Mostly Not Uncle Frank [0:01]

A foolish consistency, is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.

Mostly Uncle Frank [0:10]

If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [0:17]

A different drummer and now, coming to you from dead center on your dial, welcome to Risk Parity Radio, where we explore alternatives and asset allocations for the do-it-yourself investor, Broadcasting to you now from the comfort of his easy chair. Here is your host, Frank Vasquez.

Mostly Uncle Frank [0:37]

Thank you, Mary, and welcome to Risk Parity Radio. If you have just stumbled in here, you will find that this podcast is kind of like a dive bar of personal finance and do-it-yourself investing.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [0:52]

Expect the unexpected.

Mostly Uncle Frank [0:55]

It's a relatively small place. It's just me and Mary in here and we only have a few mismatched bar stools and some easy chairs. We have no sponsors, we have no guests and we have no expansion plans.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [1:11]

I don't think I'd like another job.

Mostly Uncle Frank [1:13]

What we do have is a little free library of updated and unconflicted information for do-it-yourself investors.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [1:23]

Now who's up for a trip to the library?

Mostly Uncle Frank [1:26]

tomorrow. So please enjoy our mostly cold beer served in cans and our coffee served in old, chipped and cracked mugs, along with what our little free library has to offer.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [1:44]

Welcome to offer.

Mostly Uncle Frank [1:51]

But now onward, episode 366.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [1:55]

Today on Risk Parity Radio it's time for the grand unveiling of money which means that we'll be doing our weekly portfolio reviews.

Mostly Uncle Frank [2:04]

Of the eight sample portfolios you can find at wwwriskparryradiocom on the portfolios page. But before we get to that, most of you may realize that we haven't made a podcast in a little while. That's because we've been on vacation.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [2:20]

Now I owe it to myself to tell you, mr Griswold, that if you're thinking of taking the tribe cross-country, this is the automobile you should be using the Wagon Queen Family Truckster. You think you hate it now, but wait till you drive it.

Mostly Uncle Frank [2:34]

We went out to Washington State, saw some friends, saw some family, went to some national parks.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [2:41]

I'm cold and there are wolves after me. Harks. I'm cold and there are wolves after me.

Mostly Uncle Frank [2:49]

One of my grandnephews was so happy to see me he actually wet himself, which prompted me to regale him with this clip from Talladega Nights.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [2:58]

Well, the teacher asked me what was the capital of North Carolina. I said Washington DC.

Mostly Uncle Frank [3:04]

Bingo Nice.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [3:05]

She said no, you're wrong. I said you've got a lumpy butt. She got mad at me and yelled at me and I pissed in my pants and I never did change my pee pants. All day I'm still sitting in my dirty pee pants.

Mostly Uncle Frank [3:19]

But personal relationships are the highlight of any adventure, are they not? Don't be saucy with me, bernays. Anyway, while I was gone you may have heard me appear on the choose fi podcast and if you didn't, I'll link to that in the show notes. I think it's my third time on that august podcast with my friend brad barrett the nicest guy of.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [3:44]

I want you to be nice.

Mostly Uncle Frank [3:47]

But anyway, if you are here for the first time because of that podcast, I think you need to know a couple things about the way we do things around here, which is highly idiosyncratic. This podcast is not intended to be a commercial podcast. Forget about it. It's a retirement hobby for me.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [4:07]

I don't think I'd like another job.

Mostly Uncle Frank [4:10]

And so it does not comply, and is not intended to comply with, any kind of norms of great podcasting or best practices in that regard. Do you think anybody wants a roundhouse kick to the face while I'm wearing these bad boys? Forget about it. It's more like just hanging out with me and mary and talking about these esoteric topics having to do with portfolio construction and personal finance and investing, and you're going to get a lot more of my raw personality than you would on a podcast intended to build a business off of which this is not Forget about it Including my sense of humor, which some people like and some people don't.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [4:57]

You can't handle the trapdoor.

Mostly Uncle Frank [5:03]

It was originally intended to just lay down some financial wisdoms for our adult children.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [5:11]

Time is money boy. No-transcript. I love karate, I love karate, I love money. I hate all of you.

Mostly Uncle Frank [5:32]

And a lot of friends and family happen to like that too, and that's why they listen to this.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [5:36]

You are talking about the nonsensical ravings of a lunatic mind.

