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The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

Stocks and Shares ISA , Choosing funds for ISA's, risk factors for funds etc
Investment strategy discussions not dealt with elsewhere.
1nvest
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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#445563

Postby 1nvest » September 27th, 2021, 11:54 am

tjh290633 wrote:
1nvest wrote:'Want' and getting are two different things. Consider a UK historic bad 20 year case ...

I am puzzled. Do the numbers in the horizontal axis refer to years this century? Or are they from some time past?

If they are for this century then they are a totally misleading set of data. Which stock index is it? Presumably they have adjusted by RPI or CPI? Are the annualised figures after withdrawing some money or before?

Could you perhaps provide a link to the document and the page concerned, because to me it looks like a total travesty of the real situation.

TJH

From Barclays Equity Gilt Study data Terry, so dates back to 1899 and the stocks are its version/definition of a FT All Share type stock index as per detailed in their report. A bad case 20 year sequential years series from that set, adjusted for 'Cost of Living' but where they don't define that inflation rate, rather they just include their yearly figures for 'Cost of Living Index'

Digging out their stock index basis ...
The equity returns between 1899 and 1935 are therefore calculated from a new Equity
Index, consisting of the 30 largest shares by market capitalisation in each year; between
1935 and 1962 they are calculated from the FT 30 Index and from 1962 onward they are
derived from the FTSE Actuaries All-Share Index.


Within their report they show figures for price index adjusted for cost of living and income index adjusted for cost of living and it is upon those that a bad 20 year period and the progression was plotted.

Not sure of the actual years as that chart was part of a exercise I carried out some time back to identify historic extremes that had happened with broader risk reduction/diversification purposes in mind.

Sorry I can't provide a link as the Barclays Equity Gilt Study PDF (2016) I used is also a locally preserved version and I don't really have a means to upload/share that (and would break permission rules). In that the table is in Figure 7 on document page number 74/75 (PDF page 76/77).

A large part of the reasoning that led me to prefer a SWR style withdrawal approach and choice of preferred asset diversification with a regular inflation uplifted income provision utmost in mind.

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#445578

Postby 1nvest » September 27th, 2021, 12:48 pm

simoan wrote:
88V8 wrote:
dealtn wrote:How do you avoid it then?

By not needing to.
Our divi/coupon interest more than suffices for our needs & wants and funds two full annual ISA subs.
So I don't, in practice. do TR. Other than using the annual limit.

This is interesting and is at the root of my issue with the income only approach i.e. it only works for someone if they start out with a very large pot of money in the first place. It is a really bad way to grow wealth through equity investment for those with smaller pots and less wealth. If you can put £40k into ISA's and maybe generate another £30-40K for living expenses just through dividends received then you are looking at a pot of £2m or so.

That's fine and works for very wealthy individuals, but to propose an equity income only strategy to those with much smaller investment pots who may be just starting out on their investment journey is just plain wrong. I'd go further, it's dangerous, because investing in high yield equities offers poor risk/reward for the vast majority of investors.

All the best, Si

Bear in mind that the original HYP1 (Pyad) was formed by a 'Value' player, who perhaps saw dividend yield as being a simple measure of relative value (distressed situations where stocks might continue to fade or rebound relatively strongly) broadly diversified across sectors in initial capital equal weighting. That once bought the intent was to hold forever. And where by selecting big blue-chip type stocks the risk of total failure was less likely.

From my personal observations HYP1 (non tweaked), TJH HYP (tweaked), a basket of IT's (B7/B8/whatever) have all tended to yield similar overall total return outcomes, at least across 1997 to 2020 years inclusive type ranges that I've measured. Similar also to the FT250 index outcome - that includes around 50 IT's and subsets of stocks that might be considered as HYP like holdings.

