Well, that was more like a "normal" year. Not the huge gains of 2009 and not the disastrous losses of 2008. No, 2010 was much more like 2007 which I've previously referred to as the last "normal" year.
The TSX began the year at 11,746 and finished at 13,443 for a gain of 14.44%. My stuff was up 15.13%. That's always the goal, to come out ahead of the TSX. Of 251 trading days, there were 143 to the upside and 109 downers.
Even better, my trading account gained 26.55%. I made a total of 18 trades during the year, the same as 2009. In the fall it seemed like a trading frenzy as I bought and sold RIM, got out of Encana, bought BMO and RBC, captured my first ever double with the sell of Scorpio Mining, sold Lundin, bought and sold the two coal miners, ended four years of dead money by getting out of Organic Resource Management, doubled my BMO and RBC positions and finally added Cisco Systems, my first ever purchase on the Nasdaq Exchange. Whew! Seems like a lot when I put it all in the same sentence.
On the fund side, I reduced my possible downside as I took money off the table by transferring from my long held Canadian Resource Fund to a Canadian Bond Fund. I've missed some upside with that move but as I've said on these pages, there comes a time when it's you've gotta know when fold 'em. As I approach my next retirement my risk tolerance reduces. As we've learned, a drop of 25% can occur in an instant and the 33% gain required to get it back can take a very long time. I can't afford to play that game again!
I'm still holding the large cap Canadian Endeavor Fund but will similarly convert it on the first sign of weakness. The most pleasant surprise was that those lame Seg Funds recovered with a gain of 14.87%. After dropping 38% within months of buying them at the mid 2008 high, I figured the only way I'd ever recover would be to hold for 15 year guarantee period. Now, I can see a way out by the time I'm clear of those damn Deferred Sales Charges...about six or seven years.
2010 was my second year with TPCI. I'm always interested in reader feedback. I heard from a number readers after the May post Who Should(n't) Be In Funds? As I suggested in the post, nobody I heard from had ever had finance guy contact them about an exit strategy based on their age or approaching retirement. Pretty much everyone I heard from recognized themselves in the July post Why we fell in love with funds. Do we still love finance guy today? A week later I wrote A Little More About The Last (Next) Ten Years as I wondered if we will ever again return of the heady days of the eighties and nineties.
All in all, I enjoyed a decent year with my investments and had some fun along the way blogging on TPCI.
Happy New Year and Good Luck To All!
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