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Six Lessons For Investors 2009年 01月 13日 09:05John C. Bogle There is almost no limit to the ability of investors to ignore the lessons of the past. This cost them dearly last year. Here are six of the most important of these lessons: 1) Beware of market forecasts, even by experts. As 2008 began, strategists from Wall Street's 12 major firms forecast the end-of-the-year closing level and earnings of the Standard and Poor's 500 Stock Index. On average, the forecast was for a year-end price of 1,640 and earnings of $97. There was remarkably little disparity of opinion among these sages. Reality: the S&P closed the year at 903, with reported earnings estimated at $50. Strategists aren't always wrong. But they have been consistent, betting year after year that the market will rise, usually by about 10%. Thus, they got it about right in 2004, 2006 and 2007, but also totally missed the market declines in 2000, 2001 and 2002, and vastly underestimated the resurgence in 2003. Ignore the forecasts of inevitably bullish strategists. Bearish strategists on Wall Street's payroll don't survive for long. 2) Never underrate the importance of asset allocation. Investing is not about owning only common stocks. Nor are historical stock returns a sound guide to future returns. Virtually all investors should keep some 'dry powder' in their portfolios in the form of high-grade short- and intermediate-term bonds. Investors who failed to learn that lesson fell on especially hard times in 2008. How much in bonds? A good place to start is a bond percentage that equals your age. Although I don't slavishly adhere to that rule, my bond position accounted for about 65% of my personal portfolio in early 2000. Because returns on my bond funds since then have totaled 50% and returns on my stock funds were negative 25%, bonds are now about 75% of my portfolio, still close to my advancing age. With all the focus on historical returns that greatly favor stocks, don't ignore bonds. Consider not only the probabilities of future returns on stocks, but the consequences if you are wrong. 3) Mutual funds with superior performance records often falter. Last year was an extreme example. With the S&P 500 off 37% for the year, Legg Mason Value Trust fell by 55%. Fidelity Magellan Fund, after a good 2007, was off 49%. Funds managed by proven long-term pros felt the pain -- Dodge and Cox Stock down 43%; Third Avenue Value down 46%; CGM Focus down 48%; Clipper down 50%; Longleaf Partners down 51%. (Full disclosure: Four of Vanguard's actively-managed equity funds also lagged the market by wide margins.) Only time will tell whether the disappointing shortfalls experienced by these and other funds will be recovered in the future, whether the skills of their managers have atrophied, or whether their luck has run out. Whatever the case, chasing past performance is all too often a loser's game. Managers of funds seeking market-beating returns should make it clear to investors that they must be prepared to trail the market -- perhaps substantially -- in at least one year of every three. 