In contrast the FT100 (and also FT All Share as a large part of that is a heavy weighting of FT100 stocks) has been pretty dire. Suggestive that the mechanical method upon which that FT100 is based can be a poor choice. Generally it was hit hard by the dot com, and again by the 2008/9 financial crisis ...etc. I saw similarities to that and Japan's lost two decades, when you invest heavily into giants that even after they stumble/decline a lot they're still relatively big, then you're carrying those stocks that might never recover former high levels, at least not for decades. The FT250 mid cap in contrast feeds both in and out of the bottom/top, giants are ejected into the large cap index for that to bear such risk. FT250 is more like a equal weighted type holding in some respects with no single stocks/sectors tending to become excessively overweighted. Yes the FT250 sector weightings do indicate relatively heavy Financials exposure, but that includes the 20% or so of Investment Trusts that it includes that individually diversify broadly but are counted under 'Financials'.

HYP's historically have tended to be more volatile, so similar risk with more volatility = lower risk adjusted reward (lower Sharpe Ratio). Relying upon dividends for income/spending is also volatile, in contrast alternatives such as SWR provide a regular inflation adjusted income.

Many HYP'ers seem to have enough alternative sources of income such that stock income is icing. Perhaps £20K/year of pension income that covers basic spending, and where stock income/dividends pay for cruises/whatever (non necessities). Or that have sufficient wealth such that even if dividend income halved or more the amount of income was still sufficient to cover spending on necessities (£1.5M+ type portfolios where 4%/£60K income being cut to 2%/£30K was still 'enough'). For others, perhaps £500K portfolio value, no occupation/state pension and more reliant upon that providing at least £20K/year (4%), a reduction to £10K dividends (dividends halve) could be unacceptable. A factor however is that after perhaps a decade, maybe a 60 year old hitting 70, and a 4% SWR average type case tends to see considerable real gains in addition, maybe £500K start date portfolio value having risen to in excess of £1M in inflation adjusted terms and after SWR withdrawals. More so over recent decades as interest rates have transitioned from high 1970/1980 levels down to low 0% levels that acted as a rising tide effect. Forward time however and that tide is more inclined to turn and see it recede. Using the 1980 to recent history of 'average stock rewards' is not a good foundation upon which to build.

The conclusions I came to were not to rely upon a single index as even indexes exhibit deviations/differences and/or might be based on what turns out to be a poor mechanical selection method. Also don't rely upon a single method such as 100% stock, as each such style has its bad times. Blending 50/50 stock/bonds with 100/0 is a form of diversification that reduces the risk of being in either the 50/50 or 100/0 worst case outcomes alone, i.e. 75/25 combined is safer/better than 100/0. And diversify across currencies as otherwise a single currency risk could be devastating. Holding a bunch of stocks that have foreign exposure isn't necessarily currency diversified as many firms hedge their FX exposure back to the domestic currency as that is more inclined to yield less erratic earnings etc.

Yet another factor is that much of historic 'average stock' rewards are backward looking, weren't actually held. 30+ years ago investors might have been more attracted to FT30 type stock index sets that since have been superceded by 'better' alternatives that yielded higher/better results as the suggested historic average outcome. And yet another factor is that historically taxes/costs were much higher, long term average around 38% for basic rate taxpayers, and that tended to spike at the worst possible times (as the circumstances inducing bad times also had the state looking to bolster its income to cover its spending). The Stones self exiled for such reasons as 95%+ tax rates, as did the Beatles sing 'Taxman', 19 for you 1 for me ... in reflection of 95% tax rates. Even more mortal beings, Joe Average were paying around 40% tax rates. 16% inflation, 16% interest, 40% taxation = -6.4% real reward, that if supplemented by drawing 4% for spending !!

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#445600

Postby simoan » September 27th, 2021, 1:40 pm

1nvest wrote:Bear in mind that the original HYP1 (Pyad) was formed by a 'Value' player, who perhaps saw dividend yield as being a simple measure of relative value (distressed situations where stocks might continue to fade or rebound relatively strongly) broadly diversified across sectors in initial capital equal weighting. That once bought the intent was to hold forever. And where by selecting big blue-chip type stocks the risk of total failure was less likely.

From my personal observations HYP1 (non tweaked), TJH HYP (tweaked), a basket of IT's (B7/B8/whatever) have all tended to yield similar overall total return outcomes, at least across 1997 to 2020 years inclusive type ranges that I've measured. Similar also to the FT250 index outcome - that includes around 50 IT's and subsets of stocks that might be considered as HYP like holdings.