Mostly Uncle Frank [5:42]

But my approach to this has had a very positive secondary, unintended consequence, which is to gather a rather sophisticated audience in terms of personal finance, and so, other than friends and family, the kinds of people who tend to listen to this are people that already have a good background in personal finance, have a good background in personal finance, they already are successful do-it-yourself investors, and they're not looking for me or anyone else to actually tell them what to do. What they're looking for is the answer to a question like well, what else is there in terms of personal finance other than the things that we've all read and known about for 10 or 20 years? And so the podcast has evolved into essentially an extended conversation between me and this audience of sophisticated people, who ask a lot of interesting emails and bring us a lot of interesting material to talk about.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [6:39]

You can't handle the binaise.

Mostly Uncle Frank [6:42]

Which means, other than monitoring the sample portfolios, I do not have to provide actually a lot of content, as it is the audience that provides the content here I just stare at my desk, but it looks like I'm working, I'd say, in a given week I probably only do about 15 minutes of real, actual work

Mostly Uncle Frank [7:06]

but if you're new here, it will seem like you are entering some conversation that's been going on for quite some time and sometimes that's kind of daunting. I would suggest that you go back and listen to episodes 1, 3, 5, 7, and 9 to get a basic background of what we are talking about here, because everything does build off of that, and so if you like what you find here, that's great. Please stay, please ask questions, but if you don't feel free to leave, release the hounds Because, as I said, I'm not trying to build a large audience here and I would prefer to keep a small, very interested audience. We have between 1,000 and 1,500 regular listeners to this podcast, and that is more than enough to call this podcast a success, especially considering the quality of the listener that we have and the quality of the emails that I get. They are not things that you can typically just go and search online or look up on Investopedia, but I think that's enough navel-gazing for one episode, and so, without further ado, here I go once again with the email.

Mostly Uncle Frank [8:18]

And First off. First off, we have an email from Mark. First off, we have an email from Mark. All hail, the commander of his majesty's Roman legions, the brave and noble.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [8:31]

Marcus Vindictus.

Mostly Uncle Frank [8:34]

And Mark writes.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [8:35]

I remain a patron contributor to the Father McKenna Center. This is more of a comment than a question. I have been casually tracking the daily movements of DBMF and KMLM for a while now and have been surprised by how many days and weeks they go in different directions, with one of them up and the other one down. That doesn't mean their long-term movements aren't still highly correlated, of course. So I put them into Portfolio Visualizer and they only have a correlation of 0.73 to one another for the three years that Portfolio Visualizer has KMLM data for.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [9:10]

I know three years isn't much time for a back test, but putting a replacement ticker with a longer timeline here negates the point of this exercise, because what I am probing is the correlation of these two specific investments here and, based on the data we have available, I think an argument can be made that there may be enough correlation diversification between DBMF and KMLM to justify splitting a managed futures allocation between the two instead of just picking one of them, similar to the way we split our stock allocation between large cap growth and small cap value. On the downside, this would reduce tax loss, harvesting opportunities for our managed futures allocation. But if I were pairing up two investments to be a tax loss harvesting pair. I would normally want the two investments to have a correlation. More like 0.99 and not 0.73 anyway. Thoughts more like .99 and not .73 anyway.

Mostly Uncle Frank [10:06]

Thoughts. Well, first off, thank you for being a Patreon contributor to the Father McKenna Center. As most of you know, we do not have any sponsors for this podcast, but we do have a charity that we support. It is called the Father McKenna Center and it serves hungry and homeless people in Washington DC, and it serves hungry and homeless people in Washington DC. By the time I release this podcast, we will have done our annual Walk for McKenna, which is one of our major fundraisers. But our minor fundraiser is this podcast, and so if you do contribute to the Father McKenna Center, you do get to go to the front of the email line, and that has become much more valuable recently, as we are about two months behind in emails. So if you sent me one recently but you're not a contributor to the Father McKenna Center, you're going to have to wait a couple of months.

Mostly Uncle Frank [10:55]

Mark did go to the front of the line because he is a contributor. There are a couple ways to do that. You can either join our Patreon If you go to the support page at wwwriskpartnercom. You can do it that way. Or you can go directly to the Father McKenna website and donate directly there, which may be more efficacious for your tax purposes. But, either way, just remind me that you are a contributor when you send in your email, so that I can duly move it to the front of the line, because I can't keep track of all the contributors now. I do try to answer all of the emails that I do get, the ones that aren't spam, at least, or the ones that aren't requesting to be a guest on this podcast, and as long as our audience remains relatively small, I will continue to do that, and I'll worry about it later if it ever becomes a real issue. We get more than four or five months behind in emails, but we're only two months behind. Anyway, let's get to your email.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [11:55]

Welcome to another edition of Thunderdome.

