No-look November 2018

[Breelander]

The only routine that I'm actively trying to change with this process is the one where I habitually concentrate far too much on the contents and valuation of my portfolio...

Well, if that's all you're worried about, then by that definition I've had a 'No-look' year throughout 2018

I routinely record share prices, but I don't much bother abut what they are doing.

[tjh290633]

Do you mean that you are reading IDP's RNS resumes on HYP Practical?

Surely that is cheating?

It's not clear who you're asking Terry, but I certainly wouldn't advocate a complete investment-news black-out being necessary for involvement in the 'No-Look-November' process.

I've not gone out to actively seek-out any particular financial news, as I think that would perhaps go against the spirit of the sabbatical, but I've also certainly not actively avoided any particular financial news that I might come across as part of my otherwise normal daily routines either...

The only routine that I'm actively trying to change with this process is the one where I habitually concentrate far too much on the contents and valuation of my portfolio, and I think so long as the spirit of that intent is followed (and we've already agreed in the past that there may well be extenuating circumstances where a brief excursion into portfolio-territory might well be necessary...), then I think that's about as much as we can expect during this process, to be fair.

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

Ah! My impression was that you cut yourself from all information about your portfolio, like news of dividends, corporate actions, as well as forswearing looking at share prices.

With November being a particular busy time for declarations and receiving dividends, with 13 announcement and 9 dividends paid in my case, and the prospect of the need for a trimming operation and reinvestment, it's not a month that I would choose for the exercise.

TJH

[Itsallaguess]

Ah! My impression was that you cut yourself from all information about your portfolio, like news of dividends, corporate actions, as well as forswearing looking at share prices.

With November being a particular busy time for declarations and receiving dividends, with 13 announcement and 9 dividends paid in my case, and the prospect of the need for a trimming operation and reinvestment, it's not a month that I would choose for the exercise.

Well, to be fair, news of dividends and corporate actions are not something I look out for at any time really, so this sabbatical is nothing to do with that from my own point of view, but of course others may want to include such measures in their own approach to the situation.

In terms of share-prices, I won't seek them out during this four-week period, as I think that would constitute a breach in the spirit of the attempt, and this is something I'm very keen to include in this period, simply because it's something else I think I probably do too much of, and importantly I think I do it to no real-world advantage, which is a key aspect of the types of things I'm keen to cut down on during this period.

Basically this whole thing is around the idea that once a portfolio is of a sufficient size, and is diversified enough, it's capable of getting on with what it's designed to get on with, without the need for perpetual monitoring....

Taking part in this November feature really has taught me that this is the case, and the advantage of doing it is that I've seen very good bleed-over into the periods outside of the month of November, which again was something I was keen to take advantage of if it happened, which for me it certainly has.

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

[tjh290633]

In terms of share-prices, I won't seek them out during this four-week period, as I think that would constitute a breach in the spirit of the attempt, and this is something I'm very keen to include in this period, simply because it's something else I think I probably do too much of, and importantly I think I do it to no real-world advantage, which is a key aspect of the types of things I'm keen to cut down on during this period.

Basically this whole thing is around the idea that once a portfolio is of a sufficient size, and is diversified enough, it's capable of getting on with what it's designed to get on with, without the need for perpetual monitoring....

Taking part in this November feature really has taught me that this is the case, and the advantage of doing it is that I've seen very good bleed-over into the periods outside of the month of November, which again was something I was keen to take advantage of if it happened, which for me it certainly has.

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

Actually I guess that looking at valuations once a month is not all that problematical, as any situations which have arisen during that month can be resolved then.

Corporate actions requiring responding are a different matter, I suspect.

TJH

[poppy101]

I caved already
Only lasted one week

[Itsallaguess]

I caved already

Only lasted one week

Well on the positive side, you lasted a whole week, so well done!

You didn't fail, by the way - the challenge was to give it a go and see how you got on, and if you consider a week an improvement on your normal habits, then you've proved that you can do it....

It might also still be educational to process how your portfolio and also it's components moved over the week, compared to the general market - it was surprising for a few of us last year that even over a period of a month, the movement of the portfolio and it's constituents could be considered just as 'noise', and so did help encourage a sense that continual monitoring was really not adding any real value at all.

Something to beat for next year too, so we'll hopefully see you in just 51 short weeks then!

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

[nimnarb]

Just seen this thread. Interesting Itsallaguess. Like the idea but wouldn't work for me over in the States as apart from AAPL MSFT, NVDA who produce dividends, I don't look to these Companies for income as such, plus invest in(some say high risk) SaaS Companies from an early stage. I think if you are set up right with long standing boring but stable Companies(whatever that means today) producing be it monthly or qtr dividends and your constitution is calm and relaxed, could work, but I reckon many would cheat and have a quick look, human nature innit!

Anyway, up until a month ago, was riding high with overall returns for the year of about 58% but with the way things have been going(getting murdered today on Aapl and a few others) not jumping up and down so much but the point of this post is that my wife(partner ) feels that you have the correct way to go. Set it up right to start with and don't look every 5 minutes and in her case perhaps a few times a year and that's it.

Now would I have a heart attack or would it improve my health if I listened?

[OLTB]

It's not tempting at all to look at what the current political shenanigans are having on my portfolio

Cheers, OLTB.

[Itsallaguess]

Well, I'm still plugging away - not looked at all since October 31st, and in all honesty I'm having a much easier time of it than this time last year.