Obviously, I have never followed the HYP approach. However, one of the first investment books I read was "Contrarian Investment Strategies" by David Dreman. His Strategy #4 describes a "Price-to-Dividend" approach that is the spitting image of the original HYP dogma, but Dreman sells it as a Total Return approach, not for Income only. So maybe that was the only tweak Pyad made to Dreman's strategy?

Like most of the contrarian/value investing approaches described by Dreman it's been a disaster for many years. To have followed such an approach whilst ignoring some of the greatest and most profitable companies to have ever been listed on world stockmarkets, is basically, criminally negligent.

All the best, Si

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#445662

Postby tjh290633 » September 27th, 2021, 4:40 pm

1nvest wrote:From Barclays Equity Gilt Study data Terry, so dates back to 1899 and the stocks are its version/definition of a FT All Share type stock index as per detailed in their report. A bad case 20 year sequential years series from that set, adjusted for 'Cost of Living' but where they don't define that inflation rate, rather they just include their yearly figures for 'Cost of Living Index'

Digging out their stock index basis ...
The equity returns between 1899 and 1935 are therefore calculated from a new Equity
Index, consisting of the 30 largest shares by market capitalisation in each year; between
1935 and 1962 they are calculated from the FT 30 Index and from 1962 onward they are
derived from the FTSE Actuaries All-Share Index.


Within their report they show figures for price index adjusted for cost of living and income index adjusted for cost of living and it is upon those that a bad 20 year period and the progression was plotted.

Not sure of the actual years as that chart was part of a exercise I carried out some time back to identify historic extremes that had happened with broader risk reduction/diversification purposes in mind.

Sorry I can't provide a link as the Barclays Equity Gilt Study PDF (2016) I used is also a locally preserved version and I don't really have a means to upload/share that (and would break permission rules). In that the table is in Figure 7 on document page number 74/75 (PDF page 76/77).

A large part of the reasoning that led me to prefer a SWR style withdrawal approach and choice of preferred asset diversification with a regular inflation uplifted income provision utmost in mind.

Thanks. I had a copy dated 2012, but it does not have a graph like that. Chapter 5, UK asset returns since 1899, has a figure 7, but it is "Figure 7: Maximum and minimum real returns over various periods" and shows the maxima and minima for 1. 5, 10, 20 and 23 years for cash, gilts and equities. The 20 year chart shows a slightly negative minimum for equities, and negative minima for cash and gilts. By 23 years the minimum for equities is positive, cash slightly negative and gilts well negative.

They summarise in Figure 8:

Figure 8: Equity performance 
. Number of consecutive Years
. 2 3 4 5 10 18
Outperform cash 74.00 76.00 78.00 80.00 93.00 94.00
Underperform cash 37.00 34.00 31.00 28.00 10.00 1.00
Total number of years 111.00 110.00 109.00 108.00 103.00 95.00
Probability of Equity Outperformance 0.67 0.69 0.72 0.74 0.90 0.99
Outperform Gilts 76.00 82.00 82.00 80.00 81.00 84.00
Underperform Gilts 35.00 28.00 27.00 28.00 22.00 11.00
Total number of years 111.00 110.00 109.00 108.00 103.00 95.00
Probability of Equity Outperformance 0.68 0.75 0.75 0.74 0.79 0.88
Source: Barclays Capital

TJH

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#445680

Postby 1nvest » September 27th, 2021, 5:53 pm

tjh290633 wrote:Thanks. I had a copy dated 2012, but it does not have a graph like that.

The chart is my own Terry, it's not one plucked from their report, formed from (some of the) data in from their data table i.e. (IIRC) the greatest sequential 20 year real value declines in inflation adjusted price index along with the corresponding inflation adjusted income index (using their values for inflation). Not actually sure its the greatest/worst case, may be one of the worst rather than the worst.

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#445999

Postby 88V8 » September 28th, 2021, 4:37 pm

simoan wrote:
88V8 wrote:By not needing to.
Our divi/coupon interest more than suffices for our needs & wants and funds two full annual ISA subs.
So I don't, in practice. do TR. Other than using the annual limit.