Mostly Uncle Frank [12:01]

This is an interesting observation that you've made. First, just orient everyone that ETFs he's talking about are both managed futures ETFs, which are excellent for diversification because they are not correlated with either stocks or bonds and are often negatively correlated with one or the other. But although these operate in the same space, they operate a little bit differently. Kmlm is the older one of these, and this one is following an algorithm that dates back to the 1990s, so it's about 30 years old in terms of the algorithm. Even though the ETF itself is only a few years old, it's still following the same system, and so it is buying or selling a bunch of commodities, currencies and interest rate related instruments based on trends, based on its own algorithm. Now, dbmf is a new idea. It is the first attempt to create an index fund, or a pseudo index fund in this area. It tracks something that is called the Sacck Gen Index, societe Generale. It's a French bank, if you're not French.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [13:15]

Now go away or I shall taunt you a second time.

Mostly Uncle Frank [13:20]

That tracks an index of all of the commercial or hedge fund type CTAs the big ones that follow these sorts of systems and DBMF recreates that through a replicating algorithm. And so what you'll see with these kinds of funds is that when you are in an environment like, say, 2022, when there are strong trends going on, particularly in interest rates and currencies, and usually commodities follow along with that, they will tend to track very closely in terms of being positively correlated. But when you are getting to markets like we have right now, which are not trending very much, you see currencies going up and down, you see interest rates kind of going up and down or remaining stable, and commodities really haven't gone anywhere recently. The only exception to that has been gold really.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [14:19]

I love gold.

Mostly Uncle Frank [14:24]

In those kind of environments you'll see these kinds of funds perform differently because they are following different algorithms and some of the algorithms are following longer trends than other ones. It's kind of the simplest way to explain this that something that is following a shorter time frame algorithm in a trend following space is going to shift more quickly than something with a longer time frame in terms of how it operates. Hopefully that's not too confusing, but since we're at one of those kind of inflection points where there aren't many trends in most of these markets, you're going to see that kind of deviation until the economy changes again and some trend comes out of it, either because we're going into some kind of recession or we're having some kind of new inflationary episode. So as to your question, is it better to split between them than just hold only one? I think the answer is it's probably six of one, half a dozen of another over a long period of time. There certainly is nothing wrong with holding both of them if you don't mind that extra added complication, even though it's not much of a complication.

Mostly Uncle Frank [15:36]

Kmlm has the advantage of having the longer track record. Dbmf has the advantage of being the closest thing to an index fund in this area that you can find. Statistically they're fairly comparable, although I think KMLM probably has a higher volatility and a higher potential risk reward, but not by much of both of them. And then just be prepared to stick with that, because it is going to be the rebalancing between them and among the other asset classes that you're really going to see the best effect on your portfolio with one of these things, and the purpose of one of these things is really to dampen the overall volatility of a portfolio, because their return profiles would suggest that their overall returns are going to be somewhere between stocks and bonds.

Mostly Uncle Frank [16:36]

So if you want to hold both of them, go right ahead. I don't think it'll make that much of a difference in an overall portfolio if you're only allocating, say, about 10 or 15 percent of this asset class anyway. So just pick something and stick with it and you'll be fine. Now I did get another email from you, but we're not going to answer that one today. I'll probably save it for next week. We can't have an all-Mark show.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [17:02]

I don't think I miss what you think I miss.

Mostly Uncle Frank [17:05]

But I did see the other email and we will get to it in the course of business here. And you won't be angry, I will not be angry. And so thank you for your observations and thank you for your emails.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [17:23]

Very good, that'll be all.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [17:24]

Quicktime Hodge.

