/13 of 31 counts of fraud and money laundering after deceiving clients by secretly investing more than $46 million of their money into two risky startups in which he had an ownership interest. […] Spangler was sentenced 3/14/14 to 16 years in prison […]

It is important remember the relatively loose relationship between NAPFA and its members. There are many reputable, honest fee-only financial advisors out there that are members of NAPFA. BUT, you can’t solely rely on NAPFA membership to mean that the person you pluck out of their directory will be reputable and fee-only. It’s not very difficult to become a member, so unscrupulous people can join to get that layer of credibility and then abuse it.

Educate and protect yourself. NAPFA is a trade organization, so it mostly about marketing and getting good publicity. There’s nothing wrong with that, but as a potential client there is much more due diligence to be done before settling on an advisor. Make sure your money is kept at a well-known third-party custodian such as Schwab, Fidelity, or TD Ameritrade. Know what products are often sold by commission. Use the helpful resources at this SEC.gov broker check page.