PessOptimist's Account Talk

[DreamboatAnnie]

PO, Hope your having a great Birthday!!! :smile:

 

[PessOptimist]

I finally got a foot or two feet in the market on 5/29/20 after sitting in G since 2/19. 20% S fund. Timing seems to be good so far. Last 10 days got me back all monies taken out for my monthly installment payments on partial withdrawal so far this year. TSP terms not mine. I am withdrawing a certain dollar amount each month. I can change that down to $200 per month but am not sure I can ever stop it under the new rules.

This rise in stocks does not seem normal to me, but what does lately? Thought about going back to G on Friday. Thought about it this morning. Futures are down tonight. Maybe shoulda sold. Tomorrow will tell.

It’s not the end of the world if S fund dives. There’s enough in G to last over 10 years at current installment rate. I sure would like to appear I know what I am doing. Big question is getting greedy or get out?

Thanks for all the birthday wishes. I have dabbled with F fund over the years bmneveu but keeping money in G and F at the same time has seemed not wise as if F goes up, bond rates go down. “normally”. Of course G fund is not so great these days. I have had very bad luck with the F fund over the years. Possibly would have been different if I had bought and held it.

PO

 

[nasa1974]

Please NO "S" Fund dive. I just got back on the plus side.

 

[PessOptimist]

Well, shoot. The old question. Stick it out or capitulate? Still positive for June but back negative for the year. Not on autotracker but based on my own withdrawals. Payback for transferring to stock funds after all this time?

PO

 

[Rod]

Well, shoot. The old question. Stick it out or capitulate? Still positive for June but back negative for the year. Not on autotracker but based on my own withdrawals. Payback for transferring to stock funds after all this time?

PO

If you stick it out, you could be riding it back down for 5% - 10% (since 9 Jun). But the question is how far down are you willing to ride it out? Of course, what goes down must come up. So technically, you have nothing to lose by sticking it out, right? Furthermore, Daddy Fed will be there to hold your hand during the entirety of the ride.

 

[PessOptimist]

If you stick it out, you could be riding it back down for 5% - 10% (since 9 Jun). But the question is how far down are you willing to ride it out? Of course, what goes down must come up. So technically, you have nothing to lose by sticking it out, right?

Furthermore, Daddy Fed will be there to hold your hand during the entirety of the ride.

Thanks Rod, I think I did take the ride. It was supposed to be a quick in and out experiment and I shoulda got out last Friday or Monday. Got greedy. It went down much quicker than I imagined. No real harm done and now I sit and see what happens. Karma for stating thoughts about recouping withdrawals?

Rod, hard to believe it’s been almost 11 years since you retired. Time flies. Good luck with moving the account.

I sit 20S and 80G for now.

PO

 

[PessOptimist]

Happy July everyone.

Good luck to Tom with the autotracker. For anyone freaking out about not getting the updates it is real close to yesterday but up a fraction. Todays prices are posted at TSP.GOV. less than 1% for all stock funds.

I am supposed to be following a couple of strategeries for stocks but as usual have not. One has to do with 13 day EMA and 20 day SMA. The other has to do with 10 day EMA and SMA. One I violated, one I didn’t. It is only 20% or so of the TSP balance so no great danger so far. For example I made $101 in the S fund today. Better than losing.

I saw a post earlier about getting out or in on Friday. Just a reminder, Friday is a holiday and STP is closed.

PO

 

[PessOptimist]

Up down. Like a merry go round round…

The idea of having a whopping 20% in equities is to only offset the withdrawals a household member insists are needed. So I watch it daily. I wish I had followed some sense posted here and got out two days ago. Whatever, 20% in S is not going to make us starve to death, just bring the disapproval of the household member if she notices.

Now I feel like a buy and holder since I can’t predict when to stay 20%S or go 100%G.

Just discussing. Best of luck to everyone.

PO

 

[PessOptimist]

After two months the daring venture of putting 20% in S fund has mixed but overall good results.

Good result is that my graph I created years ago is going up slightly again after going down slightly every month since I started withdrawals in July 19. Mixed news is I started updating the TSP spreadsheet every day. I get to track daily, monthly and yearly profit or loss. Up and down lately. Overall creeping up so far.

I once read on this MB that if you don’t know why you are moving funds, don’t. I had allowed this to immobilize me because I really don’t know. Plus isn’t it prudent to put everything in G when you retire? That was OK when G was paying 2.5+% but not so much now.

I was motivated to put 20% in S fund on 5/31 by a plan I could understand. Not perfect as the STO and MACD are so close now and RSI is over 50. Then came the SMA envelope which I had never heard of. Not sure how to use it. Still above it.

Why 20%. Has to do with actual money amount. I promised to leave a certain amount in G no matter what. Unless it goes negative, we don’t know what TSP will do then. Probably leave the principle alone unless they run short on booze in the board room.

Why S fund? S or C, never liked I. S ups and downs give me more excitement in my life.

For now I appear to be a buy and holder at 20% S fund. But I think I know why. I would love to buy low, sell high. I just need to figure out how to do it.

PO

 

[PessOptimist]

Another comment on deciding to make a move in the TSP. If it is up at 1200EDT I don’t want to miss gains. If it is down at 1200EDT I don’t want to sell at a loss. By 1600EDT it will be wherever it is. No way of knowing these days.

