Welcome to the Party, man
While most around here don't recommend buy and hold strats, it is a bit dangerous to your retirement to swing. I call it swinging when you flex 100% here for this reason and 100% there for that reason... Some do it, some do it well - others, not so much.
Let me provide an example outside of TSPTalk. I started a phone message group for TSP investing. I kept getting asked when I IFT'd, why I IFT'd, and what my allocation is. I'd just point them here, but they kept asking - so I just blurb out investment comments on a group chat. Well, one of the guys just lets his wife hunch-move their TSP allocation. I was down something like 4% on April 3rd and smelled fresh meat on the savannah. The Lion Must Feed. This dude responded that his wife was frightened of all the tariff stuff, couldn't read what the Trumpster was doing, and thus camped the Lilly Pad (G) for a +0.94% gain while we all were losing our shirts. I responded that being All In on the Lilly Pad on a hunch bet was a great way to ensure an 'Alpo Meal Deal Retirement'. The banter rolled. He stuck in G and is still in G - there is, of course, still tariff talk, still wars in the Middle East, still riots somewhere, and whatever else is going on. Lilly Pad for life.
Anyway, I'm now up 8% and his TSP is up around 2.5%.
Was that 'market timing'. A bit, yes. But, it wasn't swinging. I was 35% in G/F and 65% in C/S/I on April 2. At COB April 3 I was 25% G/F and 75% C/S/I. I played the edges, stayed in the market enough to catch the recovery gain, and never ran too much risk. I am getting to be an oldster now.
You don't have to be swinging to make bank. But, if that is your style make it happen. It is just that watching the news about tariffs or underwear styles or what Buffett did three months ago ain't the way to do it...
Personally, I would find three allocations that work in downish/normalish/goodish markets and keep with those. Maybe tinker with the allocations a little bit based on what is going on. Leave the 100% G holding allocation to big crashes like 2008 - which you could see/feel in late 2007. Leave the 100% C/S/I allocation to March/April 2009 - you could see/feel that boom coming on. Otherwise, hold a bit of everything most of the time...
GLHF