I think that the political shenanigans are actually helping to be honest, as I know that current events are likely to be having effects on my portfolio that are definitely not going to be influenced one way or another just because I might happen to be watching those effects, so I'm really able to take a quite profoundly zen-like attitude to the whole thing really, and I'm just allowing myself to get on with things whilst accepting that this is the case.

So, half-way through the month. If others are still in the game then I hope you're managing well.

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

[Gengulphus]

what's next?

Under the duvet December?

Might not be a bad idea

Distracted December - as a month, it certainly has plenty of available distractions!

Gengulphus

[Itsallaguess]

Well, with five more trading days to go until the end of November, I've got to say that even with knowing there's likely to have been some big swings in some of my single-company HYP holdings, I've still found the whole exercise really quite easy to deal with.

I'll be reporting on the movement of my portfolio and it's constituents, and comparing that with the general market movements of the various indices we took note of at the start of the month, and once I've done that I might see if there's anything juicy that looks like it might be worth topping up in my HYP.

If it's anything like last year, I'll expect to see some outlier movements in some holdings, but at a portfolio level I really don't expect to see much variation at all from the general market changes over the month.

With that said, I also expect the next five trading days to possibly be the most 'interesting' of the year in terms of any Brexit news, so I may just take a watching brief for now, and see how things settle down over December.

For anyone who's not given this a go over the past couple of years, I can highly recommend the abstinence - it really is quite liberating...

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

[Raptor]

Still on thre "wagon". Not bad with 5 lots of dividends in and 2 to come. I think the "brexit & US/Sino" has helped me keep away and the lack of money to invest....

Will be interesting to see how the Portfolio has done against my "benchmark". Also have my daughters one too.

Maybe we should have a "give it a rest 2019"...

Raptor.

[vrdiver]

Although I had not planned to take part, the political events and subsequent "sea of red" I have been expecting to see, should I look, has kept me away. I know, I really know, that the market will have peaks and troughs, but I find the peaks much more addictive to look and re-look at, whereas the troughs have two effects on me:
a) douse any desire to see how my portfolio is doing, and
b) make me grateful I live off of natural yield rather than capital growth - which in times like these I'd struggle to stay calm.

VRD


(for the avoidance of doubt - I take my hat off to those who have mastered capital growth harvesting. It's just a step too far for my investing skills)

[OLTB]

I have managed to stop myself looking (it's been difficult some days...) and I can just imagine what my TUI shares are up to today following Thomas Cook's trading update.

Ripe for a top-up some may say but only, of course, from December

Cheers, OLTB.

[StepOne]

No-look November is impossible for me. The first thing I do when I get into the office each morning is update my portfolio spreadsheets.

But in an attempt to get into the spirit of things I have decided to stop recording portfolio and FTSE values every Friday in a separate spreadsheet and instead only record the values once a month.

Baby steps

StepOne

[Itsallaguess]

No-look November is impossible for me. The first thing I do when I get into the office each morning is update my portfolio spreadsheets.

But in an attempt to get into the spirit of things I have decided to stop recording portfolio and FTSE values every Friday in a separate spreadsheet and instead only record the values once a month.

Baby steps

Definitely, and I do agree that just giving ourselves a little bit of intent and then making sure we actually deliver on it, goes a long way to forging the road ahead....

Funny that you've stopped recording portfolio-values every Friday, as that's actually the only time I do it!

Three days to go - nearly there now!

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

[Breelander]

...in an attempt to get into the spirit of things I have decided to stop recording portfolio and FTSE values every Friday in a separate spreadsheet...

Funny that you've stopped recording portfolio-values every Friday, as that's actually the only time I do it!

I feel that Friday closing prices are a good indicator of sentiment for the week just gone by as people will be closing positions ahead of the weekend. I record Monday too as an indicator of expectations for the week ahead. The rest of the week seems too 'noisy' to be worth recording.

As I just record my share prices, not actually draw any conclusions from (or act on) them, I haven't felt a need to join your 'experiment'.

[StepOne]

But in an attempt to get into the spirit of things I have decided to stop recording portfolio and FTSE values every Friday in a separate spreadsheet and instead only record the values once a month.

Baby steps

Definitely, and I do agree that just giving ourselves a little bit of intent and then making sure we actually deliver on it, goes a long way to forging the road ahead....

Funny that you've stopped recording portfolio-values every Friday, as that's actually the only time I do it!

Well my spreadsheet of weekly values goes back 15 years now, for my 2 portfolios plus the FTSE-100. There are lots of calculated columns in there, looking at biggest fall, biggest rise, consecutive weeks rise, beating/losing to the FTSE, but basically apart from occasionally killing time playing with the numbers, I never really do anything with this information. It's certainly never informs my buy/sell decisions, so what's the point. Reducing the updates to once a month is a step in the right direction, and maybe someday I will reduce to annually. I think these are better moves than going cold Turkey for a month.

Cheers
StepOne

[monabri]

If my portfolio is typical then I'd have a glass of brandy at the ready for when you update!

[Itsallaguess]

If my portfolio is typical then I'd have a glass of brandy at the ready for when you update!

Ha!

I am actually expecting a poor performance - perhaps even disjointed to the general market give the jungle-drums that I've inevitably picked up over the last month.

I'm going to take the index levels tonight at some point, and will look into the granular portfolio performance over what looks like a wet weekend coming up.

Thanks for the heads-up though, I shall steel myself at the point of pressing the update button!

Cheers,

Itsallaguess