As I write this, the major US indexes are down about 3-3.5%, while the TSX is down about 2%. The usual things in market downturns are happening today – US dollar is rising, Canadian dollar is down relative to the US dollar (nearly two pennies), and there is a rush into US treasuries. Apparently this might be due to another EU country that is on the verge of requiring a bailout, but this was to be expected.
Due to the fixed-income nature of my portfolio, it is relatively stable today – assisted somewhat by the exchange rate fluctuation, but even when you back it out the damage is less than half a percentage point. Although my cash balance is roughly 8%, some of the securities in the portfolio have very little volatility and thus the risk-reward is ratio is minimized. I receive a decent return while waiting and this is by design.
Patience, and stalking targets for purchase is all you can do when the marketplace starts to become volatile. For those that have taken out cheap money on margin and invested it into the marketplace, you can be sure that they are starting to feel a lot of pressure to liquidate and reduce their leverage ratios. Ideally, you want these people to liquidate at exactly the wrong time, and at the same time, and you want to be there to place a bid for those shares or securities that are trading well below your estimated fair value, and you have sufficient buying power (or a whole bunch of cash) to take advantage of the situation.
I am continuing to look at low volatility equities and am really not interested in increasing the risk in my portfolio at present. The reward just isn’t there and there still isn’t enough panic factored into the marketplace.
Also, 2010 has so far been the lowest volatility year to date. Right now the portfolio is less than 1% down from the end of March 2010 (where I stated that I don’t expect much more in the way of performance for the rest of the year).