Trading the 401(k)

There are plenty of reasons NOT to do this, but I would expect that many personal finance bloggers do so to some degree. Definitely not all, but the number is surely non-zero. Even respected professionals such as Teresa Lo advise against it for most people. However, the opportunity is just too good to pass up. This is the first of potentially many instances in which I plan to do this over the coming years.

To start, due to the almost 20% bounce off recent market lows, my 401(k) is has gained slightly over $5000 in value. Not a huge amount, true, but hardly non-trivial. So it seemed like a good time to lock in some of these gains. I am a believe that we have not seem the bottom of this bear market, and this is simply a violent bear market rally. As well, the numbers I've seen in my 401(k) strongly suggest that to me.

I started by rebalancing completely out of my employer's equity fund. I have been greatly disturbed that my employer pays 401(k) contributions as equity. I already draw my paycheck from this company. Being doubly long by holding such a significant amount of equity (about 6.37% of the total value of the account) on top of my income is a worrisome state. Thankfully, I was able to sell all of my current holdings, which are up 10.7% since the last time I updated my asset allocation spreadsheet. Future contributions will still be made in stock, but this I can't stop so there's no sense in worrying about it.

Next, I liquidated all holdings, both equity and fixed income. With the exception of the bond funds, all of the holdings are up double digits in the last few weeks. (I last updated my spreadsheet earlier this month.) I think a decline is imminent across most equity markets worldwide, and I want to accumulate as much dry powder as possible for future deployment. Hopefully, I will lock in significant gains and more importantly, avoid the downside after this rally fizzles out.

For the record, the holdings in my 401(k) were up as follows: US small cap equities up 16.66%; emerging market equities up 13.06%; international mid-cap equities up 12.38%; US large cap equities up 15.39%; US large cap equity index up 14.85%; international large cap equity index up 16.57%; US real estate up 20.27%.

Anyway, we'll see how this works out. I don't anticipate significant upside movement on any of my holdings, and if I'm able to avoid the next leg down, then I'll have the resources to acquire even larger blocks of shares on the way back up. Mind you, I think it will be a long way back up, several years in the making, but I'd like to take a value investing approach to this, while exercising some downside risk mitigation.

Wish me luck!