This is interesting and is at the root of my issue with the income only approach i.e. it only works for someone if they start out with a very large pot of money in the first place. It is a really bad way to grow wealth through equity investment for those with smaller pots and less wealth. If you can put £40k into ISA's and maybe generate another £30-40K for living expenses just through dividends received then you are looking at a pot of £2m or so.

That's fine and works for very wealthy individuals, but to propose an equity income only strategy to those with much smaller investment pots who may be just starting out on their investment journey is just plain wrong.

Yes to the large pot, plus State and occupational pensions. The pot generates a more than adequate income even without the pensions, natural yield >5%.

I always saw HYP as a retirement strategy, so never measured it against growth options but I can well believe that it's not growth-optimal.
So if I were pot building, it would not be an HYP pot. That would be something into which I transitioned at least a year ahead of retirement so as to acclimatise to the management process and the lumpiness of the income.

What I would never adopt in retirement is a strategy that requires me periodically to liquidate assets to generate cash.

V8

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446003

Postby dealtn » September 28th, 2021, 4:41 pm

88V8 wrote:
What I would never adopt in retirement is a strategy that requires me periodically to liquidate assets to generate cash.

V8


So you are content to leave the entirety of "the pot" to those you leave behind when you retirement, er, finishes?

(Genuine question in case you think I am being "smart")

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446020

Postby Arborbridge » September 28th, 2021, 5:19 pm

dealtn wrote:
88V8 wrote:
What I would never adopt in retirement is a strategy that requires me periodically to liquidate assets to generate cash.

V8


So you are content to leave the entirety of "the pot" to those you leave behind when you retirement, er, finishes?

(Genuine question in case you think I am being "smart")


In my case, yes. Why wouldn't I?

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446022

Postby Arborbridge » September 28th, 2021, 5:24 pm

The answer is maybe but probably not. In any case, it depends where you are in life and what your aim is, so as ever it seems like just a journo making copy. Fashions come and go, and journos make a living out of telling us all about them - usually when it is far too late.

And by "untouched" do they lterally mean that? - or is there some wiggle room for sensible evolution of a portfolio? I doubt leaving investments utterly and completely alone has ever been on the table for most investors except a few Dorises. My sister in law being one . I doubt she's ever checked her portfolio except when they write to her - then she has a blank expression.

Arb

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446025

Postby dealtn » September 28th, 2021, 5:26 pm

Arborbridge wrote:
dealtn wrote:
88V8 wrote:
What I would never adopt in retirement is a strategy that requires me periodically to liquidate assets to generate cash.

V8


So you are content to leave the entirety of "the pot" to those you leave behind when you retirement, er, finishes?

(Genuine question in case you think I am being "smart")


In my case, yes. Why wouldn't I?


Well It's a personal decision, so I don't think there is a right or wrong here. I don't intend leaving my maximum wealth to my dependents. I intend to enjoy much of it, but leave something.

The point being, regardless of strategy, I can't do that by only taking "natural yield". At some point(s) I will be selling investments. I don't think periodically liquidating, as described above, is an unusual thing in practice. Maybe I'm the odd one, but a dogmatic intention not to sell seems more odd to me. It will be interesting to discover what others think.

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446046

Postby Arborbridge » September 28th, 2021, 6:11 pm

dealtn wrote:
Arborbridge wrote:
dealtn wrote:
So you are content to leave the entirety of "the pot" to those you leave behind when you retirement, er, finishes?

(Genuine question in case you think I am being "smart")


In my case, yes. Why wouldn't I?


Well It's a personal decision, so I don't think there is a right or wrong here. I don't intend leaving my maximum wealth to my dependents. I intend to enjoy much of it, but leave something.

The point being, regardless of strategy, I can't do that by only taking "natural yield". At some point(s) I will be selling investments. I don't think periodically liquidating, as described above, is an unusual thing in practice. Maybe I'm the odd one, but a dogmatic intention not to sell seems more odd to me. It will be interesting to discover what others think.


I wouldn't say in my case it's a dogmatic intention. Well, depends what you mean by dogmantic! Let's just say I intend to enjoy life, do all I want to do, but my long term aim would be to leave my wealth to my wife and children, as my father did for me. Then it's up to them what happens.
The fear and big fly in the ointment is, of course, the cost of old age and dying. It isn't my aim to crock up and see all my carefully accrued investments going to some greedy care outfit.
Big problems there. I need the capital to generate income, so I can hardly give it away to them now, but on the other hand I don't need the capital except for its income generating power.