Mostly Uncle Frank [17:36]

I love Quicktime Harch Second off.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [17:44]

Second off, an email from James. Hey Jim, baby, I see you brought up reinforcements.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [17:50]

Well, I'm waiting for you, Jimmy boy, and James writes Frank, I've made a donation to the Father McKenna Center, a worthy cause that has a high financial responsibilities rating, via their website. One I would like to estimate the safe withdrawal rate from my portfolio and I'm familiar with the tool at portfolio charts. However, until age 70, I will be withdrawing more from my portfolio to make up for delaying Social Security. Question do you know of a tool that enables modeling the impact of drawing Social Security later in retirement? Ignoring this leads to a safe withdrawal rate of 4.7%. However, until age 70, I would need to withdraw 6.9% for seven years, then reduce it to 4%. Alternatively, I could start taking Social Security three years earlier. I have added the funds needed during those gap years until age 70 to the total I need, so maybe that is close enough. However, the drawdown will be in the early years of retirement, not distributed across all my retirement years. Interestingly, this is analogous to other higher drawdowns early in retirement, like traveling when you are more able. Two a golden butterfly portfolio is estimated to support a safe withdrawal rate of 6%. Much nicer.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [19:07]

My challenge is that 60% of my portfolio is in the Thrift Savings Plan, which supports Large Cap Blend C Fund, small Cap Blend S Fund, non-government Bonds F Fund and something comparable to Long-Term Bonds G Fund. However, there are no small cap value or gold funds. Tsp does offer some mutual funds now, but with significant fees and only for 25% of TSP holdings. Questions how do you recommend that I analyze the option of rolling over my TSP into IRAs at brokerages multiple due to FDIC insurance limits, to determine if that is worthwhile? Tsp index funds have very low fees, but now low no-fee funds are available at brokerages like Fidelity for some funds. Or would you recommend that I instead investigate a different risk parity portfolio that can be better accommodated with TSP funds? Thank you for your very informative podcast. If you could point me in the right direction for my further analysis, I would appreciate it, james.

Mostly Uncle Frank [20:11]

Well, james, thank you for your donation, and that is also why your email went to the front of the line. See, there's a theme going on here.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [20:20]

This is a conspiracy. That's what this is.

Mostly Uncle Frank [20:25]

But now getting to your email, your first question is whether there is a tool that allows you to model the impact of drawing social security later in retirement. And the answer is yes, there is.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [20:38]

Yes.

Mostly Uncle Frank [20:40]

And you will find it at Portfolio Visualizer. It's in the section with the Monte Carlo simulations. It's called the Financial Goals tool and what that allows you to do is turn on or off any number of streams of income over the course of many years to do exactly what you have proposed. And it also allows you to adjust those cash flows by inflation, which Social Security adjusts by. So you can get a more accurate analysis there and you can also tell it to withdraw more money early on, if that was another issue you had here. But anyway, you put those parameters in, put your portfolio in and then you can model both the changing cash flows and the overall Monte Carlo simulation going on in there. You should use the method or data set that corresponds with asset classes there, because that will give you the most data to analyze. If you use ticker symbols, it's going to give you a very abbreviated data set and I would not recommend relying on that. So it's a very robust tool and the price is right. It's free and I would suggest that you check it out and see what you come up with by modeling various different scenarios. That is the straight stuff. Oh, funk master, it sounds like you already do have a handle on what your social security payments are likely to be. If you don't, you can get that information from the Social Security Administration. You do need to go set up an account there under your Social Security number and it will tell you what your cash flows are slated to be, given a particular retirement age or claiming age, I should say.

Mostly Uncle Frank [22:31]

Moving to your second question, question number two All right, yes, the offerings in the thrift savings plan are rather limited and would be difficult to deal with for really managing a retirement kind of portfolio and I would probably just roll all of that into an IRA. A couple of things. You mentioned that the F-Fund is non-government bonds. Actually, the F-Fund is a mixture of government and non-government bonds that is designed to track what is called the Bloomberg Aggregate Bond Index, just kind of like a fund like BND. That Vanguard offers a total bond market fund with an intermediate duration, which is okay, but it's not probably what you actually want. The G fund is not long-term bonds, it's actually short-term bonds, very short-term bonds. So you wouldn't want to confuse the G fund for a long-term bond fund like VGLT. So I would just plan on rolling that whole thing over to an IRA.

Mostly Uncle Frank [23:38]

Now you mentioned FDIC insurance limits. That does not apply here. Fdic insurance only applies to bank accounts, and I think there's a lot of confusion here amongst amateur investors. The reason that FDIC is important for bank accounts is that when you deposit money in a bank, they are just giving you an IOU. Your money becomes the bank's money, so you are dependent on the solvency of the bank to repay you. When you put money into a brokerage account and buy securities or funds, you are not giving the money to the brokerage. The brokerage is simply holding the securities or funds, which are separate legal entities from the brokerage. That is why you really don't need FDIC insurance at a brokerage, because you are not dependent on the solvency of the brokerage to pay you back. Brokerages have a different kind of insurance called SIPC insurance, which deals with the possibility of fraud, in which case people are going to jail. Hello Dad, I'm in jail, hello Dad.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [24:57]

I'm in jail. Hi Dad, I'm calling you from jail.

