I have not been actively trading in Updown this year. I only made two trades all year long and those were back in February. Even so, I wanted to keep track of my positions and see how well they've done. My summary of performance for my portfolio versus the S&P is shown below.
My last update covered June through August 2012.
Here is my monthly performance for the entire 2012 year :
| Freeby50 | S&P 500 | diff. | |
| Jan-12 | 2.8% | 4.4% | -1.6% |
| Feb-12 | 2.4% | 4.1% | -1.7% |
| Mar-12 | 2.0% | 3.1% | -1.1% |
| Apr-12 | -0.4% | -0.8% | 0.4% |
| May-12 | -1.6% | -6.3% | 4.7% |
| Jun-12 | 3.9% | 4.0% | -0.1% |
| Jul-12 | 4.4% | 1.3% | 3.1% |
| Aug-12 | -1.3%* | 2.0% | -3.3% |
| Sep-12 | 1.1% | 2.4% | -1.3% |
| Oct-12 | -2.4% | -2.0% | -0.4% |
| Nov-12 | -1.8% | 0.3% | -2.1% |
| Dec-12 | 0.4% | 0.7% | -0.3% |
| SUM | 9.5% | 13.2% | -3.7% |
As I noted in my last update my shares of Coca-Cola (KO) are incorrect in the Updown system because UpDown did not properly credit me for a 2:1 stock split. That had a minor impact on my performance numbers from Sept. to Dec. as well. However KO is only about 4% of my holdings so it wouldn't change my overall performance too much.
I ended the year on a bad note. My portfolio underperformed the S&P 500 from August through December. I only had three months in 2012 where I beat the S&P 500 with 4.7% better in May, 3.1% more in July and barely more at 0.4% in April.
For 2012 I underperformed the S&P 500 by about 3.7%. My stocks were up around 9.5% and the S&P 500 was up 13.2%. It may not seem 'bad' to be up by 9.5% in a year. But I consider it pretty poor performance when you compare it to the S&P 500.
Conclusion?
I could spin this two ways. I could say that my portfolio was full of stocks that were poor choices as reflected by my 2012 performance below the S&P 500. Clearly I did not do well versus the index. On the other hand since I didn't do hardly any active trading during the year I could claim that the poor performance in 2012 is evidence that you really need to be actively involved in your stock trading if you expect to do well. But maybe the real conclusion is a little of both. Maybe this set of stocks in my portfolio are bad choices for a 'buy and hold' strategy. I know if I were to pick stocks with a 'buy and hold' mentality that I'd personally shoot for more blue chip stocks that are more dependable.
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