Arb.

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446047

Postby 88V8 » September 28th, 2021, 6:14 pm

dealtn wrote:
88V8 wrote:What I would never adopt in retirement is a strategy that requires me periodically to liquidate assets to generate cash.

So you are content to leave the entirety of "the pot" to those you leave behind when you retirement, er, finishes?
(Genuine question in case you think I am being "smart")

Haha, no you're right. I complain to the wife that we're piling up wodges of dosh and not doing anything with it.
I could buy another classic car... I have my eye on one at £38k... but that's a one-off.
I look at £5k holidays, it seems like a lot of faff.
What I'd really like is to move house, that's unlikely as our present gaff has a lot going for it.
On the whole we are indeed pretty content to go on as we are.

We should give more away but the wife worries that one day we'll need to go into care and run out of money..
So yes, I expect our executors will have a surprise.

HYP... was supposed to be fire-and-forget. A 'TR' strategy where one periodically has to sell stuff, that's more like having to make one's own gunpowder. HYP can be a hobby as well as an income strategy, I suppose TR is another hobby. We all need hobbies.

V8

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446084

Postby Eboli » September 28th, 2021, 7:34 pm

Arb said:

Let's just say I intend to enjoy life, do all I want to do, but my long term aim would be to leave my wealth to my wife and children, as my father did for me. Then it's up to them what happens.


And hurrah to that! But a more succinct explanation for setting the rate of inheritance tax at 80% rather than 40% I have not read! It seems that at whatever rate of IHT the desire to consume only the fruits from the tree is paramount. So there is no behavioural excess burden to this tax despite Adam Smith and his followers trying to convince us otherwise.

Eb

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446086

Postby scrumpyjack » September 28th, 2021, 7:41 pm

Eboli wrote:Arb said:

Let's just say I intend to enjoy life, do all I want to do, but my long term aim would be to leave my wealth to my wife and children, as my father did for me. Then it's up to them what happens.


And hurrah to that! But a more succinct explanation for setting the rate of inheritance tax at 80% rather than 40% I have not read! It seems that at whatever rate of IHT the desire to consume only the fruits from the tree is paramount. So there is no behavioural excess burden to this tax despite Adam Smith and his followers trying to convince us otherwise.

Eb


That is a complete non sequitur. The 80% IHT, which we used to have, is akin to cutting down the tree when it is obviously better to continue to nurture it. Family businesses and farms would be destroyed. This is of course the reason why most countries do not have confiscatory rates of IHT/Estate tax and indeed exempt business assets (which is rather unfair on those whose assets are not 'business' assets).

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446091

Postby kempiejon » September 28th, 2021, 8:16 pm

TR is just a way of measuring portfolio performance that includes capital appreciation, dividends and other distributions. If your pot isn't big enough such the dividends are not enough to live on but growth is sufficient you will have to sell some profits or cut back on expenditure or work for longer to make a bigger pot.

You know all this leaving the capital intact does talk me into more IHT too but to keep the capital intact forever and use the various portfolios' natural yield to fund the country.

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446092

Postby Alaric » September 28th, 2021, 8:20 pm

In the days of share certificates, finding out what you were worth took a bit of bother. You had to list out what you owned, look up the prices, multiply and sum. These days, the online Brokers will tell you this minute by minute the markets are open. Equally being able to sell at the push of a mouse click beats phoning up and posting share certificates. So measuring total wealth and converting it to cash when required is far easier than it used to be.

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446175

Postby dealtn » September 29th, 2021, 8:43 am

88V8 wrote:
HYP... was supposed to be fire-and-forget. A 'TR' strategy where one periodically has to sell stuff, that's more like having to make one's own gunpowder. HYP can be a hobby as well as an income strategy, I suppose TR is another hobby. We all need hobbies.

V8


Well if HYP (or another High Yield Strategy) is "fire-and-forget" and also a hobby it sounds like the practitioner has misinterpreted the "forget" bit.