Mostly Uncle Frank [25:03]

And brokerages like Fidelity and Vanguard and Schwab handle trillions of dollars in customer funds, including extremely large accounts, and so FDIC insurance is not applicable and should not be a consideration in how many accounts you open. You only really need one IRA at one of those kinds of well-established brokerages and you're not going to have a problem In terms of who to deal with. Think, fidelity and schwab have the best platforms and customer service available these days. Vanguard is behind. They're trying to catch up, but I would probably go with fidelity as a first choice, particularly if you're unfamiliar with brokerages, because they do a very good customer service and they could help you make the transitions pretty easily, and then you can access your account from your computer or even your phone.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [25:56]

Groovy baby.

Mostly Uncle Frank [25:58]

You will also find very low-cost funds in ETF form, and that is the form that I would suggest that you buy them in. Etfs are cheaper, more efficient and portable cheaper, more efficient and portable. And so are the iPhone, if you will, to the BlackBerry, represented by mutual funds, which are the older technology. Both of them can hold the same kinds of assets, but ETFs are now the preferred vehicle, now that we've gone to no-fee trading and fractional shares in most of these places. Hopefully this is helpful. Please write in again if you'd like, and thank you for your email Last off. Last off, we have an email from Anderson.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [26:54]

You know, back in Baton we could have fed 600 men in the time.

Mostly Uncle Frank [26:57]

It's taken you ham and eggers just to take my order.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [27:01]

And Anderson writes Uncle Frank, my oldest child is turning 11.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [27:06]

Stop crying and fight your father.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [27:09]

We have set up 529s for all of our kids, which will only cover a portion of college, probably 25 to 50% of standard state tuition. This was intentional, as there are a lot of variables we don't know about. Will they get scholarships, ap credits, etc. This is in Vanguard funds consisting of total, stock market, international and small cap All equities. What would be your recommendations for how and when to start transitioning this portfolio as he gets closer to college age? I feel that it is similar to setting up a decumulation portfolio for retirement, except that all of it will get used.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [27:49]

Until you pin me, festivus is not over. Please someone, stop this. Let's rumble all right.

Mostly Uncle Frank [27:57]

Well, anderson also went to the front of the email line because he is also one of our patrons on patreon, and so thank you for that and your donations to the Father McKenna Center. I should mention that at our walk, risk Parody Radio did appear on our t-shirt because we used the money collected from the patrons on Patreon to make a large donation to sponsor the walk with, and so thank you all for those contributions. I forgot my full disclosure, which is I am on the board of the Father McKenna Center and am the current treasurer, so I not only raise the money, I also count the money.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [28:36]

Count the money.

Mostly Uncle Frank [28:39]

The money Money say it Money, money, money Money.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [28:42]

Money, money, money, money Money.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [28:44]

Money, money, money Money.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [28:45]

Money, money, money.

Mostly Uncle Frank [28:49]

Now getting to your question. Well, what we did was we just transitioned all of the 529 money that we had accumulated into bonds when our kids hit high school, and we did that for a couple of reasons, the first being that our 529 contributions were not going to cover their complete expenses. The only thing we used the 529s for at the time were to get the state tax deduction that we have here in Virginia. Now there are more flexible things you can do with 529s than you could a few years ago, because our savings in 529s were largely from about 2000 to 2015 and the laws have changed since then. But we also wanted to know exactly what that number was, so that we had a better idea of what we needed to cover, since we were going to disgorge those as the first payments for their first years.

Mostly Uncle Frank [29:50]

I think this is a bit different than a decumulation portfolio, simply because you know you're going to spend all of the money in a very short period of time. It is more like having some kind of bridge account that somebody might have between, say, the time they retire and the time they take Social Security, and they are filling a gap with a certain pile of money that they're putting in short-term instruments, and that's probably more the way I would look at it Now. I am aware that some people have such large 529s now that they are kind of managing them for a longer future. But if you were just planning on spending that money right away, I would get it into short-term instruments and not mess with it after that. But I would say that the truth is I have not optimized for that and we did not attempt to optimize for that at the time, because it didn't seem to be worth the effort that we could simply take more risk in other assets that we knew were going to be held long term and then just fix these and leave them alone, and that may be another approach you might take. That if you're going to put all of this stuff essentially in short-term bonds and cash, if you have other assets that are already in short-term bonds and cash that are for the longer term or could be for the longer term, you may want to reallocate those into different assets and leave this as the cash portion that you know is going to be spent in the near term.