4) Owning the market remains the strategy of choice. Such a strategy guarantees a return that lags the market return by a minuscule amount, and exceeds the return captured by active equity-fund managers as a group by a substantial amount. Why? Because the heavy costs incurred by investors in actively-managed equity funds can easily amount to 2% to 3% annually. Typical expense ratios run from 1% to 1.5%; the hidden costs of portfolio turnover often come to 0.5% to 1.0%; a 5% front-end sales load, amortized over a holding period of five to 10 years, adds another 0.5% to 1.0% per year in costs. As a group, investors are by definition indexers. (That is, they own the entire market.) So indexing wins, not because markets are efficient (sometimes they are, sometimes they are not), but because its all-in annual costs amount to as little as 0.1% to 0.2%. Indexing won in 2008 by an especially wide margin. Low-cost, low-turnover, no-load S&P 500 index funds outpaced nearly 70% of all equity funds, and (admittedly a fairer comparison) more than 60% of all funds focused on large-cap U.S. stocks. This continues the pattern -- with some variations -- that goes back to the start of the first index fund 33 years ago. The bond index fund did even better. Its return of 5% for 2008 outpaced more than 80% of all taxable bond funds. In sum, active management strategies as a group lose because they are expensive. Passive indexing strategies win because they are cheap. 5) Look before you leap into alternative asset classes. During 2006-2007, equity mutual funds focused on developed international markets and emerging markets provided strong relative returns to U.S. stocks. During that period, U.S. investors made net purchases of $285 billion in mutual funds investing in non-U.S. stocks, and liquidated on balance some $35 billion from funds focused on U.S. stocks. This extreme example of 'performance chasing' at its worst is hardly defensible. But, disingenuously, it was touted by fund marketers as adding 'non-correlated assets,' or 'reducing volatility risk.' In 2008 -- with non-U.S. developed market funds falling by 45% and emerging market funds tumbling by 55%, we learned once again that, just when we need it the most, international diversification lets us down. Commodities were no different. As the global recession developed, commodity funds sank, the largest such fund tumbled 50%. Always keep in mind: When the investment grass looks greener on the other side of the fence, look twice before you leap. 6) Beware of financial innovation. Why? Because most of it is designed to enrich the innovators, not investors. Just think of the multiple layers of fees to the salespersons, servicers, banks, underwriters and brokers selling mortgage-backed debt obligations. These new products (credit default swaps are another example) enriched their marketers during 2005-2007, only to impoverish the clients who held them in 2008. Our financial system is driven by a giant marketing machine in which the interests of sellers directly conflict with the interests of buyers. The sellers, having (as ever) the information advantage, nearly always win. We can't say that we haven't been warned about the perils of ignoring the past. More