The Investor Diaries: Week 17

The investors:

Just a reminder – the above are those investors that did a once-off “So I had R3,500 to invest, and this is what I did with it 17 weeks ago.” Below are those same investors, as if they’d continued to invest money (R1,000) each month (except for the Art Enthusiast, because, well, buying a first edition didn’t work out so well…):

I feel like I’m repeating myself here, but a lil Satrix ETF really does seem to be the best in both scenarios.

To summarise:

The Contented Pragmatist – remains contented. And a little supercilious. Also: he’s using words like “supercilious”.
The Recent Finance Graduate – is learning that FNB share builder is a fairly expensive way to do things. Although he’s also learning that what comes down usually does come up (especially when it comes to share prices). And he’s beginning to suspect that Dollar Cost Averaging is a theory that might have some truth to it*.*The Contented Pragmatist: “This man is a fool.”
The Goldbug – needs to pray more. Because gold is not doing so well.
The Daredevil – should be pretty happy with life, actually. It just goes to show that Active Investment (like a Unit Trust) is about as good as Passive Investment (like an ETF) – provided that the Active Investment takes place in a market where there’s not a lot of people investing (like the small business space in this example).
The South African Bear – is a general annoyance who can’t understand why the Rand isn’t plummeting into the ground at a rapid clip*. *Because contrary to popular belief, things are not as bad as all that. Of course there are issues. But there is still a population that’s growing. And there’s an efficient tax service. And a pro-business government…
The Honourable Jeffrey – is trucking along with his fixed deposit. Although, as you’ll notice from the indicators below, the annual inflation rate is sitting at 6.6%. He’s making an annual return of maybe a third of that? So he’s losing “money” in the sense that he’s losing purchasing power.
The Circumspect Whore – is exposed to all equity, and that’s quite fine. Especially when you consider that it’s fairly low-risk (in the grand scheme of equity investment). Certainly – less risk than the Satrix, which is linked to why there’s a lower return.
The Scrooge – should not have invested in a bond ETF through FNB share builder. A classic example of fees outweighing the return.