Mostly Uncle Frank [31:22]

The reason we decided to do it when they hit high school was that we know that the stock market can easily have a five-year downturn and could have up to a 10-year downturn, and so we figured that well, it's at or near an all-time high right now. Let's just take those chips off the table. You could do something more complicated that might be more efficient in some way, particularly if you were trying to save some of this and put it into a Roth IRA, which I know you can do now with some of this 529 money. But I think the simpler approach is just to earmark it for immediate disgorgement and spending as soon as they hit college and do it that way. Hopefully that helps and thank you for your email.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [32:07]

Now we're going to do something extremely fun.

Mostly Uncle Frank [32:10]

I'd like to play a game of horseshoes with old Ned. And the extremely fun thing we get to do now is our weekly portfolio reviews of the eight sample portfolios you can find at wwwriskpartnercom on the portfolios page. And since we haven't done it in a few weeks, it's not really going to be a weekly review. And since we haven't done it in a few weeks, it's not really going to be a weekly review. It's more like a monthly review or monthly up to this point, as we will be heading into the next month and doing distributions next week, probably mostly out of gold.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [32:46]

This is gold, mr Bond, I think you've made your point, goldfinger.

Mostly Uncle Frank [32:49]

Thank you for the demonstration, but then, hopefully after today, we will get back on our weekly updates.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [32:59]

Sorry for the hiatus, but I had children to attend to.

Mostly Uncle Frank [33:08]

So just looking at these markets for September, with one trading day left the S&P 500 is up 1.61% for the month. The NASDAQ is up 2.21% for the month. Small cap value, represented by the fund VIOV is up 0.50% for the month. Gold is the big winner this month. Gold is up 6.11% for September.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [33:30]

You're insane gold member.

Mostly Uncle Frank [33:33]

And it's actually been outperforming the stock market both this year and the last three years.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [33:39]

And that's the way, uh-huh uh-huh, I like it.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [33:42]

KC on the sunshine band.

Mostly Uncle Frank [33:44]

Now, that doesn't happen all the time, but it does happen sometime. You can just never predict when it's going to happen.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [33:51]

A crystal ball can help you, it can guide you.

Mostly Uncle Frank [33:55]

Moving on, long-term treasury bonds, represented by the fund VGLT, are up 2.43% for September. Wreaths, represented by the fund REET, are up 2.19% for September. Commodities represented by the fund PDBC are up 1.19% for September. Commodities, represented by the fund PDBC are up 1.12% for September. Preferred shares, represented by the fund PFF are up 3.37% for September and managed futures, represented by the fund DBMF, are up 1.32% for September. I think this is the first September in about five years that there's been good performances in all, or almost all of the tradable markets out there. But now going to these sample portfolios. First one's the all seasons portfolio. This is a reference portfolio. It's only 30% in stocks and a total stock market fund. It has 55% in intermediate and long-term treasury bonds and the remaining 15% is divided into gold and commodities. It's up 2.1% for September. It's up 10.35% year-to-date and up 12.03% since inception in July 2020. Now moving to these bread and butter kind of portfolios, the next three. First one's Golden Butterfly. This one is 40% in stocks divided into a total stock market fund and a small cap value fund, 40% in treasury bonds divided into long and short and14% for September. It's up 12.16% year-to-date and up 35.18% since inception in July 2020. Next one's golden ratio. This one is 42% in stocks in three funds, 26% in long-term treasury bonds, 16% in gold, 10% in a REIT fund and 6% in a money market fund or cash. It is up 2.03% for September. It's up 13.56% year to date and up 32.91% since inception in July 2020. Moving to the risk parity ultimate, which is kind of our kitchen sink portfolio that has about 15 funds in it I won't go through. It's up 2.93% for the month of September. It's up 15.91% year-to-date and up 23.68% since inception in July 2020.

