dealtn wrote:My recollection was that 20 years ago Stephen Bland "selected" a portfolio of 15 shares. There was no "rules" of the system then about ranking by yield, one per sector etc. ...
No need to rely on recollection - here are links to archived copies of the articles in November 2000, which are an
introduction to the strategy and the
selection of HYP1 (though the portfolio was only given that name later).
There
were 'rules' telling you how to select the shares, and there were
also suggestions about how one might go about it. For example, the first of those links says:
"
Stick to FTSE 100 companies and spread the holdings around sectors. I would do it by ranking the shares in the index by descending yield, then work down the list choosing one from each sector, but doing a bit of research on each potential candidate. You don't want excessive debt, for example. Another useful clue is to pick only those companies that have increased dividends regularly over the last few years."
The first sentence of that quote is 'rules', telling the reader what to do. The rest of it is (as it says) how pyad would go about following those 'rules', implicitly suggesting that readers do the same, rather than being 'rules' themselves. And both 'ranking by yield' and 'one per sector' are there - but in the suggestions, not the 'rules'. So basically, I think you're right when you say "
There was no 'rules' of the system then about ranking by yield, one per sector etc.", but it's worth clarifying that only means that those elements weren't 'rules' then, not that they weren't around at all then.
And it's also worth pointing out that the second of those links says:
"
To obtain a little more choice, I went marginally outside the FTSE 100 index and set £1.5b as my minimum capitalisation filter."
so that there was a bit of flex in the "
Stick to FTSE 100 companies" 'rule', and it also says:
"
There is a definite bias towards financials, with two banks and two insurance companies. However Royal & SunAlliance (LSE: RSA) is a composite with a leaning towards general insurance, whereas Britannic (LSE: BRT), I believe, is involved wholly or mainly in life products. On the banks, Lloyds TSB (LSE: LLOY) is a clearer with substantial international involvement, but Alliance & Leicester (LSE: AL.) is a UK-based mortgage bank.
There is also a something of a bias towards holes in the ground, with two of the world's leading mining companies and an oil major. I like these companies and in fact would include some or all of them in long-term-hold growth portfolios at the moment as well as this income package. The same goes for some of the banks and insurers too."
so even pyad himself didn't entirely follow his "
choosing one from each sector" suggestion - he made some sort of case that Britannic and Royal & Sun Alliance were in somewhat different sectors, and similarly for Alliance & Leicester and Lloyds, but it's very hard to make such a case for Anglo American and Rio Tinto and he didn't even try to do so.
Gengulphus
I almost mentioned that some of us don't just boaat about the good news: I have always aspired to being transparent and showing what my HYP is doing whether good or bad. As the results have fallen behind over the years, the observant will have noticed that the proportion of my wealth invested in ITs has increased compared with HYP. I'm not rushing to make changes, and that is because throughout my investing life, I've been aware of what I call the "supermarket queue" syndrome. Change queues from a slow one to a faster, and the faster queue then slows down.
One surprise to me is that the OEICS have stood up well, which considering they do not have reserves, can only point to their managers being better stock pickers than I am. 