Since I am on MST my cutoff for a move is 0900 and market close is at 1300. My solution to indecision is to not turn on the computer until after 0900 and sometimes not till 1300. No reason to get out of bed then since other stuff can wait.

PO

 

[flalaw97]

Another comment on deciding to make a move in the TSP. If it is up at 1200EDT I don’t want to miss gains. If it is down at 1200EDT I don’t want to sell at a loss. By 1600EDT it will be wherever it is. No way of knowing these days.PO

I was wondering if there were any general rules of thumb, like if 80% of the time it is up by 1% at 1130 (EDT) if it is usually still up at closing? I doubt there are statistics on it readily available (only TSP traders would care?) but if at least we could make an "educated" guess, that might make me feel better. Maybe I will try to keep stats for a month or two... Or I could just let be will be.

 

[nnuut]

It's a Grand Complication and can change on a dime. I can't explain it after all these years trying. That's why I don't give my opinion of what to do.

 

[nasa1974]

Another comment on deciding to make a move in the TSP. If it is up at 1200EDT I don’t want to miss gains. If it is down at 1200EDT I don’t want to sell at a loss. By 1600EDT it will be wherever it is. No way of knowing these days.

Since I am on MST my cutoff for a move is 0900 and market close is at 1300. My solution to indecision is to not turn on the computer until after 0900 and sometimes not till 1300. No reason to get out of bed then since other stuff can wait.

PO

PO,
I never understood the 12 noon cut off for an IST since it is such a disadvantage for those west of the Eastern Time Zone. My guess is that the majority of TSP accounts are in the Eastern Time Zone, but that doesn't make it right. Sure glad I'm not stationed in Hawaii because I would have to decide before 6am local time if I want to make an IFT or not.

 

[rangerray]

PO,
I never understood the 12 noon cut off for an IST since it is such a disadvantage for those west of the Eastern Time Zone. My guess is that the majority of TSP accounts are in the Eastern Time Zone, but that doesn't make it right. Sure glad I'm not stationed in Hawaii because I would have to decide before 6am local time if I want to make an IFT or not.

My guess is that they limit us to make moving our money around seem less desirable.

 

[nnuut]

My guess is that they limit us to make moving our money around seem less desirable.

Yep!:nuts:

 

[DreamboatAnnie]

BINGO! Thars a perfect example of the "Nanny" state for ya! Now children, listen to me and obey! The IFT limits are for your own good! DON'T ask any questions-- we know what's best! Shush and be quiet or you will be punished! Get used to more of that folks....hummm...we will see what happens in a few more months..

My guess is that they limit us to make moving our money around seem less desirable.

 

[Tsunami]

I was wondering if there were any general rules of thumb, like if 80% of the time it is up by 1% at 1130 (EDT) if it is usually still up at closing? I doubt there are statistics on it readily available (only TSP traders would care?) but if at least we could make an "educated" guess, that might make me feel better. Maybe I will try to keep stats for a month or two... Or I could just let be will be.

This intraday chart is related to your question. I've seen this pattern a zillion times where the market tends to peak around 9:50 am eastern time, when the initial buying frenzy runs out of steam...and the low for the day is often around 2:30 pm, then it's up from there...

https://www.seasonalcharts.com/intraday_indices_dowjones.html

 

[flalaw97]

Thanks for that! Of course I am trying to correlate an 11:30 price to a closing price (wishful thinking) and that chart would indicate that, on average, prices will be higher at the end of the day than at 11:30 but it is obviously difficult to tell if it is skewed by some significant end of day runups. Thanks for sharing!

 

[PessOptimist]

Happy Friday everyone.

It was nice to have dodged another bullet today. Well no but specifically on my whopping 20% S fund. If I were more gutsy I would have more money in equities.

Reflecting on the 21+ years my TSP has existed, I read and hear stuff stating I should have $1 million+ there. Based on the max contributions allowed I suppose that is possible. If I had been a better investor.

I am willing to bet I am not the only one who has friends of second cousins of friends of spouses who make statements like that. Most never dealt with TSP trading restrictions and most have a suggestion for an investment firm I should have gone with. One that makes me chuckle a bit says I could have had a TSP while in the military if I had wanted to. I was in 72-96 so I must have missed that.

Happy Friday evening all and I deal with what I deal with and try to ignore most of it.

Just whining about stuff.

PO

 

[PessOptimist]

Thanks tom4jean for posting this link.

Elliott_Trader: Paraphrase of Ira Epstein's Rules for Trading.

After reading it I see it states it is for futures trading only. The definitions should apply in after the fact trading. I think. Those of us only in TSP for equities cannot be day traders so maybe we can be swing traders? This has been addressed before but I am too lazy to go look for it.

Obviously TSPers must make their moves before 1200EST so must boot up the Ouija board about 1100 EST in case it has updates to download. Then it is often wrong. Flipping a coin may be almost as good.

The indicators in the link are very valuable. Helps me understand what some are posting about. I looked for imbedding and unembedding a lot but nowhere did it say in simple terms Slow Stochastic over 80 or under 20 for three consecutive days. Then the definition for unembedding is ambiguous. Does one day do it?

Bottom line for me is for the very first time I understand that embedding refers to the slow stochaistic. Hard to find that explanation for dummies.

Putting 20% in the S fund has been successful so far. The goal as I stated is to continue to take annual withdrawals from TSP but to see if I can keep it at the amount it was the day I retired. Maybe I am not aiming high enough.

Thanks for everything all of you posted on the MB. It all helps.

PO