Mostly Uncle Frank [36:25]

Now moving to our experimental portfolios. These all involve leverage funds, so don't try this at home, even though I know some of you do. Well, you have a gambling problem. First one's the accelerated permanent portfolio. This one is 27.5% in a levered bond fund TMF, 25% in a levered stock fund UPRO, 25% in PFF, a preferred shares fund, and 22.5% in gold GLDM. It is up 4.64% for the month of September. It's up 20.20% year-to-date and up 10.16% since inception in July 2020.

Mostly Uncle Frank [37:08]

Now moving to our most levered and least diversified portfolio, the aggressive 50-50, which is essentially half stocks and half bonds. It is one-third in a levered stock fund a UPRO, one-third in a levered bond fund TMF, the remaining third divided into a preferred shares fund and an intermediate treasury bond fund. It's been up 3.77% for the month of September. It's up 17.92% year-to-date but down 3.3% since inception in July 2020. Its lack of diversification has hurt it over time, particularly not having any gold in it.

Mostly Uncle Frank [37:47]

Now, moving to one of our newer experimental portfolios, the levered golden ratio. This one is 35% in a composite fund called NTSX, that is, the S&P 500, and treasury bonds levered up 1.5 to 1. 25% in gold, gldm, 15% in a REIT fund, o, 10% each in TMF, a levered treasury bond fund, and TNA, a levered small cap fund, and the remaining 5% in KMLM, a managed futures fund. It's been up 2.96% month to date for September and is up 16.61% year to date. It's up 0.91% since inception in July 2021. And finally, our last and newest portfolio, the Optra portfolio. One portfolio to rule them all.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [38:41]

Surely you can't be serious. I am serious.

Mostly Uncle Frank [38:44]

And don't call me Shirley. This one is 16% in a leveraged stock fund UPRO, 24% in a composite value-tilted fund, a worldwide value tilted fund called AVGV, from Avantas, 24% in a treasury strips fund, GOVZ, and the remaining 36% divided into gold and a managed futures fund, GLDM and DBMF. It's been up 2.87% month-to-date for the month of September and it's up 7.1% both year-to-date and since inception in July 2024. And that concludes our portfolio reviews for this week and for this month so far. Portfolio reviews for this week and for this month so far. If anything, this month teaches us that we should not be relying on crystal balls or trying to predict anything, because ordinarily September is one of the worst months of the year, but this is probably the best month these portfolios have had this year.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [39:47]

Now you can also use the ball to connect to the spirit world this year.

Mostly Uncle Frank [39:53]

Now you can also use the bull to connect to the spirit world, and ordinarily gold does not outperform every other asset, but it has been. This year it's up almost 30 percent and again, that is not something that I've heard anybody predicting. In fact, it was predicted that gold would suffer under the higher interest rate regime that we've been under for most of the year. Under the higher interest rate regime that we've been under for most of the year. Wrong. So score one for naive diversification across many asset classes and not trying to time any of the markets.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [40:22]

Yeah, baby, yeah.

Mostly Uncle Frank [40:24]

But now I see our signal is beginning to fade. We will have more regular podcasts coming up this next month. I don't plan to be going anywhere, at least for most of the month, and if you have comments or questions for me, please send them to frankatriskparodyradiocom. That email is frankatriskparodyradiocom. Or you can go to the website, wwwriskparodyradiocom. Put your message into into the contact form and I'll get it that way. If you haven't had a chance to do it, please go to your favorite podcast provider and like subscribe. Give me some stars a follower view, that would be great. Okay, thank you once again for tuning in. This is Frank Vasquez with Risk Parity Radio signing off.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [41:13]

My friends and I skipped school and we came this close to robbing a bank. I flushed Grandpa's wallet down the toilet. Chip, I'm gonna come at you like a spider monkey. Greatest generation, my ass. Tom Brokaw is a punk. Chip, I'm gonna jacked up on Mountain Dew. Answer the lady. Did I stutter? The law doesn't apply to us. Dad, make him stop looking at me. Anarchy, anarchy, anarchy. I don't even know what that means, but I love it. You're gonna break us like wild horses, ain't ya? Oh, I get it. Moral ambiguity, the hallmark of all early 20th century American fiction. Great analysis, walker, thank you.

Mostly Not Uncle Frank [42:02]

The Risk Parody Radio Show is hosted by Frank Vasquez. The content provided is for entertainment and informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment tax or legal advice. Please consult with your own advisors before taking any actions based on any information you have heard here, making sure to take into account your own personal circumstances.