Regardless a "TR" strategy, as you describe it, might involve a single phone call, or a few mouse clicks once a year (even every 5 years), to reallocate capital into cash. I've no idea but I'd be surprised if making gunpowder is as simple and quick as that.

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446232

Postby Jam2Day » September 29th, 2021, 11:21 am

My greatest concern is the relevance of risk capital markets in the context of growing central intervention through money printing and totalitarian policies. Put simply, if concerted central government policy around the world continues to take the role of arbiter of all things with the aid of the big stick policy of creating debt out of thin air, this must surely cast a growing shadow over the function and relevance of free market consensus. Capital markets are especially vulnerable. For me, free markets, have been largely decimated over time by design. So, who or what will be the 'canary in the coal mine' when it comes to reliable value? It seems to me one either takes the possibly blinkered view that 'The Fed Et Al' have your back and you are therefore happy to continue 'squirreling away' the fruits of your endeavours for the rainy days (HYPsters) in time honoured fashion, or you tread carefully to avoid the potential minefields while making sure you stay as liquid as necessary or possible. As always, you pays your money and takes your choice and conventional thinking would suggest navigating a path somewhere down the middle ground is the prudent course. However, the burning question these days is where is the middle ground when eye watering amounts of so called investment capital is ploughed into the derivative machine. Assuming central governments are inclined to act in good faith, a more than generous assumption in my view, the key must surely boil down to demographics. But ask yourself, would you trust the shambolic flounderings of largely politically motivated factions to genuinely 'watch your back' while 'death and taxes' continue to loiter unerringly in the background? Answers on a postcard.

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446240

Postby 1nvest » September 29th, 2021, 11:39 am

88V8 wrote:What I would never adopt in retirement is a strategy that requires me periodically to liquidate assets to generate cash.

Actual historical data, not monte-carlo simulation data, indicates of the order of both price and income indexes adjusted for inflation progressively declining to being 80%+ down. For those in retirement/drawdown such a decline might mean too little dividend income capital to fill spending requirements and enforced sales of assets to generate cash - at relatively low price levels. And those measures ignore taxation/costs (and also assume the investor achieved the historic 'market average' i.e. Index outcome, which often is a backward measure that tended to have average investors actually lag that 'more optimal' index that evolved over time).

The 1980's high to recent low interest rate/inflation era has been great for stocks and bonds, the above is more inclined to arise out of moves in the opposite direction i.e. from such times as of recent very low interest rates.

Some periods, such as from 1960, were relatively bad for all-stock investors who were also drawing a income (no matter how drawn i.e. spending dividends or selling some shares out of stock accumulation/total return). 50/50 stock and precious metals were much better. But over other periods stocks/precious metals hit their bad times also, such as from 1987. 50/50 of both, so 75/25 stock/PM was more average, got through both of those start date periods OK

Image

BUT as PM generates no dividends/pays no interest, you have to resort to DIY dividends i.e. selling some assets out of total returns to 'pay' your own dividend at the times and to the amounts desired.

Fundamentally its just a psychological issue. Take a HYP and set all stock dividends to be auto-reinvested and create your own DIY dividends that compare to the amount of dividends the price only HYP generates ... and generally the total returns and income are the exact same.

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Re: The days of leaving your investments untouched and living off dividends are over

#446353

Postby Arborbridge » September 29th, 2021, 5:13 pm

Eboli wrote:Arb said:

Let's just say I intend to enjoy life, do all I want to do, but my long term aim would be to leave my wealth to my wife and children, as my father did for me. Then it's up to them what happens.


And hurrah to that! But a more succinct explanation for setting the rate of inheritance tax at 80% rather than 40% I have not read! It seems that at whatever rate of IHT the desire to consume only the fruits from the tree is paramount. So there is no behavioural excess burden to this tax despite Adam Smith and his followers trying to convince us otherwise.

Eb


But a more succinct explanation for setting the rate of inheritance tax at 80% rather than 40% I have not read!

I find that an extraordnarily perverse and unnatural statement. Every person has the right to accumulate and pass on his wealth - it is a sacred duty to improve the lot of one's family. All you are saying is that you want to dip your hand into someone's pocket because you can - this is legalised robbery. Otherwise known as the politics of envy.

Arb.


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