than 2,000 years ago, the Roman orator Cato noted that, 'there must be a vast fund of stupidity in human nature, or else men would not be caught as they are, a thousand times over, by the same snares . . . while they yet remember their past misfortunes, they go on to court and encourage the causes to what they were owing, and which will again produce them.' While the events of 2008 reinforced that message, perhaps these stern and oft-repeated lessons of experience will help investors avoid similar mistakes in 2009 and beyond. (Editor's Note: Mr. Bogle is the founder and former chief executive of the Vanguard Group of Mutual Funds. His newest book, 'Enough. True Measures of Money, Business, and Life,' was published by Wiley in November.) 投资者应吸取的六个教训 2009年 01月 13日 09:05John C. Bogle 投 资者几乎能把历史教训忘得一干二净，去年这让他们深受其害。以下列出最重要的六点教训：1. 小心对待市场预期，即使是专家的预期。2008年初，华尔街12家大型公司的策略师对标准普尔500指数年底的收盘点位和收益水平作出预期。他们平均预计，该指数年底收于1,640点，去年的每股收益为97美元。这些专业人士的见解相差无几。 而事实情况是，标准普尔500指数收于903点，每股收益估计为50美元。 策略师并非总是错的。但他们总是年 一年地预计市场将上涨，而且涨幅通常在10%左右。所以，2004、2006和2007年他们的预测基本准确，但完全没有预料到2000、2001和2002年的市场下挫，也大大低估了2003年市场的反弹力度。 别理睬那些一贯看涨的策略师的预期。看跌人士无法在华尔街长期立足。  Corbis 那么持有多少债券呢？建议投资组合中债券所占百分比与您的年龄相当。尽管我并非绝对遵守这个规定；2000年初，债券在我的个人投资组合中大约占65%；由于从那时起，我的债券投资累计盈利50%，股票投资为亏损25%，所以现在我的投资组合中债券占75%，仍然比较接近我的年龄。 在全心关注股票可观历史回报的同时，也不要忽略债券。不仅要看到股票投资将来赚钱的希望，同时也要考虑一旦判断失误的后果。 3. 历史业绩出众的共同基金经常遇挫。去年就是一个极端的例子。标准普尔500指数全年累计下跌37%，美盛 值信托基金(Legg Mason Value Trust)下跌55%。富达麦哲伦基金(Fidelity Magellan Fund) 2007年表现良好，2008年却损失49%。由专业机构管理的基金也蒙受损失：Dodge and Cox Stock跌43%；第三大道价值基金(Third Avenue Value)跌46%；CGM Focus跌48%；Clipper跌50%；长叶松合伙人基金(Longleaf Partners)下跌51%。（充分披露：先锋集团(Vanguard)旗下四只较为活跃的股票型基金也远远落后于市场表现）。 这些基金遭遇的惨痛损失能否在将来得到弥补，这些基金经理是否已经是江郎才尽，或者他们的运气是否已经不复存在，只有时间能告诉我们答案。不管怎样，追踪历史表现通常是失败者的做法。寻求战胜市场表现的基金经理应当对投资者说明，他们必须做好每三年中至少有一年的时间落后、甚至是大幅落后市场的准备。 4. 投资整个市场依然是首选策略。这种策略确保投资者的回报率仅略低于市场水平，而大大高于较为活跃的股票型基金整体回报率。原因何在？因为较为活跃的股票型基金投资者每年承担的繁重成本很容易就能达到2%-3%：管理费率通常为1%-1.5%；变换投资组合的潜在成本一般在0.5%-1.0%；5%的前端费率分摊在5-10年的持有期中；再加上每年0.5%-1.0%的其他成本。 作为一个整体，投资者就是构成指数的个体（也就是说，他们拥有整个市场）。所以指数化投资获胜并不是因为市场有效（市场有时候是有效的，但有时候没有），而是因为其每年所有成本加起来只有0.1%-0.2%。 2008年指数化投资显示出明显优势。低成本、低换手率、零佣金的标准普尔500指数基金表现超出所有股票型基金近70%，超出美国所有大型股基金（公认为一种更合理的比较对象）60%以上。这延续了33年前第一只指数基金创立时的情况，只是略有不同。债券指数基金的表现更好，2008年的收益率为5%，强于80%以上的应税债券型基金。 总的来说，积极管理策略整体失败是因为成本高昂；被动的指数化投资策略胜出则是因为成本低廉。 5. 在投资替代资产类别前要三思而行。2006-2007年，专注于发达国际市场和新兴市场的股票型共同基金收益高于美国股市。在此期间，美国投资者净买入2,850亿美元投资非美国股票的共同基金，净抛售大约350亿美元专注美国股市的基金。 这种“追逐业绩”的极端案例很难有什么值得辩护的。但基金销售人士却鼓吹称这增加了非相关性资产或降低了波动性风险。2008年，除美国以外的发达市场基金下跌45%，新兴市场基金跌去55%；这再次说明，就在我们最需要国际分散化投资的时候，它却让我们失望了。 大宗商品市场也与此类似。随着全球经济衰退不断加剧，商品类基金下挫，其中规模最大的基金下跌了50%。一定要记住：不要总是这山望着那山高，要三思而行。 6. 当心金融创新。为什么呢？因为大部分金融创新工具的设计目的在于充实创新者的腰包，而非投资者。想想需要向出售抵押贷款支持债券的销售人员、服务机构、银行、承销商和经销商支付的多层费用吧。这些新产品（例如信用违约掉期）在2005-2007年间令其销售者富裕起来，但持有这些产品的客户在2008年损失惨重。 我们的金融体系是由一个庞大的市场机器所驱动，其中卖方和买方的利益存在直接冲突。卖方仍然享有信息优势，几乎总是胜出。 可以说我们不是没有被警告过忽视历史教训的危险。两千多年前，罗马演说家加图(Cato)指出，人类本性中一定有很多愚蠢的特质，否则人们不会千百次地落入相同的圈套；虽然人们还记得过去的不幸遭遇，他们却继续追逐并鼓励那些导致其不幸的因素，而那又会带来新的不幸。 2008年的市场状况则再次证明了他的预言，也许这些多次重复的深刻教训能够帮助投资者避免2009年和以后再犯下类似的错误吧。 （编者按：Bogle是先锋集团的创始人和前任首席执行长。他的新书《知足：金钱、商业和生命的真正尺度》(Enough. True Measures of Money, Business, and Life)于2007年11月份由Wiley出版社出版。）
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